I've liked to joke that, because of their encrypted "passbook" accounting and payment system, a way for holy-land pilgrims to deposit money in Europe, deduct amounts from an encrypted document for Templar-sponsored passage, hostelry, etc., en route, and collect the remainder on arrival in Jerusalem, that the Templars were the original financial cryptographers. :-). More seriously, it was operating this kind of medieval Western Union cum Brinks cum Wells Fargo cum Hilton, which not only allowed them to effectively transfer the asset value of whatever booty they may have acquired in their early days back home, but also to make the lion's share of the money they were eventually disbanded for... Cheers, RAH Who put a "Templar's Square" maths puzzle on the IBUC shirt at the first EFCE conference in Edinburgh because of Roslyn Chapel, just outside of town, and who, coincidentally, has spent the last 16 years in the Boston neighborhood of Roslindale, the former home of a large, discrete, Masonic temple, speaking of punters who think they're modern Templars... ------- --- begin forwarded text