` `..                                       comments to ... gemmm@netzero.com





...                . . . ___ 1191 . . . AND . . . ROSES ___


100 / gematria of 'hebsaleh' {'rose' in hebrew} is 1191 declares Studion in his 1604 "Naometria' -- - 1191, the year of the founding of the Teutonic Order. ..............Yet, 1198 is the.....___'accepted'___..... date for establishment of the Teutonic Knights.



the number 1191 must be 'code language' for stating 'the PRECURSORS of the Teutonic Knights and the Knights Templar were the men of the Knights of Schwangau {order of St Gereon},' a brotherhood organized in 1191




1 0 1  / Hormayr--Hortenburg, in 'die goldene chronik von hohenschwangau,    writes of knights Ulrich and Hinrich being 'gebruder von Schwangau und Geerian'  .   .   .   .   .   . indicating the two were ONE organization.






1 0 2   / bonding 'rose' {'hebsaleh'} to 1191 evokes rosenkreuzer imagery -- emblems associated with the ROSICRUCIANS






1 0 3  / when we bring up 'rosenkreuz,' we think of the knights of the red cross.. ... the Templars.

 . . ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ___KNIGHTS_____OF_____THE_____SWAN  ____


2 0 0    / Should we be seeing Wagner's grail knights as the Knights of Schwangau {Gereonritters} who eventually became Teutonic Knights ? Wagner built his opera on von Eschenbach's verses.. ... with von Eschenbach POSSIBLY familiar with the lais of Gereonritter Hiltbold von Schwangau



 2 0 1 / we are aware of lore surrounding the grail family's 'swan knight' Lohengrin . . . and tales of Crusader Godfroi deBouillon's PUTATIVE descent from Lohengrin.   The knights of Schwangau perforce having us think of the swan knight Lohengrin.


2 0 2   /  When we consider that alternate spellings of 'Lohengrin' are "Loherans--gerain' and 'Loheran--grin' and 'Loheran--garin' and 'Loheran--geerian,'  it becomes quite easy to realize that 'the knights of st gereon' was simply another rubric for 'the schwangau knights.,'   aka 'the knights of st. geerian' or 'gereon'




2 0 3   /  Wagner's patron, the eccentric Ludwig II, built Neuschwanstein  Palace to glorify legends of the Herren von Schwangau. Ludgwig had been raised in the ORIGINAL 'swan castle' of Hohenschwangu near the Bavarian town of Fussen. Finding the site too bare-bones, the extravagant ruler laid out plans for Neuschwanstein.





2 0 4   /  in 'the grail,' jean markale writes of those who keep watch over the Grail, in vonEschenbach's version, as 'fierce upholders of a racial purity.' Should we be correct in believing the 'grail knights' were the knights of the gereonorden, knights who all belonged to a single clan, we would indeed be witnessing 'racial purity' in its most extreme form... ... the 'pure blood' of one family group.





...............      ..............   ___  OCTOBER . . . . . 13   ___            




3 0 0  /   October 13th, the date on which the French knights templar were arresteed, is associated with St Colomon.    The Schwangau knights worshipped at the chapel of st colomon.       http://www.mail-archive.com/celt-saints@yahoogroups.com/msg00692.html
. . see also  http://www.ask.com/fr?u=http%3A%2F%2Freverso2.com%2Fri45r%2FASP%2Furl%2Fresult.asp%3Fdirections%3D1031%241033%241%26autotranslate%3Don%26motsinconnus%3Dfalse%26templates%3DGeneral%26url%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.allgaeu-ausfluege.de%2Fkirchecoloman.htm&ou=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.allgaeu-ausfluege.de%2Fkirchecoloman.htm&s=a&srcl=de&tarl=en





3 0 1   / What was Irish saint colomon doing in Bavaria and Austria ? The Irish colomon made his way to the suburbs of Vienna. The locals, not understanding gaelic, believed him to be a spy, so strung him up. Why was the Irishmen so dear to the Herren von Schwangau ? Was it his association with October 13th ?







               ...............   ST . . . GEREON . . . BASILICA . . . IN . . . COLOGNE   .......




