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"The secret of the Grail has been safe for a thousand years. And for all that time the Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword has been prepared to do anything to keep it safe."
Kazim[src]

The Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword was a secret society sworn to keep the Holy Grail safe from discovery and misuse. Members of the organization wore a tattoo of the cruciform on their chests.

History[]

Formation[]

Founded by 938,[1] the Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword was the successor of an Aramaic-speaking Semite secret society.[4] It was a secret and fanatical cult dedicated to protecting the Holy Grail.[5] To house the Holy Grail, in the year 1000, the society built the Temple of the Sun in the Canyon of the Crescent Moon using a pre-existing Greco-Roman facade as the front.[4]

In the mid-twelfth century the Brotherhood adopted the symbol of a cross with three bars similar in design to the Eastern Cross but the upper and lower bars took the shape of the Holy Grail.[6]

Protecting the Holy Grail[]

Kazim

Kazim reveals his tattoo.

In 1938, a team of Brotherhood members led by Kazim were in Venice to help protect the secret of the Grail from being found by Walter Donovan's expedition (Henry Walton Jones, Senior, Elsa Schneider and then later also Indiana Jones and Marcus Brody). The Brethren managed to knock out Marcus, but were unable to burn out Indy and Elsa to prevent them from discovering the Tomb of Sir Richard in the catacombs and gaining key information from the knight's shield.[2]

When Indy and Elsa emerged on a piazza, the brothers gave chase by motorboat, losing several members in a boat wreck and a few more to Indy's fists. Only Kazim survived and Indy let him go when they realized they were not at odds with each other, Kazim trusting the archaeologist's word that his father was his priority not chasing the Grail.[2]

Kazim2

A brotherhood member armed with a rifle fighting the Germans in Hatay.

When the Nazis mounted their expedition in Hatay to find the Holy Grail, Kazim kept tabs of their progress, becoming aware of their intentions to cross the Republic's deserts to locate the relic by spying on Donovan's meeting with the ruling Sultan. Assembling his forces, Kazim and the Brotherhood staged a rifle ambush he used M1916 Spanish Mauser, his men used Czech vz. 24 in the desert near the Canyon of the Crescent Moon. During the initial assault, several Nazis and Hatay soldiers were killed, but the Nazis counter-attacked with machine guns and stick hand grenades, eventually defeating the Brotherhood's soldiers[2] and wiping them out.[7] Whether or not any members of the Brotherhood survived the attack, no further attempts to prevent the Nazis or the Americans from recovering the Grail were made.[2]

Legacy[]

In the early 21st century, before its eventual publishing, Indiana Jones' journal was circulated by the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation to intelligence agents from North Korea, China and Cuba. Among its contents, Jones included some details he learned about them and their symbol.[6]

Members[]

  • Kazim
  • Sworn Members of the Brotherhood

Behind the scenes[]

The Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword first appeared in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, an invention for the film.[2]

The group was a later addition to the film's story as writer Jeffrey Boam wrote Kazim, then known as Kemal, as an agent of Hatay and Nazi ally pursuing the Holy Grail for his own purposes, and the men working under him were simply referred to as Turkish agents. However, in his rewrites, Tom Stoppard changed Kemal's name and motivations and developed the Brotherhood.

The promotional website for Indiana Jones and the Adventure of Archaeology misattributes the Brotherhood as being the kidnappers of Henry Jones rather than the Nazis.[8]

In LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures, the Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword's members, Kazim included, survive their ambush of the Nazis (although some can be killed by Indy and Sallah if the player chooses to do so), though they make no further appearances after their last scene.[9] In the sequel, however, the Brotherhood is only represented by Kazim in portable versions of the game as their subplot, along with the Biblioteca di San Barnaba scene and the Venice speedboat chase, is omitted from the home console iteration.[10]

Appearances[]

Sources[]

Notes and references[]

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