Chronicle of the Knights of the Cross Lore Books

Description

Old chronicle of the Knights of the Cross with a red star. The blank sheets of parchment at the end of the book reveal that its author never finished it.

Text

Chronicle of Crusaders

The history of the rise and fall of the noble and honourable order of the Knights of the Cross.
Thank God and Christ that He has been pleased to guide my hand and bless me in the unworthy thing which I have, perhaps, only presumed to do out of insolent pride. I give attention to work where others cannot, to record what is not to be forgotten. Concordia res parva crescunt. Discordia res maxima dilabuntur.

About the founding of the Knights of the Cross
There have always been many foreign religious orders in the Kingdom of Bohemia, but none of them have ever come from our roots. The blessed daughter of Premysl, Agnes of Bohemia, seeing the misery and suffering of her subjects, who, plagued by sickness and wounds, had nowhere to turn, founded in the year 1233, at her female monastery, the humble hospital brotherhood of St. Francis.
By the grace of God, unity and devotion to helping their fellow men, the brothers soon achieved renown, so that after only two years the brotherhood moved to the church of St. Peter under the old town of Vyšehrad in Prague. Many clerics and priests now came with an interest in joining the Order, which was not even a real Order yet. In the year of the Lord 1237, through the intercession of the blessed Agnes of Bohemia, Pope Gregory IX himself took the Hospitallers under his protection, so that no foreign power could harm them and they would have to confess to him and to God alone. The Bull Omnipotens Deus established the brotherhood as the Knights of the Cross.

About Judith’s Bridge
Blessed Daniel, the thirteenth Bishop of Prague, had the intention of building a stone bridge where for centuries only deep fords and sandy paths led across the Vltava River. The bishop also won his king Vladislav II Premyslide and his wife Judith, when they were in Italy on a campaign against the Milanese in the summer of 1158 and took a great wealth there.The bishop also enlisted excellent Italian craftsmen to build Prague’s oldest bridge, so that it was said to have been built in just three years, so that it was possible to cross between the Old Town on the eastern bank to the sub-castle of the old Premyslid kings’ seat on the west. Named Judith’s Bridge after the noble patroness of the building, it became the oldest in the Bohemian Kingdom and the third stone bridge north of the Alps before the terrible flood in the year of the Lord 1342 destroyed it.

About the founding of the hospital in the Old Town of Prague
In the year of the Lord 1252, under the second Grand Master Conrad called Swabian, because he came from Swabia, the brothers moved to the foot of the Judith Bridge and founded a new large hospital there. In addition to caring for the wounded and sick, the Order was given the privilege by the gracious King Wenceslas I to collect customs duties on the bridge for its repairs.
The new hospital with the Church of the Holy Spirit soon became the main seat of the Order, which flourished greatly in those blessed years thanks to the beneficence of the King and other Bohemian lords. They thought of their immortal souls by having other hospitals built in their towns for the greater glory of God.

About the death of Blessed Agnes of Premyslid
After the severe winter in the year of the Lord 1282, under the administration of the fourth Grand Master, who was Otto of Saxony, died the venerable abbess, the Most Holy Agnes of the Premyslid family, called Bohemian, who founded the Order of the Knights of the Cross and contributed most to its flourishing. This woman, in her holy work, never married, although many princes aspired to her, and on the contrary she dedicated her life to God. Together with other noble maidens she founded the Convent of the Poor Virgins of St. Clare and became its first abbess. Here she cared for the poor and the sick and, as a daughter of the king, sought to right wrongs, always protecting the poor from the strong and powerful. Kyrie, eleison.

On the growth of the Order
The Crusader Order stood faithfully by the Premyslid family for many years, and for this it received many benefits. But when King Wenceslas III was assassinated in Olomouc in the year of the Lord 1306, the country was in a terrible state of lawlessness for five years. Then the Order of the Cross fortified their commandery, but not their hearts. Many pilgrims continued to find relief from illness within the walls of the hospitals. Finally, the turmoil was ended by the coronation of the new King John of Luxembourg.
The Order did well in his service, but it was his son, Emperor Charles IV, who brought the order to its true growth. Thanks to him, the order acquired a wealth of learned foreign books, holy relics and other mysteries. The Order’s commanderies abounded from Cheb to Vratislava in Silesia, and many villages, mills, ponds and castles fell under the sovereign power of the Grand Master Frederick.

On the Fire of the Order’s Commandery
The death of the blessed Emperor Charles IV in the year of the Lord 1378 ignited a spark of sinful hatred. Only a few hours after the death of the illustrious emperor, a red rooster engulfed the entire Order’s commandery in the Old Town of Prague. The flames quickly consumed the entire church, the hospital and the Order’s library containing thousands of precious manuscripts and holy relics. Many of the sick and the brothers who had thrown themselves into the fire for them were burned.
The terrible loss was all the greater because the land books and records also disappeared. It was very well contrived. For the new pope, Urban VI, did not look kindly on rich monasteries and rebellious orders, and gave his bishops free rein to intrigue. Much of the Order’s property was soon lost under strange circumstances.
Old Grand Master Frederick died two years later and could no longer look on at the misdeeds of his brothers. His successor was elected Zdeněk, who, however, more than concerned with the reformation of things, was on the contrary more concerned with intrigue, and conspired with the Prague chapter against the archbishop, so that truth and unity came to a great detriment. God, what dark times have come for our order. We have fallen prey to the whore of Babylon and have been poisoned by the poison from her breast. For by courtesy small things grow, but by discord even the greatest things crumble to dust.