4 0 0   / Why did the medieval residents of Cologne build a large, impressive basilica to honor the OBSCURE st. gereon ? The planet is not exactly teeming with churches dedicated to martyred gereon. Although cologne is not next--door to Fussen and Schwangau, neither is it millions of miles away from the towns.




4 0 1   / The huge stone head of st gereon lies on the campus of the Cologne basilica. Perhaps we're correct in believing that st gereon is meant as a stand-in for the decapitated John the Baptist.




4 0 2  /  Gereon is one of the 'four crowned martyrs' {quatuor coronati} important in the lore of freemasonry




4 0 3   / the town of Fussen, near the Schwangau stronghold, had a st gereon chapel




4 0 4  /  Clements in 'the order of the dragon' alleges that cologne had an active cathar community ... with a cathar 'bishop' in the 1140's, putatively with 'members throughout the world, even clergy and monks.'   Were the schwangau knights 'tainted' with the cathar heresy ?




__ HUNGARIAN___KING___STEPHEN___BUILDS___JERUSALEM___HOSTEL    


5 0 0  /   in 1019 { is this date meant to jibe with 1191 [see note     ] ? ? ? } king stephen of hungary had a hostel for Hungarian pilgrims built in Jerusalem.  Some historians believe construction was begun in 1018.  'the realm of st stephen' by elman


 5 0 1  /  Was this hostel the nub of the order of 'hospital monks' that would eventually become the gereonorden or herren von Schwangau or Teutonic knights  ?






5 0 2  /  A number of Bavarian knights {with Schwangau being a Bavarian city} had arrived in Hungary following King Stephen's marriage to Gisela of Bavaria.



5 0 3  /  This hungarian nexus would be consistent with POSSIBLE details bonding the order of st gereon to the HUNGARIAN order of the cross--bearers. 






                                         _______HINTS_____OF_____HERESY___



6 0 0  / does 'St Gereon' somewhow equate with 'Cathar' ? With Cologne in  the 1140's being the center of a Cathar fellowship { # 807 }, we have the st. Gereon cathedral being built in Cologne - - - - -the St. Gereon ritterschaft being instituted in 1119



6 0 1  / we've all read works such as 'The Templar Revelation' presenting  the 'Johannite' thesis in bloodline topics - - - the idea that John the Baptist was the true founder of the path that came to be known as Christianity.



With 'Gereon' overlapping with 'kinsman'  ( note 301 to 306 }, is "St. Gereon' code--language for the COUSIN of Jesus, John the Baptist ? As in 'sankt gereon' {literally 'holy cousin'} equals 'john' ?







6 0 2  / were triangles a crucial part of Cathar imagery ? The Cathars who seem to have formed a powerful community in twelfth century Cologne.



6 0 3   / if freemasonry can be viewed as an unconventional {as opposed to orthodox} spiritual path, we have to cite St. Gereon as one of the craft's four crowned martyrs - - - Quatuor Coronati






6 0 4   / triangles are an emblem associated with freemasons. Three green triangles were placed on tunics of St. Gereon knights { note 1002 }. http://books.google.com/books?pg=RA1-PA195&lpg=RA1-PA195&dq=%22chevaliers+de+st+gereon%22&sig=AOtRGIAhZ4AitE24_aursODdPYY&ct=result&id=jhkXr4a1K4kC&ots=tqOMO3DSbc&output=html_text



The old-english syllables 'gara' {does 'gara' jibe with 'gereon' ? } relate to 'triangle' as in the 'gore' found on skirts ( # 701 ). Polish 'gora' {'hora' in Czech} also relates to triangles when we see 'gora' meaning 'mountain,' with mountains triangular in shape.



6 0 5   / a church in Fusen, a town close to the site of the original Hohenschwangau, is St. Gereon's. Did the warriors of the Herren von Schwangau {possibly adherants of the Cathar doctrine} choose to worship in a chapel which embodied their unique faith in a Johannite cult ?






