Order of the Flaming Rose

The Order of the Flaming Rose, sometimes simply The Order, is a militant religious knightly order, featured in CD Projekt's The Witcher franchise. At first knights were mostly based and organized in kingdoms of Aedirn and Temeria but later, after the uprising in Vizima, king Foltest confiscated the Order's assets in his realm to finance repairs and they were forced to move further north to Redania and even Kaedwen.

The primary purposes of Order are to defend the downtrodden from evil and spread the belief in the Eternal Fire, but they are also sometime serving as brute force to hunt down heretics and police force.

Heraldry


During the rule of Jacques de Aldersberg, coat of arms were red rose in golden flames on a red field. Later, after his death, this was changed and rose was no longer in flames but became surrounded by golden ribbon with inscription written on it in modern alphabet. Another symbol of the Order is the white rose with white being silver in heraldry. See also concept arts and sketches.

Grand Masters

 * Jacques de Aldersberg
 * Siegfried of Denesle (optionally)
 * Ulrich
 * Siegfried de Löwe

Knights

 * Tybalt
 * Roderick de Wett
 * Arthur Tailles of Dorndal
 * Adalbert
 * Antoine Pfeil
 * Anselm
 * Eric Vogel
 * Eric von Kidon
 * Ernst Goltz
 * Evariste of Metinna
 * Patrick de Weyze
 * Peter Nayhaer
 * Polycarp of Rinde
 * Lieutenant von Herst
 * Fette de'Amin
 * Robbe
 * Thunder
 * Tuur
 * Lewie

Affiliates

 * White Rayla
 * Adalbert
 * Hugo Balde

History
The Order was formed in 1268 with help of Redanian Intelligence Service, Dijkstra and Oribasius in particular, to counter the rising power of sorceresses, who were organizing themselves and growing in might. Furthermore, Redanians intentionally refused to grant a charter to the main commandery of the Order, thus preventing a strong organization from planting roots within the country's borders.

Whole organization was built on foundations of Order of the White Rose, which was operating in Temeria for centuries but instead of staying true to their ideals, knights of White Rose became more and more interested in getting donated lands from local nobles and transient accumulation of asset. Attaining membership required only the donation of one thousand Novigrad crowns to the order's treasury.

After the end of the second war with Nilfgaard and death of Grand Master Rudolf Valaris his cloak pinned up a charismatic leader known as Jacques de Aldersberg who undergone a major reform and directed order to help with upholding the law, maintaining peace, ensuring survival of Northerners, protecting the people from monsters and other evils, without wanting coins,and last but not least to promote belief in the Eternal Fire.

The Order's first headquarters were located in Cloister of Vizima's Temple Quarter, with numerous commanderies spreaded across the whole of Temeria and Aedirn. At its start the Order of the Flaming Rose was underestimated and treated too lightly by both aristocracy and monarchs. The Grand Master was calculating and cunning, but he was above all a fanatic. In that time the Order aimed to gain as much power over people's souls as possible. To achieve this, the Order waged secret wars with other clandestine organizations, such as the Lodge. The persecution of witches and freaks was but a prelude to the real attack, which was later directeded against the mages.

After Geralt killed Jacques at the behest of King Foltest and Radovid V, The order dissociated itself from the politics of its former leader, changing even the setup of its coat of arms, ever since then the rose is no longer burning, but instead is surrounded by a golden ribbon. The order resigned from all their previous possessions and was completely relocated to Redania by Radovid V himself who granted them land near Roggeven and helped them to build new stronghold Castle Barienmurg. They even stopped killing monsters, last of which were werewolves of Tretogor forest. They were invited to the peace talks at Loc Muinne, where they camped outside as they supported the peace of the negotiation and provided protection.

The Order also took part in "witch hunt" that followed after summit. During the Third Nilfgaard War, when the front reached the Pontar, they were sent by Radovid V to fight in a massive but indecisive battle that took place there. A large portion of the Order was sacrificed, and they were anxious to grieve for their fallen. However, their homes were no longer theirs; Radovid had sold their estates, fortresses, and outposts to the highest bidder, seized its treasury, and disbanded the order. A mixture of negative emotion caused the current Grand Master, Ulrich, to slowly go insane, and officially declared war on Radovid's Redania. Members of the order noticed this, and left the order to join the witch hunters under Radovid or became freelancer mercenaries. An even bigger insult to Ulrich was that a high-ranking officer of the Order, Siegfried de Löwe, had taken a chunk of his soldiers to oppose his radicalism. Ulrich and other radical leaders were later eventually slain by Geralt at the request of Adela, member of the Redanian Free Company, and their remaining followers died fighting against the sheriff's army.

Even though it looked worse than ever, the new Grand Master managed to reunite the Order somehow. They gained respect, fortune and name back to the point where they were able to send a representative, Count Arthur Tailles of Dorndal, and his bodyguards to the International Knights’ Tourney under the patronage of Lady Vivienne de Tabris during 1275 near Beauclair in Toussaint. And that is still not all. There was also a group of sanctimonious knights that tried to get Novigrad rid of a striga, one that marauded for years after the end of third war with Nilfgaard. They did not managed however.

Source

 * The Rose and the Flame

By the beginning of the third game the Order of the Flaming Rose was officially disbanded by the orders of Radovid 5th for a sizable time already, because of this they do not appear in the main game, however it is mentioned several times, and even Geralt mentions the brotherhood when he talks with Triss in the Lighthouse.

Hearts of Stone Expansion
Having resorted to banditry and drug manufacturing, "fallen knights" from the Order feature across the landscape east of Gustfields.

Trivia

 * The Order was, before the death of Jacques, killing monsters for free. Now they don't have enough time to do that.
 * One of the ongoing battles in the original game is the question of Geralt's loyalties. He can choose to side with the Order, taking a stand against the Scoia'tael.
 * The Order appears to be based, in large part, on the Christian Chivalric orders of the Medieval Age, most notably the Knights Templar. Their function as monastic warriors of the Eternal Flame, structure under a grandmaster, and even their fate is reminiscent of the Templars. Whilst they seem to be mostly influenced by the myth and legend surrounding these orders, Jacques de Aldersberg’s name is almost certainly inspired by the last Grandmaster of the Knights Templar, Jacques de Molay.

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