Cressing Temple is a medieval site situated between

Witham Witham () is a town and civil parish in the Braintree district, in the county of Essex, England. In the 2011 census, it had a population of 25,353. It is twinned with the town of Waldbröl, Germany. Witham stands on the Roman road between the ...

and Braintree in

Essex Essex ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East of England, and one of the home counties. It is bordered by Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, the North Sea to the east, Kent across the Thames Estuary to the ...

, close to the villages of

Cressing Cressing is a village and civil parish in the Braintree district of Essex, England. Within the parish is the village of Tye Green and the hamlet of Hawbush Green. Cressing Temple is south from Cressing village, and less than 1 mile east fro ...

and

White Notley White Notley is a parish in Essex, England. The settlement (which includes the outlying hamlet of The Green) lies equidistant between the towns of Witham and Braintree, Essex, Braintree amongst arable farmland, in each direction. White Notley i ...

. It was amongst the very earliest and largest of the possessions of the

Knights Templar The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon, mainly known as the Knights Templar, was a Military order (religious society), military order of the Catholic Church, Catholic faith, and one of the most important military ord ...

in England,http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=39854&strquery=cressing temple Retrieved 9 October 2014 and is currently open to the public as a visitor attraction. The site has protection as an

ancient monument An ancient monument can refer to any early or historical manmade structure or architecture. Certain ancient monuments are of cultural importance for nations and become symbols of international recognition, including the Baalbek, ruins of Baalbek ...

. The Knights Templar built two barns which are preserved as

Grade I listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

buildings; one of these medieval barns is claimed to be the oldest standing

timber-framed Timber framing () and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy Beam (structure), timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and Woodworking joints, joined timbers with joints secure ...

barn in the world.Bettley, James, and Nikolaus Pevsner. Essex: The Buildings of England. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2007. 313.

The Knights Templar Preceptory of Cressing

The manor of Cressing was granted to the Knights Templar in 1136 by Matilda of Boulogne, the wife of King Stephen. It is close to the main road between

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

and

Colchester Colchester ( ) is a city in northeastern Essex, England. It is the second-largest settlement in the county, with a population of 130,245 at the 2021 United Kingdom census, 2021 Census. The demonym is ''Colcestrian''. Colchester occupies the ...

and the road between Witham and Braintree.Haag, Michael (2014) The Tragedy of the Templars. Published by Profile Books Limited () The Preceptory of Cressing was therefore one of the very earliest Templar estates in England, It received further grants soon after its founding in the form of property at

sometime between 1138 and 1148, and was placed first in a detailed list of Templar holdings in 1185. It was the largest of their estates in Essex. Later, King John confirmed to the Templars at Cressing the land of Berecholt on 14 July 1199, and the land of Newland on 8 June 1214, as well as a market on Thursdays and a three-day-long fair at the feast of the Decollation of St. John the Baptist at the new town of Wulnesforde in the parish of Witham. Later, sometime before his death in 1255, the Templar Peter de Rossa granted over 100 acres of the manor of Rivenhall to Cressing, a parish in which he was parson and lord. The original 1400-acre site was a considerable agricultural enterprise, and was led by a Templar

Preceptor A preceptor (from Latin, "''praecepto''") is a teacher responsible for upholding a ''precept'', meaning a certain law or tradition. Buddhist monastic orders Senior Buddhist monks can become the preceptors for newly ordained monks. In the Buddhi ...

, accompanied by two or three knights or sergeants, together with a chaplain, a bailiff and numerous household servants overseeing around 160 tenant farmers. The manor had a mansion house, bakehouse, brewery, dairy, granary, smithy, gardens, a

dovecote A dovecote or dovecot , doocot (Scots Language, Scots) or columbarium is a structure intended to house Domestic pigeon, pigeons or doves. Dovecotes may be free-standing structures in a variety of shapes, or built into the end of a house or b ...

, a watermill, and a windmill, with a chapel and associated cemetery dedicated to

St Mary Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under various titles such as virgin or queen, many of them mentioned in the Litany of Loreto. ...