... ..... ......  6 0 6   / the decapitation of the Baptist. The HUGE head of st gereon lolling around the grounds of Cologne's St. Gereon basilica http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Gereon . Martyr St. Gereon, like John, was be-headed.



6 0 7   / Writers have alleged that the languedoc Cathars possessed the Holy Grail. Perhaps it was the Cathars of St. Gereon's in Cologne who clustered about the relic ... ... with Wagner dramatizing this scenario when he has the Schwangau knights (gereonritters).... ___LITERALLY___.... being the guardians of the Holy Grail.







. . ... . . . ._  ___'GERMAN'____EQUALS____'KINFOLK' ____


7 0 0  / william urban's book on the Teutonic Knights states that the brotherhood was built on the 'ruins of a practically defunct order.' I have to believe it was easy to confuse 'german order' with 'gereonorden' or 'order of saint gereon' {also known as the knights of schwangau}


7 0 1  / i've found brief HINTS that original gereonritters {knights of schwangau} were all men of the same clan.... the Stein or Wolkenstein or Rothenstein or vonStein or Reichstein or Reichenstein family


We prefer 'wolkenstein' because 'wolkenstein' comes down to meaning 'stone stone' or 'stein stein.' On a literal level, 'wolkenstein' is 'cloud stone,' yet 'cloud' derives from old english 'woelken' for 'rock.' Ergo, 'wolkenstein' is 'rock stone' or 'stone stone.'




... ...  7 0 2  / are we looking at a scenario in which the original gereonritters were ALL related to one another ? 'Germain' in french is 'first cousin.' 'Germanus' means 'having the same parents.'


English 'germane' equals 'akin' or 'connected.' In 'Othello,' Shakespeare has Iago yell at Brabantio, '{if you let Desdamona wed Othello}, you'll have coursers for cousins, and jennets for __germans.'__



And, indeed, 'teuton' equals 'tribe' or 'people.' http://sci.tech-archive.net/Archive/sci.lang/2007-03/msg01402.html
We are then getting 'gereon knights' meaning 'cousin knights' and 'teutonic knights' meaning 'knights of the one tribe or ethnic group.'




 7 0 3  / There are even URL's that aver ALL the Herren vonSchwangau {knights of the order of St Gereon} took the name 'Hiltpold' or 'Hiltbold' or 'Hiltbolt' or 'Hiltepold.' See note 801 re minnesinger Hiltpold von Schwangau. Was this another attempt to buttress the 'band of brothers' paradigm ?







7 0 4  / given the POSSIBILITY that the gereonritters were part of the STEIN bloodline, should we be recalling that vonEschenbach and other bards wrote of the Holy Grail being a stone or 'stein' ? Should we be seeing Wagner's 'grail knights' as the 'stein knights' or 'men of the stein family who formed the Gereonorden or Knights of Schwangau' ?










7 0 5  / Hormayr--Hortenburg in 'Die Goldene Chronik von Hohenschwangau' writes of Ulrich . . . and Heinrich being 'gebruder von Schwangau und GEERIAN'... with Ulrich and Heinrich being LITERAL brothers.











_GEREONRITTERS___MORPH___INTO___TEUTONIC___KNIGHTS _

8 0 0  / in the early years of the Teutonic Knights , some of the men were of the ministerales caste. Grandmaster vonSalza came from a ministerales family. The Gereonritters {Herren von Schwangau} had been known as minsterales of the Hohenstauffen rulers.

8 0 1  / Clements, in 'the order of the dragon,' states that when, in 1198, the Teutonic Knights were brought into existence, 'a connection was not denied to an even older order, the German Order.' As we see in note 301, there was very likely confusion between 'german order' and 'gereonorden.'



8 0 2  / we know the Teutonic Knights absorbed other groups {Sword Brethren and Livonian Order} with these subsidiary troops retaining a fair amount of atonomy {including their own grandmasters} ; ergo, it would seem likely that, in this spirit of AMALGAMATION, the Teutonic Knights were born on the foundation of another band - - - the Knights of St. Gereon --- the Knights of the Swan. 






