A Brief History of the Temple

The Temple is an oasis in the City of London which lawyers have used as their work place for over 5 centuries. The story of the Temple is linked with the history of the Templars, an Ecclesiastical and Military Order set up in the 12th Century to defend the pilgrims from the Turks on their way to Jerusalem. The Templars established themselves in the precinct of the Inner and Middle Temple with the acquisition of a plot of land where they built the “ New Temple”, the present Temple Church. In the 14th Century the Order of the Templars was abolished by King Edward II and the Temple Church, as it had become too powerful and a threat to the Civil and Ecclesiastical Authority. With the consent of the Pope, the King gave the surrounding land to the Order of the Knights Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem, which was a secular order. Around 1340 the Order leased all the areas to lawyers who then formed two separate Societies, The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple and The Honourable Society of The Middle Temple. Both these Societies together with Grays Inn and Lincoln’s Inn were originally delegated by the Judges “to licence” or as we say “to call” their members, who had duly qualified for the rank of ‘Barrister at Law’.