Merovingians

The Merovingian dynasty of Franks has been traditionally considered the first race of kings in what is now France. France was named for the Franks and their first ruler, Francio, was said to be a descendant of Noah.

Francio's race migrated from the legendary city of Troy in northwest Turkey, bringing their royal bloodline to Gaul. They named their settlement Troyes after their hometown. Paris was named for the Greek hero Paris whose elopement with Helen to Troy precipitated the Trojan War.

The name Merovingian refers to Meroveus, the father of Childeric I, ruler of the Salian Franks. According to genealogist Gardner, Meroveus traced his lineage through his father, Clodion, back through Joseph of Arimathea to Jesus. "Despite the carefully listed genealogies of his time, the heritage of Meroveus was strangely obscured in the monastic annals," noted Gardner. "Although the rightful son of Clodion, he was nevertheless said by the historian Priscus to have been sired by an arcane sea creature, the Bistea Neptunis [sea beast]... There was evidently something very special about King Meroveus and his priestly successors, for they were accorded special veneration and were widely known for their esoteric knowledge and occult skills."

Authors Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln saw the legend of the sea creature fathering Meroveus as alluding to, or concealing, the idea of some sort of dynastic alliance or intermarriage. Some authors have suggested that the "sea beast" story was a misinterpretation of the idea that Meroveus was half-fish, the fish being a long-standing symbol of Christ.

French author Gerard de Sede raised eyebrows by declaring that the Merovingians were, in fact, descended from extraterrestrials who interbred with selected ancient Israelites. This allegation was echoed by author David Wood, who wrote that this royal line, as well as all humans, were descendants of an extraterrestrial "super-race."

Meroveus's grandson, Clovis I, took control in about A.D. 482 (about ten years after the fall of the Roman Empire) and eventually extended his rule to include most of Gaul. Paris was his capital, a status which the city retained when Hugh Capet became king of France in 987.

According to the Priory of Sion's Dossiers secret, the Merovingians were of Jewish origin. "They were rhe lost tribe of Benjamin, who migrated to Greece and then on to Germany, where they became the

Sicambrians [Franks]," reported Picknett and Prince. Others pointed out there was su much, intermarriage in the region that the terms "Goth" and "Jew" became interchangeable.

The Dossiers secret declared that the descendants of Jesus and Mary Magdalene, living in southern France, intermarried with the Sicambrian Franks and founded the Merovingian royal lineage. Priory members claimed that the parchments discovered by the priest Sauniere at Rennesle-Chateau were genealogical lists tracing the Merovingian lineage right up to descendants living in Europe today—to include the evasive Pierre Plantard.

Some support for this idea can be found in the Jewish principality of Septimania, created in the mid-eighth century after the Jewish inhabitants of Narbonne aided King Pepin in taking the city from the Muslims. The first king of Septimania was a Prankish noble named Theodoric (the Grail romances refer to him as Aymery), a Jew "recognized by both Pepin and the caliph of Baghdad as 'the seed of the royal house of David.'" Theodoric is thought by many to have also been a Merovingian. His son, Guillem dc Gellone, also rose to prominence as both a Merovingian and Jew of royal blood. "Jesus was of the Tribe of Judah and the royal house of David. The Magdalene is said to have carried the Grail—the Sangraal or 'royal blood'—into France," noted Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln. "And io the 8th century there was, in the south of France, a potentate (Guillem] of the Tribe of Judah and the royal house of David, who was acknowledged as king of the Jews. He was not only a practicing Jew, however: he was also a Merovingian."

Clovis converted to Christianity after evoking the name of Jesus, at the urging of his Catholic wife, Clotilde, during a crucial and ultimately successful battle in 496. This came at a time of decline for the Roman church, then locked in a continuous battle against Arianism.

Arianism, named after the Alexandrian priest Arius, taught chat God created everything including Jesus and therefore, Jesus was not himself God, but rather a heavenly teacher, a messiah. This concept, perhaps strengthened by the Magdalene tradition in southern France, gained considerable popularity at the time.

To counter Arianism, Roman emperor Constantine had convened the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325. When Arius rose to argue his views, he was punched in the face. The council, under firm control of the Roman

church, declared chat God was a Trinity—Father, son, and spirit. Arius and his followers were banished, "There were now only two official objects of worship": commented Gardner. "The Holy Trinity of God and the Emperor himself—the newly designated Savior of the World. Anyone who disputed this in any way was at once declared a heretic. Christians who attempted to retain loyalty to Jesus as the Messianic Christ were discounted by the Imperial Church as heathens."