__BANKING__TEMPLARS - - - WEALTHY__GERMAN__TOFFS_




9 0 0  / Considering the bounty amassed by the banking Templars, we note the sums garnered by the Teutonic Order--Knights of Schwangau--Gereonritters. Ordensland rents collected from vast acres in the Baltic and in Prussia. Cash from sales of parcels to free peasants.

Taxes collected from Prussian burghers. Thalers from granting charters to towns. Profit from the sale of natural resources -- particularly amber and timber and metals. The equity represented by the order's castles and fortresses -- such as the impressive Marienburg site.


.. .... . . . . . . 9 0 1  /  teutonic knights, like the templars, seemingly had a fondness for hard cash.  The german group in ordensland {territory in northeast europe governed by the brotherhood} operated its own mint in the town of thorn .  .  .  'torin' to the people of poland

9 0 3 /  another source of profit.   Towns in ordensland joined the Hanseatic League, a trading consortium noted for its lucrative ventures.   See 'the origins of prussianism;' by Treitschke


 _PARALLELS__BETWEEN__TEMPLARS    +    GEREONRITTERS__


1 0 0 0  /  Fighting men of western europe found it attractive to join the teutonic knights in Ordensland forays.  In the 'Canterbury Tales,' Chaucer says of the knight :
....... . . In Lettow hadde he reysed and in Ruce
. . . ......No Chritian man so ofte of his degre

The Plantagenet Black Prince had spent months with the Teutonic Order in the Ordensland. So did Lancastrian Henry of Bolingbroke... the noble who later became England's Henry IV.


1 0 0 1  / sundry researchers assert that the Templars grew apathetic about slaying followers of Mohammed because the soldier-monks harbored pro-Islamic sympathies. One might suggest that campaigining against Baltic pagans provided a heaven-sent scenario. The Gereonritters--Teutonic Knights {with a sizeable component of members from the Templar order} could maintain their brotherhood - - - could keep their Crusader status - - - without having to battle Moslems.

1 0 0 2  / with nobles forming the Templars in 1119 and the Order of St. Gereon in 1191, are we faced with numerical 'code language'? Both dates equate to '3,' a figure long seen as carrying weighty spiritual signficicance.
. . . . . . . .. .. . . . . . ________ IMAGERY . . _______

1 1 0 0 / Men of the Herren von Schwangau {Order of St. Gereon} wore black crosses on white tunics, the garb of the Teutonic Knights.


1 1 0 1  / Tunics of the Gereonritters bore three green hillocks in a triangular formation. Should we be associating this logo with triangles important in freemasonry ?


1 1 0 2  / While the three green hillocks undoubtedly represent the crosses on Calvary, we are forced to wonder if the trio also mesh with the three castles owned by the Herren von Schwangau : Frauenstein and Buching and Trauchgau {Druchgo}.

1 1 0 3  / The Teutonic Knights were called 'Knights of the Cross.' One url contends there was a connection between the German troop and  the Hungarian Order of the Cross-bearers. http://books.google.com/books?id=eJMOAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA37&lpg=PA37&dq=ordre+et+%22porte-croix%22+et+1000+et+etienne&source=web&ots=Zv8Dhvbhtn&sig=d9vlBhwvawyCcKvAmNoz1O4wFh0&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result
and http://books.google.com/books?pg=RA1-PA196&lpg=RA1-PA196&dq=gereon+and+%22porte-croix%22&sig=vvFOw-yvjQLXo0qG2cSd7yF7Cws&ct=result&id=jhkXr4a1K4kC&ots=tqPEK7CT9b&output=html



.  ....................... . . ___THE___ITALIAN___CONNECTION___

1 2 0 0   / the Hohenstauffen Holy Roman emperors ruled numerous areas in Italy ... with sovereigns such as Frederick the second exhibiting intense love for Sicily. Thus, we are not surprised to find mention of the Ordini San Gereone ... clearly the same league as the Herren von Schwnagau. . . http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=it&u=http://www.realecasadisvevia.it/magistero.htm&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=2&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dordini%2Band%2B%2522san%2Bgereone%2522%26hl%3Den

