Hugues de Payens

Hugues de Payens
King Baldwin II of Jerusalem ceding the Temple to Hugues de Payens and Godfrey de Saint-Omer
Born	c. 1070 Troyes, France
Died	24 May 1136 (aged 66) Kingdom of Jerusalem
Other names	Hugo de Paganis Ugo de' Pagani
Known for	First Grand Master of the Knights Templar

Hugues de Payens or Payns (c. 1070 – 24 May 1136) was the co-founder and first Grand Master of the Knights Templar. With Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, he created the Latin Rule, the code of behavior for the Order.

Most of the primary sources for his life are in Latin or medieval French. In French his name usually appears as Hugues de Payens or Payns (French pronunciation: ​[yɡ də pɛ̃]). His earliest certain appearance in documents is under the part-Latin, part-French name Hugo de Peans (1120–1125; details below). Later Latin sources call him Hugo de Paganis. In English works he often appears as Hugh de Payns, in Italian sometimes as Ugo de' Pagani'.

No early biography of Hugues de Payens exists, nor do later writers cite such a biography. None of the sources on his later career give details of his early life. Information is therefore scanty and uncertain; embellishments depend partly on documents that may not refer to the same individual, partly on histories written decades or even centuries after his death.

The earliest source that pins down a geographical origin for the later Grand Master is the Old French translation of William of Tyre's History of Events Beyond the Sea. The Latin text calls him simply Hugo de Paganis, but the French translation, dated to c. 1200, describes him as Hues de Paiens delez Troies ("Hugh of Payens near Troyes"), a reference to the village of Payns, about 10 km from Troyes, in Champagne (eastern France).

In early documents of that region Hugo de Pedano, Montiniaci dominus is mentioned as a witness to a donation by Count Hugh of Champagne in a document of 1085–90, indicating that the man was at least sixteen by this date—a legal adult and thus able to bear witness to legal documents—and so born no later than 1070. The same name appears on a number of other charters up to 1113 also relating to Count Hugh of Champagne, suggesting that Hugo de Pedano or Hugo dominus de Peanz was a member of the Count's court. By the year 1113 he was married to Elizabeth de Chappes, who bore him at least one child, Thibaud, later abbot of Abbaye de la Colombe|la Colombe at Sens. The documents span Hugues' lifetime and the disposition of his property after his death.