Faxfleet itself is situated west of what is now Kingston-upon-Hull, twenty miles south of Youlthorpe and some twenty-five miles south-west of Beswick. It lies at the once strategically-important confluence of the Ouse and Trent as they join to become the great Humber river and was a fishing, fowling and trading community from Romano-British times.  Inset: The Great Seal of the Order of the Knights Templar

The place-name is of Anglo-Scandinavian origin meaning Faxi's fleet or stream; Faxi being an Anglo-Scaninavian personal name meaning horse. Faxfleet's economic decline began in the early fourteenth century with the suppression of the Knights Templar and today, it is a tiny, scattered settlement of houses.

The Patchett family have farmed the land on which the preceptory stood (now part of Thorpe Grange Farm) since 1951. Today, the ruins of the preceptory are, for the most part, below ground. What remains of the preceptory lies under a field known as Temple Garth to the west of the farmyard. The Humber has retreated several hundred yards in the past seven centuries and what Robert Patchett describes as the "water gate" is now a considerable way inland. 

So who were the Knights Templar? The Knights Templar were an international order of soldier-monks created in the early twelfth century by Frenchman Hugues de Payens to protect travellers on pilgrimage to the Holy Land. With the fall of Acre in 1291, the Crusades were abandoned and the Templars became to be viewed more as a rival than a friend to the rulers of Europe. By the beginning of the fourteenth century, the Knights had nine thousand fortified castles across Christendom and were suppressed by order of Pope Clement V in 1308 -- with connivance from the French king -- on charges of obscenity, blasphemy and idolatry. 

What was a preceptory? Hall (1892) describes preceptories as "manors or estates, where erecting churches for the service of God and convenient houses, the Knight Templars placed some of their fraternity, under the government of one of those more eminent Templars, who had been, by the Grand Master, created Preceptores Templi, to take care of the lands and rents in the neighbourhood, and so were only cells to the principal house in London".

What is known of Faxfleet during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries is scanty. For example, when the preceptory was closed in 1308, its value was substantial by contemporary standards, estimated at £290 4s 10d and the contents of its chapel at £12 -- the equivalent of around £97,000 and £4,000 today. 

Reader (1972) provides a small insight into the Templars' estates at Faxfleet. In 1185, Serlo, Gille, Stephen, Odo, Harvat and Ucca were recorded as tenants of the Templars and were strip-farming two acres apiece. Gille, for instance, was paying rent of two shillings a year, besides a cock and ten eggs. Like their masters, their tenants bore Norman names.

By the end of the twelfth century, Faxfleet had an estimated population of one hundred including bondsmen, copyholders and freeholders. The Templars were in control of much of the local economy including markets and fairs. However, Faxfleet clearly remained an important centre for many years, even after the suppression of the Templars -- it was visited by Edward I in 1302, 1303; by Edward II in 1323; and by Henry IV in 1407.

Of Geoffrey Jolif less is known. We know of his existence only from the Calendar of Patent Rolls for the year 1290 (Membrane 37) which reads:

Feb 14, Westminster. Commission of oyer and terminer to S. le Conestab[le], J. de Steyngreve, Thomas de Metham and J. de Lithegr[eynes], touching an appeal which Thomas son of Roger de Eyvill of Suth Cave brings in the county of York against Brother Robert de Halton, master of the bailiwick of the Temple in the said county, Brother Geoffroi Jolif, preceptor of Faxflet, Brother Richard le Claver, Roger de Linton, John Brian, Ralph Surale of Popleton, William Griffin, Hugh le Maltestere of Faxflet and Roger Russel for the death of his brother William.

He ceased to be preceptor in 1301 and was not apparently among the Templars arrested at Faxfleet in 1308, incarcerated and interrogated at York Castle and later sent to serve in the Cistercian Order for penitence. 

Perhaps Geoffrey moved further afield after 1301. The Public Record Office Calendar of Yorkshire Inquisitions shows there was a Geoffrey Jolif living at Bentele (Bentley) near Doncaster in 1313. This is roughly twenty miles south-west of Faxfleet.

According to Coad (1984), a preceptor, like Geoffrey Jolif, would have been a professed member of the order of Templars but was "very rarely a knight". However, as an administrator rather than a fighting man, he would have been an educated man, a Norman and of corresponding social standing.

Inset: The advent of Norman England

This is corroborated by McKinley (1990) who states: "If surnames or by-names in use in English communities in the period from approximately 1100 to 1400 are analysed in class terms, it can be seen that there were sharp differences between one class and another in the nature of the names in use. A high proportion of the landholders of any real wealth or standing had locative names [ie. derived from place-names]. It was never the case that all landed families had surnames in that category. Some few had nickname-type names; the Norman landholding class had a tendency to employ nicknames of a grotesque or droll character, which perhaps reflected the contemporary sense of humour, and some of these nicknames in the course of time developed into hereditary surnames ...".

The evidence at Faxfleet offers one of the earliest examples of the Middle English jolif, jolyf in English. The Oxford English Dictionary suggests the adjective was not used in written English before the opening years of the fourteenth century (1305-10). By this time, it had assumed its modern meaning of "jolly, lively or festive".

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