The Templars are perhaps Europe’s oldest mystery. This is their Secret History.Nine hundred years after their foundation as the first military Order of the Church …and seven centuries since they were falsely accused by the French King Phillip IV of heresy, most people even now in the western world, know something about “the Templars.” Their heroic story as men of action – for nearly two centuries, self-sacrificial soldiers fighting both the Saracens in the Holy Land and the Moors in Spain and Portugal - the aura of mystery that surrounded them, has long fascinated western readers. In 1307, a time of widespread corruption in church and state, a surprise dawn raid on the Templars whose HQ and leaders were in Paris, was instigated by the greedy King of France who controlled the then Pope, accusing them of heresy. Five years later, the Order was terminated after the torture and imprisonment of those Templars handed by the King to the Dominican–led Holy Inquisition, mostly in France. This was not for the bogus confessions of ‘heresy.’ The Church Council, having examined the evidence, dramatically rejected that charge. Fearful of an acquittal, the Pope fell back on claiming the unanswerable excuse of ‘administrative reasons.’ The Order officially was no more. But since the money, the ships, the banking and trading operations, outside France remained intact, and thousands of Templars who had not been in France either were never arrested, or found innocent and released, what happened next? The Templars, being Europe’s military elite, had no intention of being destroyed in this way. They reorganised and from this time continued in secret.This Secret History follows their story. For nearly two centuries, before the purge, they were more than just a military organisation. Self- financing and supplying their standing armies and garrisons throughout, so as to remain independent of Kings, they became international traders and merchants involved with the Hanseatic League and others. They had a 17 ship merchant fleet in the Atlantic based at their own port of La Rochelle; with unknown numbers, both merchant and military vessels out of several ports in the Mediterranean. Their operational range for ‘the pilgrim trade’ was all around today’s Europe from the West of Ireland, the Baltic and Scandinavia, to Cilicia, in South-Eastern Turkey, becoming in the process, Europe’s first international bankers. Clive Lindley, world traveller and an avid student of the Templar Order for 40 years, has set out “Templar Knights their Secret History”. The first two books in the series, ‘End of an Epoch’ 1307 to 1314; and ‘Birth of a Nation 1315’ – are combined here within one set of covers. Book One: ‘End of an Epoch,’ includes the role played by our surviving Templars in the great battle of Bannockburn, where as refugees from the Inquisition, they fight for the Scottish King, Robert the Bruce against a massive English invasion. The outcome of this famous battle was to establish Scottish independence from England. The story tells of the Templar plans to find a permanent safe refuge; also of the deaths of the Pope and then the French King.Book Two: ‘Birth of a Nation’ has the Templars, calling themselves ‘the Fraternity,’ sending the now seasoned Sir Paul with a Templar military force to help the Swiss Foresters in their fight for independence from Austria. This culminates in the pivotal Battle of Morgarten, November 1315, one year after Bannockburn and exactly 7 centuries ago, as we publish. The book also explains the long sought connection between the Templars and the leaders of the original craft guild of master stonemasons, the architects that built the great Gothic Cathedrals and how this combination over the centuries evolved into the Masonic movement.