In 1202 a Templar brother called Haimard, a resident of the Paris Temple, was appointed treasurer to the Crown, an arrangement that benefited both parties equally. The Templars gained enormous prestige and political influence from the beginning of a tradition that would last for more than a century. France gained the most modern accounting system in Europe, consolidating all royal income and expenditure through a single set of books, allowing careful scrutiny and management on a scale seen nowhere among its neighbors.
