ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of the templar presence in northwestern Italy; this is based on an investigation into the Order's connection with local society and its links with ecclesiastical and secular institutions. After wide archival and bibliographical research, the discovery of several edited and inedited charters has made it possible to draw up the first census of the Templar foundations in north-western Italy. Owing to their location in a region profoundly touched by the dispute between the papacy and the empire, the Templar foundations in north-western Italy were inevitably involved in this conflict. The favours granted to the Temple by laymen and other exponents of the ecclesiastical hierarchy is mirrored at a much higher level in the continuous presence of Templars among the pope's followers. In addition, owing to the particular political situation of medieval Lombardy, the Templar foundations in this region came into direct contact with the two greatest powers of the period, the papacy and the empire.
