Medieval Monasteries in the Netherlands

The Netherlands had hundreds of medieval monasteries, but very few houses of the Templars. Popular lists name dozens of Templar sites. Why did monastic life come late to the northern Low Countries, and how many Templar houses can we actually prove?

A late start
According to the introduction of the census of monasteries in the Netherlands until 1800, monastic life began later there than in neighbouring countries. Foreign abbeys held estates early on, but few monasteries settled before 1100; the new orders of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, such as the regular canons, Cistercians and Premonstratensians, came mainly to the northern provinces and the southwest [1]. Among the military orders the Teutonic Order generally preceded the Hospitallers, and the Templars had only one or two settlements, at Alphen and Zaamslag [1].

The Templars: few and peripheral
Reviewing Michel Nuyttens’ standard book on the Templars in the Low Countries, Jan Hosten notes that for the Netherlands Nuyttens limits himself to a short discussion of one commandery, Ter Brake near Alphen, close to Breda [2]. Nuyttens explained the small number of Dutch Templar houses by the modest role of the Hollanders, Frisians and Groningers in the crusades; Hosten objects that the Frisians took part from the First Crusade onwards [2].

Ter Brake is the only Dutch Templar commandery whose existence is undisputed [3][4]. Later traditions date its foundation by the lord of Breda to about 1144, which the evidence supports only in part; the oldest charters naming Templars at Alphen date from 1236 and 1245 [3]. In 1214 the counts of Megen gave their allodial estate at Rixtel to the Temple, and by 1289 it was leased by the master of Ter Brake [4]. The second certain site is Zaamslag in Zeeuws Vlaanderen, where the knight Gerard van der Maelstede gave land in 1282 for building the Temple of Zaamslag [4][5].

Many claims, little proof
The long lists of possible Templar sites, often farms with names like Tempel or Tempelhof, rest on place names and local tradition [4]. Most of these attributions dissolve under source criticism: sixteenth century chronicles, misread place names and confusion with the Hospitallers [4]. After 1312 the Hospitallers took over Ter Brake and Zaamslag [3][4], which explains much of the confusion.

The northern Low Countries were rich in monasteries but poor in Templars. Only Ter Brake and Zaamslag are certain, with Rixtel attached to Ter Brake. The many other Templar sites of popular lists belong, as far as we know, to the Hospitallers or to legend.

This blog, an improved version of an earlier one, is original work by TemplarsNow^TM based on an AI-assisted quick scan on the topic. References and further reading, Open Access if available, all links verified November 3, 2026 and all sources checked but not all studied in detail: [1] Kloosterlijst (n.d.) Beknopt overzicht van de Nederlandse kloosters tot 1800, VU Amsterdam, introduction; [2] Hosten, J. (2008) Review of M. Nuyttens, Krijgers voor God. De orde van de tempeliers in de Lage Landen (1120-1312), BMGN Low Countries Historical Review 123 (3), web review; [3] TemplarsNow (2024) The Templar commandery at Alphen, after A.A. Streefland, Jaarboek De Oranjeboom 33 (1980); [4] TemplarsNow (2026) Nobles of the Low Countries and the Knights Templar, after Camps, Oorkondenboek van Noord-Brabant I (1979), nos. 111 and 439, and De Kraker (1994); [5] TemplarsNow (2013) The Temple of Zaamslag or Tempelhof.

Illustration: Zaamslag, detail of the map by Jacob Horenbault, 1569, public domain (age), via beeldbank Zeeland / tempelieren.nl.

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