. The proceeds from the Cressing Temple were all sent to fund Templar activities in the

Crusader states The Crusader states, or Outremer, were four Catholic polities established in the Levant region and southeastern Anatolia from 1098 to 1291. Following the principles of feudalism, the foundation for these polities was laid by the First Crusade ...

in the Middle East. During the reign of

King Edward II Edward II (25 April 1284 – 21 September 1327), also known as Edward of Caernarfon or Caernarvon, was King of England from 1307 until he was deposed in January 1327. The fourth son of Edward I, Edward became the heir to the throne follo ...

the Templar order was suppressed in England.

The Knights Hospitaller and Cressing

In line with papal guidance, the Templar estate at Cressing was handed over to the Order of the

Knights Hospitaller The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), is a Catholic military order. It was founded in the crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem in the 12th century and had headquarters there ...

in 1309, who preserved the Templar documents and charters of Cressing amongst their own records. The manor, controlled by a

prior The term prior may refer to: * Prior (ecclesiastical), the head of a priory (monastery) * Prior convictions, the life history and previous convictions of a suspect or defendant in a criminal case * Prior probability, in Bayesian statistics * Prio ...

of the Knights Hospitaller, continued to work as a large estate. It was targeted in 1381 during the

Peasants' Revolt The Peasants' Revolt, also named Wat Tyler's Rebellion or the Great Rising, was a major uprising across large parts of England in 1381. The revolt had various causes, including the socio-economic and political tensions generated by the Black ...

, when on Monday 10 June a large group of rebels attacked Cressing and carried away armour, vestments, gold and silver, and other goods to the value of £20 belonging to the Hospitallers, and burned books to the value of 20 marks. In

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, almost all the property of the Knights Hospitaller was confiscated by King

Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is known for his Wives of Henry VIII, six marriages and his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. ...

. Cressing was confiscated in 1540, soon after the last monasteries, and on 8 July 1541, King Henry VIII granted the manor and lordship of Cressing and the half-hundred of Witham to Sir William Huse and John Smyth, one of the barons of the Exchequer. John Smyth's family held the manor until 1657.Strachan, David (1998). Essex from the Air: Archaeology and history from aerial photographs. Published by Essex County Council Planning Dept. () Following the

Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major Theology, theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the p ...

, in the late sixteenth century there was a mansion on the site, now called the 'Great House', but it was demolished in the eighteenth century and only the farmhouse, granary, wagon lodge and stable yards remain. The mid-sixteenth century Tudor brick garden also stands and has been developed by

Essex County Council Essex County Council is the county council that governs the non-metropolitan county of Essex in England. The non-metropolitan county is smaller than the ceremonial county; the non-metropolitan county excludes Southend-on-Sea and Thurrock which ...

who acquired the barns for the people of Essex in 1987. The farmhouse dates from 1618, and the coach house from 1800. Extensive archaeological investigations were carried out as part of a programme of improvements and updates in the 1990s.

Cressing Temple Barns

Cressing Temple is the site of two Grade I-listed timber-framed buildings (the thirteenth-century ''Barley Barn'' and ''Wheat Barn'', described by historian Michael Haag as "the two finest Templar-built barns in Europe") and the later Grade II-listed ''Granary'' building. Today these are open to the public along with Tudor gardens. The Barley Barn (

English Heritage English Heritage (officially the English Heritage Trust) is a charity that manages over 400 historic monuments, buildings and places. These include prehistoric sites, a battlefield, medieval castles, Roman forts, historic industrial sites, Lis ...

listing 1123865) is an early thirteenth century (c. 1220) barn modified in later centuries, and is the oldest standing timber-framed barn in the world. The roof was originally tiled, and would have weighed close to 70 tonnes. The Barley Barn Roof Structure

The Wheat Barn (English Heritage listing 1123866) was built in around 1280, and was altered in the early 1500s and 1700s. The Granary (English Heritage listing 1123867), built sometime just after 1575, is the largest granary in Essex.

Tudor Gardens

A walled garden has been reconstructed as a Tudor garden open to the public.

Notes

External links

Official website

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