The Knights TemplarsAddison, C. G. (Charles Greenstreet)
History
The Knights Templars
Addison, C. G. (Charles Greenstreet)
Templars
There are but few remains of the ancient Knights Templars now existing
in the Temple beyond the CHURCH. The present Inner Temple Hall was
the ancient HALL OF THE KNIGHTS, but it has at different periods
been so altered and repaired as to have lost almost every trace and
vestige of antiquity. In the year 1816 it was nearly rebuilt, and the
following extract from “The Report and Observations of the Treasurer
on the late Repairs of the Inner Temple Hall,” may prove interesting,
as showing the state of the edifice previous to that period. “From
the proportions, the state of decay, the materials of the eastern and
southern walls, the buttresses of the southern front, the pointed
form of the roof and arches, and the rude sculpture on the two doors
of public entrance, the hall is evidently of very great antiquity....
The northern wall appears to have been rebuilt, except at its two
extremities, in modern times, but on the old foundations.... The roof
was found to be in a very decayed and precarious state. It appeared to
have undergone reparation at three separate periods of time, at each of
which timber had been unnecessarily added, so as finally to accumulate
a weight which had protruded the northern and southern walls. It
became, therefore, indispensable to remove all the timber of the roof,
and to replace it in a lighter form. On removing the old wainscoting
of the western wall, a perpendicular crack of considerable height and
width was discovered, which threatened at any moment the fall of that
extremity of the building with its superincumbent roof.... The turret
of the clock and the southern front of the hall are only cased with
stone; this was done in the year 1741, and very ill executed. The
structure of the turret, composed of chalk, ragstone, and rubble, (the
same material as the walls of the church,) seems to be very ancient....
The wooden cupola of the bell was so decayed as to let in the rain, and
was obliged to be renewed in a form to agree with the other parts of
the southern front.”
“Notwithstanding the Gothic character of the building, in the year
1680, during the treasurership of Sir Thomas Robinson, prothonotary of
C. B., a Grecian screen of the Doric order was erected, surmounted by
lions’ heads, cones, and other incongruous devices. In the year 1741,
during the treasurership of John Blencowe, esq., low windows of Roman
architecture were formed in the southern front. The dates of such
innovations appear from inscriptions with the respective treasurers’
names.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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