Mystery surrounds virtually every aspect of the Templar story, from their origins in the aftermath of the First Crusade, through their rise to supreme wealth and power - dominating medieval Europe for nearly two centuries - to their abrupt and dramatic suppression. Ferociously punished for alleged heresy and depravity at the beginning of the 14th century, their story is believed to have ended there, merely an interesting historical footnote. But did they, as many now believe, survive in se...

Do ghosts exist? Do you believe in ghosts? Many thousands of people claim to have seen them, even interacted with them - and often even entrenched sceptics have been converted by a moment's brush with 'impossible' paranormal entities. Sometimes ghosts are benign, protecting and warning about imminent danger; sometimes they are neutral, merely appearing and disappearing without any apparent awareness of the living. But sometimes they are evil, causing untold mental and physical problems for...

The MysteryWhat is it that brings so many people to this out-of-the-way chapel? Not only is Rosslyn Chapel (or, to give it its official title, the Collegiate Church of St Matthew) a stunning example of late medieval architecture and the stonemason's art, but it contains many clues that it is more than just a place of worship – and even that it was never intended to be simple a Christian church.History of Rosslyn ChapelThe mastermind behind the project was Sir William ...

FIRST written more than 10 years ago, Sons of the Widow has been updated to take account of new developments in Freemasonic research – but its general theme remains unaltered. Modern day Freemasons persistently maintain that Freemasonry is not a secret organisation, but an organisation with secrets. In recent years the organisation has 'opened up' to the inquisitive outside world in a manner which would have been unheard of previously – to the extent of even hosting its own websites – whil...

Modern hoax or the most powerful and secretive cabal in history? Opinions on the mysterious Priory of Sion - in its native French, the Prieuré de Sion - are polarised between these two extremes.If the Priory of Sion's claims are true, it has existed for almost 1,000 years and has counted some of the greatest names in history - Nostradamus, Leonardo da Vinci, Isaac Newton and, nearer our own time, Victor Hugo and Jean Cocteau - in its ranks. It claims to have been behind some of the...

THE 40th anniversary of one of the greatest mysteries of the 20th century was marked on November 22, 2003 – with the mystery, frustratingly, no closer to being solved. Despite the welter of conspiracy theories that have attached themselves to the assassination in Dallas, Texas, of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, only one fact is now known for certain – that his death was indeed the result of a conspiracy. Pending some startling new revelation surrounding the events of that tragic day in...

IntroductionThe first doubts about the official version were raised by Professor Spann's autopsy, which suggested that Rudolf Hess had been strangled with the cable, rather than hanging himself with it - which of course means that somebody else was involved.Background - The prisoner of SpandauUntil his death in 1987, Nazi Deputy Fuhrer Rudolf Hess had been imprisoned since his flight to Britain in May 1941. Sentenced to life imprisonment for Crimes against Peace at th...

Of all the New Testament characters, few - other than Jesus himself - have exerted such an enduring fascination as Mary Magdalene, believed by the Church to have been a reformed prostitute. Yet her never-ending appeal is odd for one who appears so briefly - and then so elusively - in the Bible: so what has made her so entrancing to generations of Christians and non-Christians alike? Was she, as many now argue, actually Jesus' wife and the mother of his children? And why is she intimately c...

For centuries belief that the Shroud of Turin really bears the likeness of the crucified Jesus Christ had to be a matter of faith alone. Then in 1898 it was photographed for the first time, and suddenly the negative image revealed an astonishingly life-like wealth of detail of a tall bearded man horribly tortured with whip, nails and crown of thorns. Virtually overnight, the age-old faith of the pilgrims seemed to be vindicated. Surely this was the very image of Jesus?

Whether or not The Illuminati – an elite body claiming an ancient pedigree – does exist, it is important that growing numbers of people nonetheless do believe it exists. So does it exist? If so, is it a force for evil or a force for good - or, as some would have it, a conspiracy aimed at making us believe there is a conspiracy? Was the Bavarian Illuminati of Adam Weishaupt the true inheritor of more ancient knowledge?A force for evil or a force for good? A movement whose benevolent...

It is the hiding place of the Holy Grail, or a great secret that will rock the Church. It is a place of hidden treasure and dark knowledge. It is the place where Jesus is buried... These are just some of the many theories now current about the village where a Victorian priest became strangely - and massively - rich, and where he left clues to a great mystery in the very fabric of his church. What is the truth about Father Sauniere and the now-famous village of Rennes-le-Château?Thi...

It was in the early hours of Sunday August 31, 1997, in a tunnel at the Place d'Alma in Paris, that Diana, Princess of Wales, was killed along with her lover Dodi Al Fayed and their driver Henri Paul. Dodi's bodyguard, Trevor Rees-Jones, survived. The family of Henri Paul not only had to cope with the tragedy of his death but the fact that the official record held that he had been responsible for the crash which claimed their lives through a combination of alcohol, drugs, and driving at hi...