5. The Priory Of Sion Was A Hoax
According to The Da Vinci Code, the Priory of Sion is a secret organization that was formed in 1099 to carry on the mission of the Merovingian kings: protecting the bloodline of Jesus. The Knights Templar was allegedly formed as the military branch of the Priory. The leaders of the Priory included such notable historical figures as the author Victor Hugo, the scientist Isaac Newton, and, of course, Leonardo Da Vinci himself. Da Vinci, as leader of the Priory, left behind clues, particularly in his paintings, as to the true nature of the Holy Grail.
The problem is that the entire Priory of Sion was a giant hoax formulated around a legend in Rennes Le-Chateau in France, where much of the speculation regarding the grail as the bloodline of Jesus can be traced. All of the documents related to the Priory of Sion were elaborate forgeries made by a man named Pierre Plantard, who used them to claim that he was the “Great Monarch” that Nostradamus foresaw. In fact, Plantard had a history of forming various associations, and he registered the Priory of Sion of 1956 as an advocacy for affordable housing. It had nothing to do with the Holy Grail, other than some opaque references that he made to reporters, which were interpreted by grail hunters as referring to it.