In 1308 King Philip IV of France established the Order under his temporal protection. Lazarus left the Holy Land and moved first to Cyprus, then Sicily and finally back to Boigny which had been raised to a barony in 1288. Later, after the fall of Acre in 1291 the Knights of St. In 1154, King Louis VII of France gave the Order a property at Boigny near Orléans which was to become the headquarters of the Order outside of the Holy Land. King Umberto II did not abdicate his position as fons honorum however, and the head of the former Royal House of Savoy remains the Order's Grand Master today. This became a national order of chivalry on the unification of Italy in 1861, but has been suppressed by law since the foundation of the Republic in 1946. In 1572, Pope Gregory XIII merged the Italian foundation of the Order of Saint Lazarus with the Order of Saint Maurice (founded in 1434) as the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus. The Order of Saint Lazarus quickly abandoned their military activities after the fall of Acre in 1291 and the dissolution of the Templars due to expense, being a relatively poor order. The leper knights were protected by a number of able-bodied knights but in times of crisis the leper knights themselves would take up arms. The Order of Saint Lazarus remained primarily a hospitaller order but it did take part in a number of battles including the Battle of La Forbie on 17 October 1244 where all of the lazar brethren who fought died and the Battle of Al Mansurah on 8-11 February 1250. The order established ‘lazar houses’ across Europe to care for lepers, and was well supported by other military orders which compelled lazar brethren in their rule to join the order on contracting leprosy. It is unknown when the order became militarised but militarisation occurred before the end of the twelfth century due to the large numbers of Templars and Hospitallers sent to the leper hospitals to be treated. The order was initially founded as a leper hospital outside the city walls of Jerusalem, but hospitals were established all across the Holy Land dependant on the Jerusalem hospital, notably in Acre. The first mention of the Order of Saint Lazarus in surviving sources was in 1142. The Order is one of the most ancient of the European orders of chivalry.įrom its foundation in the 11th century, members of the Order were dedicated to two ideals: aid to those suffering from the disease of leprosy and the defense of the Christian faith. The Military and Hospitaller Order of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem is an order of chivalry which originated in a leper hospital founded by Knights Hospitaller in 1098 by the crusaders of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem.