The speculative nonfiction book The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail (1982) presented the following myths as facts… There is a secret society known as the Priory of Sion, which has a long history starting in 1099, and had illustrious Grand Masters including Leonardo da Vinci and Isaac Newton; it created the Knights Templar as its military arm and financial branch; and it is devoted to installing the Merovingian dynasty, that ruled the Franks from 457 to 751, on the thrones of France and the rest of Europe. The notional version of the Priory of Sion first referred to during the 1960s was supposedly led by a “Nautonnier”, an Old French word for a navigator, which means Grand Master in their internal esoteric nomenclature. The following list of Grand Masters is derived from the Dossiers Secrets d’Henri Lobineau compiled by Pierre Plantard under the nom de plume of “Philippe Toscan du Plantier” in 1967. All those named on this list had died before that date. All but two are also found on lists of alleged “Imperators” (supreme heads) and “distinguished members” of the Ancient Mystical Order Rosae Crucis that circulated in France at the time when Plantard was in touch with this Rosicrucian Order. Most of those named share the common thread of being known for having an interest in the occult or heresy. The Dossiers Secrets asserted that the Priory of Sion and the Knights Templar always shared the same Grand Master until a schism occurred during the “Cutting of the elm” incident in 1188. In fact, the Prieuré de Sion, translated as Priory of Sion, was a fraternal organization founded in France in 1956 by Pierre Plantard in his failed attempt to create a prestigious neo-chivalric order. In the 1960s, Plantard began claiming that his self-styled order was the latest front for a secret society founded by crusading knight Godfrey of Bouillon, on Mount Zion in the Kingdom of Jerusalem in 1099, under the guise of the historical monastic order of the Abbey of Our Lady of Mount Zion. As a framework for his grandiose assertion of being both the Great Monarch prophesied by Nostradamus and a Merovingian pretender, Plantard further claimed the Priory of Sion was engaged in a centuries-long benevolent conspiracy to install a secret bloodline of the Merovingian dynasty on the thrones of France and the rest of Europe. After attracting varying degrees of public attention from the late 1960s to the 1980s, the mythical history of the Priory of Sion was exposed as a ludibrium — an elaborate hoax in the form of an esoteric puzzle — created by Plantard as part of his unsuccessful stratagem to become a respected, influential and wealthy player in French esotericist and monarchist circles. Pieces of evidence presented in support of the historical existence and activities of the Priory of Sion before 1956, such as the so-called Dossiers Secrets d’Henri Lobineau, were discovered to have been forged and then planted in various locations around France by Plantard and his accomplices. Despite the “Priory of Sion mysteries” having been exhaustively debunked by journalists and scholars as France’s greatest 20th-century literary hoax, many conspiracy theorists still persist in believing that the Priory of Sion was a millennium-old cabal concealing a religiously subversive secret. The fraternal organization was founded in the town of Annemasse, Haute-Savoie, in eastern France in 1956. The 1901 French law of Associations required that the Priory of Sion be registered with the government; although the statutes and the registration documents are dated 7 May 1956, the registration took place at the subprefecture of Saint-Julien-en-Genevois on 25 June 1956 and recorded in the Journal Officiel de la République Française on 20 July 1956. The Headquarters of the Priory of Sion and its journal Circuit were based in the apartment of Plantard, in a social housing block known as Sous-Cassan newly constructed in 1956. The founders and signatories inscribed with their real names and aliases were Pierre Plantard, also known as “Chyren”, and André Bonhomme, also known as “Stanis Bellas”. Bonhomme was the President while Plantard was the Secretary General. The registration documents also included the names of Jean Deleaval as the Vice-President and Armand Defago as the Treasurer. A later document, Le Cercle d’Ulysse, identifies François Ducaud-Bourget, a prominent Traditionalist Catholic priest who Plantard had worked for as a sexton during World War II, as the Grand Master following Cocteau’s death. Plantard himself is later identified as the next Grand Master.
First Appearance Journal Officiel de la République Française (20 July 1956)
First Publisher ○
Appearance List Les Templiers sont parmi nous; ou, L’énigme de Gisors (1962) by Gérard de Sède; Dossiers secrets (1967) by “Henri Lobineau”; L’Or de Rennes (1967) by Gérard de Sède; Chronicle: The Lost Treasure of Jerusalem? (TV, 1972) by Henry Lincoln (writer); Chronicle: The Shadow of the Templars (TV, 1979) by Henry Lincoln (presenter/writer); The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail (1982) by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, & Henry Lincoln; The Messianic Legacy (1986) by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, & Henry Lincoln; Foucault’s Pendulum (1988; English trans. 1989 by William Weaver) by Umberto Eco.
