Papal recognition of the Knights Hospitaller

February 15, 1113

Paschal II issued the bull Pie postulatio voluntatis, granting the Jerusalem hospital of Blessed Gerard the status of an exempt religious order answering directly to Rome. Its nursing brothers would soon start carrying swords as well as bedpans. Within a generation the Hospitallers would evolve from humble caregivers tending sick pilgrims into one of the most formidable military orders in the Latin East, commanding castles across the Levant.