Despite edicts from Rome, Arianism remained strong in western Europe. "If the early Merovingians, prior to Clovis, were ar all receptive to Christianity, it would have been the Arian Christianity of their immediate neighbors, the Visigoths and Burgundians," commented Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln.

When Clovis was baptized into Catholicism, nearly half of his troops followed his example. "A great wave of conversions followed, and the Roman church was effectively saved from almost inevitable collapse," noted Gardner. "In fact, were it not for the baptism of King Clovis, the ultimate Christian religion of Western Europe might well now be Arian rather than Catholic," The Roman authorities, in turn, proclaimed Clovis the "new Constantine" and pledged allegiance to both him and his descendants, a pledge they soon repudiated.

Upon the death of Clovis in 511, his realm was shared by his four sons—Theuderic, Chodomir, Childebert, and Lothar. The emblems of the Merovingian kings were the fish (still a symbol of Jesus), the Lion of Judah (further indication of their Hebraic heritage), and the fleur-delis (which became the symbol of French royalty). Despite strife between the brothers, Merovingian rule grew to include Septimania along the Mediterranean coast between Provence and Spain to Saxony in the north and eastward to Bavaria.

By 561 the realm had been divided between Clovis's grandsons, Charibert I, Guntram, Sigebert, and Chilperic 1. These brothers also intrigued against each other, causing weakness within the kingdom, which was quickly exploited by their neighbors. By 613 Chlotar II—son of Chilperic I—had regained some unity within the kingdom.

His son, Dagobert, was abducted at the age. of five and taken to a monastery near Dublin, Ireland, where he was educated and later married the Celtic princess Matilde. After his surprise return to France, Dagobert proved even more effective in consolidating the Merovingian sovereignty,

but in 679, while hunting, he was murdered by a retainer of Pepin the Fat, one of bis own officials with close ties to the Roman church.

According to Gardner, papal authorities deliberately obscured the history of the Merovingians to secure their own power and prominence. "The inevitable result was that accounts of Dagobert's life were suppressed to the point of his non-existence in the chronicles," he wrote. "Not for another thousand years were the true facts of his existence to be made public once more. And only then did it become apparent that Dagobert had a son called Sigebert, who was rescued from the mayoral clutches in 679. Following his father's murder he was removed to his mother's home at Rennes-le-Chateau in Languedoc. ... In time, the deposed Merovingian line from Sigebert included the famous crusader, Godfrey de Bouillon, Defender of the Holy Sepulchre."

Here again can be found the connections between the Priory of Sion, the Knights Templar, and elder traditions involving Jesus' bloodline. Although, as pointed out by Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln, "while the Metovingian royal blood was credited with a sacted, miraculous, and divine nature, it was not explicitly stated anywhere that this blood was in fact Jesus."

Yet the connection was there as evidenced by the linkage of the Jewish Franks to the Merovingians Dagobert and Guillem de Gellone through a Hugh de Plantard to Eustache, first count of Boulogne and the grandfather of the Crusade leader Godfrey de Bouillon. "And from Godfrey there issued a dynasty and a 'royal tradition' that, by virtue of being founded on the 'rock of Sion,' was equal to those presiding over France, England and Germany," they added. "By dint of dynastic alliances and intermarriages, this line came to include Godfrey de Bouillon ... and various other noble and royal families, past and present—Blanchefort, Gisors, Saint-Clair—Sinclair in England . . . Plantard, and Habsburg-Lorraine."

Following the death of Dagobert there was again division in the land. The surviving Merovingians were forced to yield power to court officials known as "Mayors of the Palace," known to be under the control of the Catholic church.

In 750 the last Merovingian king, Childeric III, was deposed by one of these mayors—Pepin III the Short—who established the Carolingian dynasty so named for his father, Carolus or Charles Martel. "The

Merovingian monarchy had been stricrly dynastic," explained Gardner, "but that tradition was destined to be overturned when Rome grasped the opportunity to create kings by papal authority... The Church's long-awaited ideal had come to fruition—and from that time onwards kings were endorsed and crowned only by self-styled Roman prerogative." (emphasis in the original) "The Merovingian kings did not rule the land nor were they politically active," wrote Gardner. "They were avid students of proper kingly practice in the ancient tradition and their model was King Solomon, the son of David. Their disciplines were largely based on Old Testament scripture— but the Roman Church nevertheless proclaimed mem irreligious."