Description The speculative nonfiction book The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail (1982) presented the following myths as facts… There is a secret society known as the Priory of Sion, which has a long history starting in 1099, and had illustrious Grand Masters including Leonardo da Vinci and Isaac Newton; it created the Knights Templar as its military arm and financial branch; and it is devoted to installing the Merovingian dynasty, that ruled the Franks from 457 to 751, on the thrones of France and the rest of Europe. The notional version of the Priory of Sion first referred to during the 1960s was supposedly led by a “Nautonnier”, an Old French word for a navigator, which means Grand Master in their internal esoteric nomenclature. The following list of Grand Masters is derived from the Dossiers Secrets d’Henri Lobineau compiled by Pierre Plantard under the nom de plume of “Philippe Toscan du Plantier” in 1967. All those named on this list had died before that date. All but two are also found on lists of alleged “Imperators” (supreme heads) and “distinguished members” of the Ancient Mystical Order Rosae Crucis that circulated in France at the time when Plantard was in touch with this Rosicrucian Order. Most of those named share the common thread of being known for having an interest in the occult or heresy. The Dossiers Secrets asserted that the Priory of Sion and the Knights Templar always shared the same Grand Master until a schism occurred during the “Cutting of the elm” incident in 1188. In fact, the Prieuré de Sion, translated as Priory of Sion, was a fraternal organization founded in France in 1956 by Pierre Plantard in his failed attempt to create a prestigious neo-chivalric order. In the 1960s, Plantard began claiming that his self-styled order was the latest front for a secret society founded by crusading knight Godfrey of Bouillon, on Mount Zion in the Kingdom of Jerusalem in 1099, under the guise of the historical monastic order of the Abbey of Our Lady of Mount Zion. As a framework for his grandiose assertion of being both the Great Monarch prophesied by Nostradamus and a Merovingian pretender, Plantard further claimed the Priory of Sion was engaged in a centuries-long benevolent conspiracy to install a secret bloodline of the Merovingian dynasty on the thrones of France and the rest of Europe. After attracting varying degrees of public attention from the late 1960s to the 1980s, the mythical history of the Priory of Sion was exposed as a ludibrium — an elaborate hoax in the form of an esoteric puzzle — created by Plantard as part of his unsuccessful stratagem to become a respected, influential and wealthy player in French esotericist and monarchist circles. Pieces of evidence presented in support of the historical existence and activities of the Priory of Sion before 1956, such as the so-called Dossiers Secrets d’Henri Lobineau, were discovered to have been forged and then planted in various locations around France by Plantard and his accomplices. Despite the “Priory of Sion mysteries” having been exhaustively debunked by journalists and scholars as France’s greatest 20th-century literary hoax, many conspiracy theorists still persist in believing that the Priory of Sion was a millennium-old cabal concealing a religiously subversive secret. The fraternal organization was founded in the town of Annemasse, Haute-Savoie, in eastern France in 1956. The 1901 French law of Associations required that the Priory of Sion be registered with the government; although the statutes and the registration documents are dated 7 May 1956, the registration took place at the subprefecture of Saint-Julien-en-Genevois on 25 June 1956 and recorded in the Journal Officiel de la République Française on 20 July 1956. The Headquarters of the Priory of Sion and its journal Circuit were based in the apartment of Plantard, in a social housing block known as Sous-Cassan newly constructed in 1956. The founders and signatories inscribed with their real names and aliases were Pierre Plantard, also known as “Chyren”, and André Bonhomme, also known as “Stanis Bellas”. Bonhomme was the President while Plantard was the Secretary General. The registration documents also included the names of Jean Deleaval as the Vice-President and Armand Defago as the Treasurer. A later document, Le Cercle d’Ulysse, identifies François Ducaud-Bourget, a prominent Traditionalist Catholic priest who Plantard had worked for as a sexton during World War II, as the Grand Master following Cocteau’s death. Plantard himself is later identified as the next Grand Master.
