Secret Societies: Inside the World's Most Notorious Organizations by John Lawrence Reynolds
Authors: John Lawrence Reynolds
Tags: History, Non-Fiction
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kept their lineage a secret from others, even while recording it among themselves so that members could recognize the holiness of their ancestry and employ it to achieve greatness of one kind or another.
Soon after, Rhaede began a long decline from its status as a major center. After being devastated during battles with Spain, its inhabitants suffered terribly during the plague years. Repeated sacking and burning by Catalan bandits persuaded the remaining residents to abandon the city entirely. Most fled inland, while a hardy few remained, rebuilding their community as a village named Rennes-le-Chateau.
Meanwhile, a monastic order was founded in Jerusalem. Known as Our Lady of Mount Zion, the order later transferred its headquarters to St. Leonard d'Acre in Palestine, and later still relocated in Sicily. It operated there for some time before being absorbed by the Jesuits in 1617, its history easily confirmed through authentic Church records. Everything we know about it appears to verify that this Priory of Sion functioned like dozens of similar facilities of its time. As a center for meditation and salvation, it interacted with the community around it, playing the usual feudal/medieval role of social hub, inspirational retreat and cultural resource. Nothing suggests that it seethed with conspirators, harbored Templars plotting revenge against the Church, or served as a genealogical resource for latter-day Merovingians. Its only role in history has been to provide a name for a society that claims 2000 years of threatened yet influential existence.
The next chapter of the tale begins in 1885 when a Catholic priest named Francois Berenger Saunière is dispatched to the parish surrounding the village of Rennes-le-Chateau. Over 1000 years had passed since the wedding of Dagobert and Giselle that bound the Visigoth kingdom and the Merovingian blood line. The old strategic city of Rhaede that had been the site of that marriage was now a backwater village housing barely 200 residents.
6 Alert readers of The Da Vinci Code will recognize that the book's author employed this name to identify the mysterious individual whose death, at the beginning of the book, sets the novel's plot in motion.
Saunière 6 is an interesting historical figure, made more interesting by his involvement in perhaps the most compellingsecret society legend of our time. Well educated and ambitious, the handsome Saunière could only have been disappointed, if not crushed, upon arriving at his new posting. Located about forty kilometers from Carcassonne in the shadows of the Pyrenees, Rennes-le-Chateau might as well have been on the moon as far as a priest with high aspirations was concerned. At thirty-three years of age, Saunière probably saw the assignment as the end of the road, if not the end of his dreams.
Francois Berenger Saunière. Keeper of the Holy Grail or ecclesiastical swindler?
To make things worse, Saunière inherited not a parish church but a pitiful ruin. Much of the chapel roof was missing, permitting rain to pour directly onto the altar. The windows were covered not with stained glass but with rough boards, the presbytery was virtually uninhabitable, no housekeeper had been assigned to him, and his monthly salary of 75 francs was barely enough to buy bread for his table. The only thing more surprising than the state of Saunière's church was his decision to remain.
At least part of this decision may have been inspired by carnal rather than ecclesiastical notions. While priests were permitted to recruit women as housekeepers, the Church suggested that thirty years or more separate their ages, indicating that Saunière's live-in housekeeper should be in her sixties. But Saunière swung the age compass in the other direction, and soon sixteen-year-old Marie Denarnaud began sharing the rundown presbytery with him. Over time, it became accepted that the couple shared both the building and its bed, a situation that the community and
Soon after, Rhaede began a long decline from its status as a major center. After being devastated during battles with Spain, its inhabitants suffered terribly during the plague years. Repeated sacking and burning by Catalan bandits persuaded the remaining residents to abandon the city entirely. Most fled inland, while a hardy few remained, rebuilding their community as a village named Rennes-le-Chateau.
Meanwhile, a monastic order was founded in Jerusalem. Known as Our Lady of Mount Zion, the order later transferred its headquarters to St. Leonard d'Acre in Palestine, and later still relocated in Sicily. It operated there for some time before being absorbed by the Jesuits in 1617, its history easily confirmed through authentic Church records. Everything we know about it appears to verify that this Priory of Sion functioned like dozens of similar facilities of its time. As a center for meditation and salvation, it interacted with the community around it, playing the usual feudal/medieval role of social hub, inspirational retreat and cultural resource. Nothing suggests that it seethed with conspirators, harbored Templars plotting revenge against the Church, or served as a genealogical resource for latter-day Merovingians. Its only role in history has been to provide a name for a society that claims 2000 years of threatened yet influential existence.
The next chapter of the tale begins in 1885 when a Catholic priest named Francois Berenger Saunière is dispatched to the parish surrounding the village of Rennes-le-Chateau. Over 1000 years had passed since the wedding of Dagobert and Giselle that bound the Visigoth kingdom and the Merovingian blood line. The old strategic city of Rhaede that had been the site of that marriage was now a backwater village housing barely 200 residents.
6 Alert readers of The Da Vinci Code will recognize that the book's author employed this name to identify the mysterious individual whose death, at the beginning of the book, sets the novel's plot in motion.
Saunière 6 is an interesting historical figure, made more interesting by his involvement in perhaps the most compellingsecret society legend of our time. Well educated and ambitious, the handsome Saunière could only have been disappointed, if not crushed, upon arriving at his new posting. Located about forty kilometers from Carcassonne in the shadows of the Pyrenees, Rennes-le-Chateau might as well have been on the moon as far as a priest with high aspirations was concerned. At thirty-three years of age, Saunière probably saw the assignment as the end of the road, if not the end of his dreams.
Francois Berenger Saunière. Keeper of the Holy Grail or ecclesiastical swindler?
To make things worse, Saunière inherited not a parish church but a pitiful ruin. Much of the chapel roof was missing, permitting rain to pour directly onto the altar. The windows were covered not with stained glass but with rough boards, the presbytery was virtually uninhabitable, no housekeeper had been assigned to him, and his monthly salary of 75 francs was barely enough to buy bread for his table. The only thing more surprising than the state of Saunière's church was his decision to remain.
At least part of this decision may have been inspired by carnal rather than ecclesiastical notions. While priests were permitted to recruit women as housekeepers, the Church suggested that thirty years or more separate their ages, indicating that Saunière's live-in housekeeper should be in her sixties. But Saunière swung the age compass in the other direction, and soon sixteen-year-old Marie Denarnaud began sharing the rundown presbytery with him. Over time, it became accepted that the couple shared both the building and its bed, a situation that the community and
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