Church of the Holy Sepulchre

The Knights and Ladies of the Holy Sepulchre walk in a procession at the First Annual Southeastern Eucharistic Congress in Charlotte, NC.

Origin

Pilgrimages to the Holy Land were a common if dangerous practice from shortly after the crucifixion of Jesus to throughout the Middle Ages. Numerous detailed commentaries have survived as evidence of this early Christian devotional. While there were many places the pious visited during their travels, the one most cherished was the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, first constructed by Constantine the Great in the fourth century AD. A local tradition, begun long before the Crusades, provided for the bestowing of knighthood upon qualified men whose presence, character and devotion were deemed worthy of enoblement by those entrusted to the care of the church. Later, this duty was assumed by the Kings of Jerusalem, then the Canons of the Holy Sepulchre, and today it falls upon the Patriarch of Jerusalem.

By the eleventh century, however, political and military events had led to a suppression of this activity by Muslim rulers, in addition to persecution of local Christians and destruction of some of the sites themselves.

As it was for the deliverance of the Holy Sepulchre that the First Crusade was organized, so for its defence were certain military orders instituted. While not one of the original surviving Orders given a charter by Papal decree, the practice of bestowing knighthood at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre nevertheless became part of this mediaeval military movement toward reinstating a Christian presence in the Holy Land.

In 1099, Godfrey of Bouillon took no other title than that of "Advocate of the Holy Sepulchre", and other Latin princes, Bohemond I of Antioch and Tancred, Prince of Galilee, bound themselves as vassals of the Holy Sepulchre as they would to a king. The ultimate fall of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem to the Muslims in 1291 did not suspend pilgrimages to the Tomb of Christ, or the custom of receiving knighthood there, and when the custody of the Holy Land was entrusted to the Franciscan Order, they continued this pious custom and gave the order its first Grand Master after the death of the last King of Jerusalem. The kings had reserved that dignity to themselves previously.