Heresies aside, it is clear why the early church was fearful of the Merovingians. If indeed their heritage connected to the "royal house of David" and specifically to Jesus, they reptesented a distinct threat to the theology being formulated by the church at the time and later by European dynasties. "The Thule Society's early mission was to put a member of Jesus' family—a Merovingian—on the throne of Europe," wrote author Henry. "When Hitler came along he dismantled this operation."

According to several modern writers, the picture that is becoming clear in light of recent research and literature is this: Mary Magdalene, as the wife of Jesus, arrived in the south of France following the crucifixion, along with Jesus' childten. They preserved their bloodline while living in the large Jewish community of the region and, in the fifth century, intermarried with Frankish royalty to create the Merovingian dynasty. The Roman church pledged allegiance to this dynasty, in full knowledge of its messianic lineage.

But church authorities, fearful and jealous of this dynasty born of both priestly and political bloodlines, fomented the assassination of Dagobert and the usurpation of Childeric III to gain complete control over what was to become the nation of France. And throughout this intrigue wound the threads of the Plantards, the Bouillons, the Knights Templar, and the Priory of Sion.

By the twelfth century, these families, knowing full well their heritage, mounted the expedition to Jerusalem—if not the entire First Crusade—to recover family genealogies from beneath Solomon's Temple. They also created the sectet Priory of Sion, and the Knights Templar as a front organization, to achieve this purpose. At this point restoration of the Merovingian monarchy may indeed have been a primary goal.

As discussed, the Templars apparently were successful in their attempt to gain the Temple treasure, whether it was merely historical records or something more substantive, such as the Ark of the Covenant or even the mummified body of Jesus. Whatever it may have been was transported back to the area of Rennes-le-Chateau and so strengthened the beliefs of the Cathars that they were quite willing to die for them. The Templars, being less willing to sacrifice themselves, simply melded their beliefs into other secret societies.

Over the years there were repeated attempts to take the throne of France for royally of Merovingian lineage, but only one in the eighteenth century came close to success. According to Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln, "By virtue of its intermarriage with the Habsburgs, the house of Lorraine [a family descended from the Merovingians] had actually acquired the throne of Austria, the Holy Roman Empire [which finally ceased to exist in 1806]. When Marie Antoinette, daughter of Francois de Lorraine, became Queen of France, the throne of France, too, was only a generation or so away. Had not the French Revolution intervened, the house of Habsburg-Lorraine might well, by the early 1800s, have been on its way to establishing dominion over all Europe."

The Habsburg dynasty was believed to be an integral part of the Priory of Sion and even related to the Rothschilds through Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa's second sou Albrecht, of Archibald, II. The family origins go back to a Swiss estate named Habichtburg (Hawk Castle), or Habsburg, built in 1020 by the Bishop of Strasbourg. Through strategic marriages, the Habsburgs grew to be the most powerful of the European royal houses. Emperor Maximilian, whose French troops were poised in Mexico during the War Between the States, was a Habsburg, as was Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.

There may have been another attempt to recreate the Holy Roman Empire in the late nineteenth century. According to French author JeanLuc Chaumeil, several of the characters involved in the Rennes-leChateau mystery—including the priest Sauniere—were members of an ultra-secret group of Scottish Rite Freemasons who, just as the Illuminati before them, sought to create a European union based on Theosophy and Gnosticism. Called the Micron du Val d'Or, this society's objectives were much the same as the CFR or Trilateral Commission's—to create a global God-ordained system "wherein nations would be no more than provinces, their leaders but proconsuls in the

service of a world occult government consisting of an elite." To most researchers, this sounds like an early-day New World Order.

As Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln saw it, "During the 19th century the Prieure de Sion, working through Freemasonry and the Hieron du Val d'Or, attempted to establish a revived and 'updated' Holy Roman Empire—a kind of theocratic United States of Europe, ruled simultaneously by the Habsburgs and by a radically reformed Church." Apparently this effort was frustrated by events early in the twentieth century.

The Habsburgs' power gradually was restricted to the Austrian Empire, which collapsed following the assassination of Habsburg Archduke Francis Ferdinand and the end of World War I. Today, the Habsburgs appear to be making a comeback with Karl Habsburg-Lothringen representing Austria in the European Parliament, his sisters politically active in both Spain and Sweden and Gyorgy von Habsburg an influential executive with the largest film producer and distributor in central Europe.

