The Knights Templar have a greater mystique since they were suppressed, and revived only by fiction writers from Umberto Eco to Dan Brown; but to me the Knights Hospitaller are in some ways more impressive for managing to hang on to their state-without-a-country status for so long as the
Sovereign Military Order of Malta. They even had a substantial air force at one point as part of a scheme to circumvent treaty restrictions on Italy.
Very strong <i>Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars</i> [0] nostalgia reading this.<p>0: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_Sword:_The_Shadow_of_the_Templars" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_Sword:_The_Shadow_of_th...</a>
And if you want to read more about how the curse unfolded, have a lot of time to spare and can either read French or get your hands on a suitable translation, Maurice Druon's "Les Rois Maudits" is the epic multi-volume tale of a medieval dynasty's decline that you'll want to read.
"Paris in the fall, the last months of the year, at the end of the millenium. The city holds many memories for me, of music, of cafes, of love, and of death."