Templar Documents Sold at Auction in London

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In London this past week John Goodchild auctioned off deeds of the Knights Templar dating back to the 12^th and 13^th Centuries. These deeds relate to holdings in the Lofthouse and Newland areas in England. The documents also have references to Temple Newsam Given the Da Vinci Codefuror, the street value of any such documents has risen significantly. I suspect that a close watch of upper end action houses lots will yield a number of such items up for sale in the coming months.

Goodchild supports a local research center in Wakefield, a displays what is simply known as the Goodchild Collection. According to a UK ARCHON search, this collection simply houses some family’s deeds from the Wakefield area. Goodchild as also written a texts relating to the Wakefield area . However, I cannot find any references on the net to the book News from Newland. It’s likely that the book is available at local book shops. Goodchild’s books and research generally follow the history of the Wakefield area. The majority of Goodchild’s texts are published by Tempus Publishing and Wakefield Historical Publications. The conspiracy theorist in me, that I do try to suppress when writing this blog, notes that Wakefield Historical Publications web site does display the Fleur-de-lay at the top and bottom of every page.

Points I found interesting about the article

• The Templar documents came from a large estate that Goodchild is not willing to name. I know there are numerous donations to charities and the like that hold anonymity clauses. But Goodchild states that he is not “prepared” to disclose this information. I know this is a matter of semantics, but interesting none the less.

• Goodchild states in the article that he had no idea of the value of the Templar documents he held. This is a rather odd statement. How could a retired archivist not know anything related to the Templars would hold significant value?

Once again, the job of the Grail Seeker leads to more questions that answers. I just wonder what else is in Mr. Goodchild’s achieves.