Evidence that Priory members may still have direct connections to Freemasons seeking political change was developed when Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln studied privately published tracts dealing with the Priory in the French National Library. One of these was supposedly written by one Madeleine Blancassal, a phony name concocted from the Priory's interest in the Magdalene and two Languedoc rivers. Of particular interest was that this work, according to its title page, was published by the Grand Alpine Lodge of Switzerland—a Masonic lodge comparable to Britain's Grand Lodge or France's Grand Orient Lodge and connected to the P2 Lodge scandal.

Although Alpine Lodge officials denied any knowledge of the tract, at least two other works bore the Alpine imprint and French journalist Mathieu Paolio claimed to have seen these publications in the Alpine Lodge library. Shortly after Paolio published a book in France exposing the Priory's interest in the Merovingian bloodline, he accepted an assignment to Israel where he was executed as a spy.

A FAR-REACHING WEB

Icke claimed that Henry Kissinger is a member of the Grand Alpine Lodge and that "it is involved at a very high level in the global manipulation."

Recall that Kissinger's name cropped up in the official investigation of the P2 Lodge scandal in Italy in the 1980s. Icke's allegation obliquely

connects Kissinger to the Priory, which Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln discovered has an "American Contingent."

This author trio worked to trace the missing parchments said to have been found by the priest Sauniere at Rennes-le-Chateau in the late nineteenth century. Piecing together confusing, sometimes deceitful, information, they concluded that at least three of Saunierc's documents had been purchased from the priest's niece and taken to England in the mid-1950s by three men, at least one of whom was a member of British Intelligence. According to official papers authorizing the transfer, "These genealogies contain proof of the direct descent, through the male line of [Merovingian] Sigibert IV, son of Dagobert II .. . through the House of Plantard, Counts of Rhedae [an older name for Rennes-le-Chateau]. ..."

The papers were held by Lloyds International of London until 1979, when they apparently were returned to a Paris bank after Lloyds discontinued the use of deposit boxes,

In checking on the English connections to the Priory papers, Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln found all the names traced back to a large insurance company named Guardian Assurance, today called Guardian Royal Exchange Assurance. They also found that all of the men named were prominent figures with aristocratic titles or standing in the banking and business community. Some had connections with Winston Churchill and intelligence services.

In January 1984 the plot thickened when the authors received a twopage letter from Plantard under the Prieure de Sion logo and a crest containing the letter R and C, thought to refer to the Order of the Rosy Cross. This Mise en Garde or Cautionary Notice warned of legal action against anyone suspected of taking or faking Priory documents. The letter carried four signatures—Pierre Plantard, John F. Drick, Gaylord Freeman, and A. Robert Abboud. Freeman has been previously mentioned in Priory documents.

Significantly, all the names on the Mise document, with the exception of Plantard, were connected to First National Bank of Chicago. Freeman became the bank's president in 1960, eventually becoming board chairman. He sat on the board of the Atlantic Richfield oil company and was associated with the MacArthur Foundation and the Aspen Institute. Abboud succeeded Freeman as the bank's board chairman and also served as president of Occidental Petroleum Corporation. Drick, beginning in 1969, became president and a board member of the bank and sat on the board of other large American firms.

According to Professor Donald Gibson, "The First National Bank of Chicago was interconnected with Rockefeller financial interests." Furthermore, prior to 1983, the London branch of First National Bank of Chicago had shared office space with none other than Guardian Royal Exchange Assurance.

Buoyed by this seemingly strong connection between the Priory and an "American Contingent," Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln were chagrined to discover that Drick had died in 1982, two years before the Priory documents were produced. To compound this mystery, it was determined that the three American signatures on the Mise letter were exact copies—even to the order presented - as their signatures on the 1974 annual report of the First National Bank of Chicago. Furthermore, Freeman denied any knowledge of the Priory. Confronted with deceit and falsified documents emanating from England, the trio wrote, "One thing seemed evident— someone with an interest in the [Priory of Sion] was active in London."

In an interview with the trio, Plantard explained everything away— he said Drick's name was still being used on Priory documents even after his death with the use of a stamp, like that carrying the other two signatures. Asked why such men as Freeman, Abboud, and Drick would concern themselves with a society whose aim was the restoration of the Merovingian royalty, Plantard told the authors that these men's primary objective was a united Europe:

Another fascinating tidbit concerning these authors' work gave an indication of the intricate interconnectedness of today's secret societies. In their book Holy Blood, Holy Grail, several times the authors cite Sir Steven Runciman as an expert historian with particular knowledge of the Crusaders, the Knights Templar, and even the Priory of Sion. Runciman's name was one of those listed in the personal address book of Clay Shaw, the New Orleans Trade Mart director put on trial for complicity in the Kennedy assassination. Along with Sir Steven, other prominent European names in Shaw's book included the Marquesse Giuseppe Rey of Italy, Baron Rafaelo de Banfield of Italy, Princess Jacqueline Chimay of France, and Lady Margaret D'Arcy, Lady Hulce, and Sir Michael Duff of England.