1 2 0 1  / the Teutonic Knights held manors in Bari and Palermo


1 2 0 2    / When the German brotherhood was expelled from Acre, their Grand Master chose Venice as his headquarters, further stressing an Italian nexus. In 1319, Prussian Marienburg was selected as the base of operation



. . . . . ___WARRIORS   FROM   ONE   FAMILY___


1 3 0 0 / we don't know how LITERALLY to take the data re each and every knight of the Order of St Gereon belonging to ONE clan. We're inclined to think that we're dealing with a matter of poetic license -- 'one family' in the sense of all german men being of the same 'blood'... or all the organization's members bearing bonds of 'brotherhood' towards their peers.



.. ... .. 1 3 0 1 / similarly, we see the 'hiltpold' monniker more as an 'assumed' name rather than as the given name of all schwangauritters -- as when the Pope takes on a new name when he assumes the throne of St Peter.



Similarly, it has been SUGGESTED that Priory of Sion nautonniers all take the name of 'jean.'



1 3 0 2 / if we in fact are dealing with men with blood ties to the Stein family { see notes xxxxx }, we find one grand master of the Teutonic Knights Conrad Zollner von Rothenstein 1382--1390}...








1 3 0 3 / In the Schwangau family tree, we do indeed repeatedly find the name 'Hiltebold' .. ... as per 'Die Goldene Chronik von Hohenschwangau' (1842) by Hormayr zu Hortenbu




1 3 0 4 / the same genealogy also mentions men of the 'Wolkenstein' family.


1 3 0 5 / in 'the order of the dragon,' author Clements lists 15th century Oswald von Wohlstein {sic} as a prominent member of the Dragon Order - - Along with that winsome Wallachia dude, Vlad Dracula. Clements almost certainly is referring to Schwangau's Oswald von Wolkenstein






PARALLELS___BETWEEN___TEMPLARS___and___GEREONRITTERS


1 4 0 1 /  Clements maintains    that the Teutonic Knights were a sub-division of the Knights Templars.  See 'the order of the dragon.'




1 4 0 2  /  ceretain scholars CLAIM that after the templars left rthe middle-east, they wought a 'nation' of their own.  We observe the teutonic knights {herren vonSchwangau or gereonritters} carving out a 'state' in purssia and the baltic - - known as 'ordensland.'   


Even the comparatively small leage of schwangau ritters established a 'realm' of three castles in addition to the swangove stronghold :  Buching and Trauchgau {druchgo} and frauerstein


................ ___MISCELLANEOUS___

1 5 0 1 /  what relationship existed between the Gereonritters and the Hungarian Order of the Cross-Bearers ?

1 5 0 2 / With poet-minnesinger Hiltpold von Schwangau born in 1190 and vonEschenbach born in 1170, could the work of one have influenced the other ?  Should we be seeing vonEschenbach's 'grail knights' as men of the Herren von Schwangau ?

1 5 0 3 /  There are sources which list the founding date of the knights of st gereon as 1190 rather than 1191.  If the group was instiuted by Frederick Barbarossa, as some historians aver,  the ruler drowned in a Cilician river in june, 1190

1 5 0 4 / blog-readers might wish to look at this 20th century piece of short FICTION,  'Maria in the Rose Bush' by Shiel, a tale employing legends of the Herren von Schwangau.  http://horrormasters.com/text/a1517.pdf

1 5 0 5 / two or three sites associate the Herreon von Schwangau {gereonritters} with 'male nurses.'  This would mesh with Teutonic knights, in their early years, being active in the Palestine hospital for German pilgrims


 . . . . . .  ____ VENERATION    OF    THE    HOLY    VIRGIN____

1 6 0 1 /  both the Teutonic Knights and the Order of the Templars were said to particularly reverence the Virgin Mary.   This play script would also seem to be the casse with the Herren von Schwangau.  One of the three castles owned by  organization was 'frauenstein,'  the 'castle of our lady'


1 6 0 2 / The stronghold of the Teutonic Knights was '  xxxx  , ' a massive fortress dedicated to the mother of Jesus.

s.


. . . . .
in          














.........s.