Graham Phillips
& Jodi Russell
Treasure Trail
Map of the Three Shires area of the Peak District in north-central England showing the four locations revealed in the Four Element Windows in Biddulph Grange.
Eliza Meteyard’s article in Country Words, dated 1 December 1866, revealed that Victorian archaeologist Thomas Bateman had found the three Templar relics, re-hidden them in the Peak District of north-central England, and taken the secret of their whereabouts to his grave. Jodi and Graham reasoned that this was a cryptic allusion to Bateman’s mysterious grave, which he had personally designed to stand on his own land. In turn, the Elemental Cross on Thomas Bateman’s grave, representing the classical elements of earth, air, fire, and water, led them to the Four Element Windows, originally installed at Biddulph Grange in the same year and painstakingly re-created after the 1896 fire. The stone urn, the only other decoration on Bateman’s grave, revealed that the Water Window indicated the area where the relics were hidden.
The imagery in three of the Four Element Windows relates to three specific places where the Templar relics were hidden separately in the Three Shires Head area of the Peak District. The relics were discovered by William Heath in the 1950s. One of them, said to be The Ring of Solomon, is still in the possession of the Heath family, but the whereabouts of the others remain unknown and are the subject of ongoing investigation.