Plantard also sent the trio of authors a copy of his letter to the Priory resigning his position as grand master, which became effective in mid1984. This communication also announced the teinstitution of a Priory

statute which prohibited members from revealing anything about the order, including their membership. Plantard said he was resigning for reasons of health, "personal and family independence" and due to his disapproval of "certain maneuvers" of "our English and American brethren." "Following M. Plantard's resignation, the Prieure de Sion became, in effect, invisible," commented the authors.

A short time later, Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln received an anonymous tract accusing the Priory of involvement with Lucio Gelli and his Italian P2 Lodge and Vatican activities concerning Banco Ambrosiano. Author Vankin also raised the possibility that the Priory was the mysterious power behind the fascist P2 Lodge, In their search for confirmation of this allegation, the authors discovered tenuous connections between the Priory and other largely unknown European secret societies.

One of these was Alpha Galates, whose members were interested in the chivalry of medieval knights. Members of this group apparently were connected to a wartime French publication entitled Vaincre, which has been accused of both supporting and working against the collaborationist Vichy government. This publication was edited by Plantard, and contributors included men linked to both the Priory and the Swiss Alpine Masonic Lodge.

Another secret society was known as the Kreisau Circle, formed in 1933 by a small group of career military officers and professionals who opposed Hitler. The circle met at the Kreisau estate of its leader Helmut James Craft von Moltke and plotted to overthrow the Nazi regime. Many circle members, including Count Claus von Stauffenberg who planted a bomb near Hitler in July 1944, were arrested and executed for their role in the failed plot.

It was Hans Adolf von Moltke who offered praise to Plantard upon his becoming grand master of Alpha Galates. Toward the end of the war, members of the Kreisau Circle were sending peace feelers to members of both British and American Intelligence, including Allen Dulles, then with the OSS in Switzerland. The von Moltkes were also heavily involved in the European unity movement, one facet of which was Retinger's American Committee on a United Europe. Recall that Retinger, "father of the Bilderbergers," was connected to Dulles and other CIA officials, CFR officials, Averell Harriman, and David and Nelson Rockefeller. A close working relationship was developed between the CIA and the Vatican, chiefly

through the Knights of Malta and Cardinal Francis Spellman of New York, spiritual adviser to the Knights and the man who first brought Vatican attention to banker Bishop Paul Marcinkus of P2 scandal notoriety.

As previously mentioned, in the 1950s Plantard helped create the Comites de Salut Public or Public Safety Committees which were instrumental in returning De Gaulle to power in France.

Obviously, this cloudy mixture of conspiracies pointed to some level of a reality not addressed by the daily media. Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln stated, "We found indisputable evidence attesting to the involvement of an organized and coherent cadre working in concert behind the scenes, sometimes using other institutions as a facade. This cadre was not named specifically, but everything indicated that it was indeed the Prieure de Sion,"

They pondered over the Priory's activities in the "shadowy underworld of European affairs—where the Mafia overlaps with secret societies and intelligence agencies, where big business clasps hands with the Vatican, where immense sums of money are deployed for clandestine purposes, where the demarcation lines between politics, religion, espionage, high finance and organized crime begin to dissolve . . . [into] a somewhat murky sphere . . . where Christian Democratic parties of Europe, various movements dedicated to European unity, royalist cliques, neo-chivalric orders, Freemason sects, the CIA, the Knights of Malta and the Vatican swirled together, pooled themselves temporarily for one purpose or another.. . ."

But no one—least of all those hardworking researchers Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln—has been able to get a firm handle on the Priory and its surrounding secret groups with their phony documents, contradictory statements, and obscure backgrounds. "The Prieure de Sion had begun to seem to us like a holographic image, shifting prismatically according to the light and the angle from which it was viewed," they wrote in 1986. "From one perspective, it appeared to be an influential, powerful and wealthy international secret society whose members included eminent figures in the arts, in politics, in high finance. From another perspective, it seemed a dazzlingly ingenious hoax devised by a small group of individuals for obscure purposes of their own. Perhaps, in some fashion, it was both."

Lincoln eventually gave up on trying to sort out the tangled mess. In the mid-1990s when asked for an update on the Priory, he replied dis-