Following in the Footsteps of the Knights Templar in France: Hidden Sites, Secrets and Debunking the Myths

We all know I’m obsessed with history, and France is jam-packed with it. But nothing fascinates me quite like the Knights Templar. They were founded in 1119 by a French knight named Hugh de Payens, who gathered eight companions with a single mission: protect Christian pilgrims traveling to Jerusalem. 

Within two centuries, they had built the most powerful military order the medieval world had ever seen, with commanderies across Europe, their own banking system, and enough wealth to make kings very nervous.

That last part turned out to be their downfall. On Friday, October 13, 1307, King Philip IV had every Knights Templar in France arrested simultaneously, tortured into confessions, and stripped of their assets. Philip was deep in debt to the order and had zero intention of repaying it.

7 Knights Templar Sites to Visit in France

France is scattered with the physical evidence of everything they built and everything they lost. Here are seven sites worth tracking down.

La Rochelle: The Port Where the Mystery Begins

La Rochelle had been the Templars’ most important Atlantic base long before Eleanor of Aquitaine gave them mills and exempted them from duties in her 1139 charter. From this port, they ran trade between England and the Mediterranean, and they stationed their main fleet here.

When Philip issued his arrest order in October 1307, something happened at this harbor that historians still argue about. A witness named Jean de Chalon later testified that a senior Templar officer had fled France with 50 horses and 18 ships loaded with the order’s treasury. No one knows where those ships went. Scotland, Cyprus, and the bottom of the English Channel have all been suggested at various points.

La Rochelle’s three medieval harbor towers, the Tour Saint-Nicolas, the Tour de la Chaîne, and the Tour de la Lanterne, all date from the 14th and 15th centuries and still guard the entrance to the old port today. Walk the harbor at dusk, and it is not hard to understand why the Templars considered it worth protecting.

Château de Chinon: Where the Grand Master Was Broken

Chinon is better known for Joan of Arc, but the castle has a darker chapter. In June 1308, Jacques de Molay, the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, was locked up in the Tour du Coudray. Between August 17 and 20 of that year, papal cardinals traveled to the fortress to collect his testimony and that of other Templar leaders.

The document they produced, known as the Chinon Parchment, was lost in the Vatican archives for nearly 700 years. When historian Barbara Frale found it in 2001, it revealed that Pope Clement V had actually absolved the Templar leaders of heresy in 1308, completely contradicting the official story that had condemned them. It made no difference to their fate.

De Molay was eventually transferred to Paris and burned at the stake on March 18, 1314. According to legend, he cursed both Philip IV and Clement V from the flames, summoning them to answer before God within a year. Both men were dead before the year was out.

You can visit the Tour du Coudray today. The vaulted chambers where the Templars were held still exist, and Templar graffiti carved into the stone walls during their imprisonment is still visible.

Commanderie d’Arville: The Best Preserved Commandery in France

The Templars arrived in Arville around 1128, when the Lord of Mondoubleau donated land to the order. What they built here became one of their most important operational bases in France, serving as a recruitment center, a military training ground, and a working farm that helped finance the Crusades.

The remarkable thing about Arville is how much survived. The 12th-century church, the tithe barn, the pigeon house, the bakehouse, and the stables from the 15th and 16th centuries are all still standing. Walking the site gives you a genuine sense of what daily life looked like for knights preparing to leave for the Holy Land.

After the order was dissolved, the property passed to the Knights Hospitaller, then to farmers during the French Revolution. A group of local municipalities bought the various buildings in 1983 and spent years restoring them. An interpretation center dedicated to the Templars and the Crusades opened in 1999, with audio guides available in English.

La Couvertoirade: A Templar Village Frozen in Time

The Templars built their first structures here in the 12th century, choosing this position on the limestone Larzac plateau for strategic reasons. They needed to control the road between the Mediterranean ports and the interior of France, and they needed farmland to supply their operations in the Holy Land. Horses, sheep, and grain were all produced here at scale.

When the order was dissolved in 1312, everything passed to the Knights Hospitaller, who expanded the fortifications during the Hundred Years’ War. The town walls you see today, built between 1439 and 1445, are largely intact. The Templar castle and church have both survived.

It is one of France’s officially designated Most Beautiful Villages, and the Templar castle and the Romanesque church are open to visitors. The dungeon has a dedicated Templar exhibition with armor, documents, and plans. If your timing is right, book a guided tour rather than going solo, as you’ll learn so much more.

Sainte-Eulalie-de-Cernon: The Richest Commandery in Southern France

The Templars established this commandery in 1159 in the Cernon valley, a green fold in the otherwise arid Larzac plateau. They chose well. Sainte-Eulalie became the wealthiest Templar base in southern France, producing enough agricultural output to fund military operations thousands of miles away.

Unlike many Templar sites that have been reduced to ruins or absorbed into later buildings, Sainte-Eulalie retained almost everything. The Romanesque church that the Templars built is still standing at the center of the village. You can visit the refectory, the dormitory, the interior courtyard, and a frescoed room that gives a rare glimpse into how these soldier-monks actually lived.

The commandery is designated as a Grand Site d’Occitanie and is located within a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Guided tours are available, and the visit includes an immersive cinema experience that puts the Crusades in context.

If you are making a day of it in this part of Aveyron, La Couvertoirade is only about 15 kilometers away.

Montsaunès: The Chapel Nobody Can Explain

The Templars built a commandery at Montsaunès in 1146, in the foothills of the Pyrenees on the main medieval road between France and Spain. The chapel, completed in 1180, is the only building that survived.

The exterior gives nothing away. Step inside, and the walls and ceiling are entirely covered in frescoes, which is not unusual for a medieval church. What is unusual is what they painted. There are no saints or biblical scenes. Instead, the entire interior is covered in geometric patterns, stars, and wheels, in configurations described by medieval art experts as “unknown esoteric decoration,” unlike anything else they have encountered.

No one has been able to explain what the images meant or why the Templars chose to fill their most sacred space with them. When Pope John XXII ordered all Templar symbols destroyed after the order was dissolved, these frescoes survived because they looked like nothing anyone could identify as Templar.

The chapel sits in the quiet village of Montsaunès in Haute-Garonne. It is free to visit and easy to miss. My advice? If you’re a history lover, make this stop top of your list.

Sergeac: The Forgotten Giant of Périgord

Sergeac sits above the Vézère river in the Dordogne, perched high enough to avoid the floods that plagued so many medieval settlements. In the 13th century, Elie Rudel, Lord of Bergerac, donated the land to the order, and what the Templars built here became the largest commandery in the whole of Périgord.

A stone cross called a croix hosannière marks the turn off the main road onto the small lane that leads to the site. Most of these crosses marked burial grounds or mass graves. This one served a different purpose entirely: because the surrounding area was covered in dense oak forest, it pointed pilgrims and travelers toward the commandery. It is still standing.

The commandery itself is set back from the road and easy to drive past without noticing. It lacks the interpretation center of Arville or the fortified walls of La Couvertoirade, which is exactly why it feels so authentic. The buildings date from the 12th century, and the atmosphere is completely different from the more visited sites.

Combine it with the cave art at nearby Lascaux, and you have a very good day in the Dordogne.