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B
BAAL - BARN
BARR - BELC
BELE - BLUE
BIBLE
BOAR - BREA
BRET - BUIL
BUL - BY
This word, being the plural of Brother in the solemn style, is more generally used in Masonic language, instead of the common plural, Brothers. Thus Freemasons always speak of The Brethren of the Lodge, and not of The Brothers of the Lodge.
Identical with the Fréres Noirs, or Black Brethren.
See Bridge Builders of the Middle Ages.
The term by which Freemasons distinguish themselves as the members of a confraternity or brotherhood united by a mystical bond (see Mystic Tie).
See Marconis, also Memphis, Rite of
See Lawrie, Alexander
A most significant symbol in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Degrees of the Scottish Rite, at which an important event transpires. The characteristic letters which appear on the Bridge, L. O. P., refer to that liberty of thought which is ever thereafter to be the inheritance of those who have been symbolically captive for seven weeks of years.
It is the new era of the freedom of expression, the liberation of the former captive thought. Liberty, but not License. It is also a symbol in the Royal Order (see Lakak Deror Pessah; also Liber; also Liberty of Passage).
In the article which begins on page 151 it is stated that the Gild of Bridge Builders was a religious fraternity. Since that article written (it was based on the then most reliable authorities) what may be called the archeology of bridge building has put that ancient craft in a new light. Just as some bishop or abbot was given credit for almost every cathedral, large church, or abbey, and even though the prelate might not have been born when the construction was begun, so did the same chroniclers make out that almost every other concerted public activity, association, etc., had been either an action by the Church or else one directed by it.
Even a local gild of six or seven blacksmiths in a French town of the year 1200 A.D. may appear in the monkish chronicles as having been a Holy Brotherhood of the Church of St. Paul Dedicated to St. Dominic, etc., the whole of it sounding as if black smithing had been a holy rite. Everything in the Twelfth, Thirteenth, and Fourteenth Centuries was, as it were, asserted with the appearance of religion - it was then as it is now with the Mexican language in which "good-bye" becomes "God go with you", and a man asks for a match "in the name of God", and a mother names a son Jesus and a Daughter Holy Annunciation.
There were fraternities of Bridge Builders in the Middle Ages; they had their Patron Saints; they went by religious names; but bridge building per se was no more religious than it is now. A bridge was build at need, and often at the expense of the taxpayers in a town; its construction might be entrusted to a special gild formed for the purpose; it might be paid for by gifts or by tolls; but the Masons who built it usually were ordinary Masons. Its was only when great bridges were built, like London Bridge (which was a row of buildings erected across the Thames) or when one was ornamented with carving or with Sculpture, or involved difficult problems of engineering, that Freemasons were called in; but it is doubtful if in many instances they formed fraternities qua bridge builders, after the fashion of the separate associations of castle builders, military architects, tilers, etc.
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It is of interest that the first great Modern bridge (at least it is so claimed by historians of it) was to a peculiar extent almost an event in the history of Speculative Freemasonry. The engineer and constructor of the famous Wearmouth Bridge in England (pages are given to it in a number of histories of engineering) was Bro. Rowland Burdon. He was made a Mason in Phoenix Lodge, no. 94, Sunderland; he joined Palatine Lodge in 1791; in 1793 was elected Master, and served several years. The foundation of the Bridge was laid with Masonic ceremonies by the Provincial Grand Lodge, September 24, 1793; its completion was also celebrated by ceremonies by the Provincial Grand Lodge on August 9, 1796 (during Washington's second term, it may be said to help Americans to place the date). (It happens that the builders of the Brooklyn Bridge were Masons, as may be found in an article in the New York Masonic Outlook. See History of Phoenix Lodge; see also other bridge items in History of Britannia Lodge, page 104.) NOTE. Apropos of the typical Medieval custom of clothing everything with a religious guise it is interesting to observe that ordinary business documents such as deeds, bills of sales, contracts, or legal documents, or a physician's prescription, or a parchment roll of kitchen recipes might be decorated with religious emblems and begin-like the Old Charges-with a religious invocation. |
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Bishops often were educated and trained in cathedral schools at a prince's or king's expense expressly to hold positions in what is now the civil service. Even the since canonized Thomas à Beeket served for years in that capacity, and was made a bishop for political reasons! Thousands of tonsured clerics were trained to work in offices, government bureaus, etc., as clerks, bookkeepers, etc., and never performed religious services in their lives. It is not out of any desire to disparage religion, or to discredit the church, but solely in obedience to the facts as found, that historians are agreed that the Ages of Faith were not more faithful than other ages, and that the men were in their spirit, thought, and conduct no more religious, or pious, in the Thirteenth Century than they are now. The fact is important for Masonic history, because a reader of it may gain the impression that because so many Medieval Freemasons worked on churches, cathedrals, abbeys, priories, monasteries, chapels, etc., they were in some peculiar sense a religious fraternity. They were men in religion, but no more so than other men; ran their own affairs; excluded priests from control over their Lodges; and had no religious rites, practices, or doctrines peculiar to themselves.
Before speaking of the Pontifices, or the Fraternity of Bridge Builders, whose history is closely connected with that of the Freemasons of the Middle Ages, it will be as well to say something of the word which they assumed as the title of their brotherhood.
The Latin word pontifex, with its equivalent English pontiff, literally signifies the builder of a bridge, from pons, meaning a bridge, and facere, to make. But this sense, which it must have originally possessed, it seems very speedily to have lost, and we, as well as the Romans, only recognize pontifex or pontiff as significant of a sacerdotal priestly character.
Of all the Colleges of Priests in ancient Rome, the most illustrious was that of the Pontiffs. The College of Pontiffs was established by Numa, and originally consisted of five, but was afterward increased to sixteen. The whole religious system of the Romans, the management of all the sacred rites, and the government of the priesthood, was under the control and direction of the College of Pontiffs, of which the Pontifex Maximus, or High Priest, was the presiding officer and the organ through which its decrees were communicated to the people. Hence, when the Papal Church established its seat at the City of Rome, its Bishop assumed the designation of Pontifex Maximus as one of his titles, and Pontiff and Pope are now considered equivalent terms.
The question naturally arises as to what connection there was between religious rites and the building of bridges, and why a Roman priest bore the name which literally denoted a bridge builder. Etymologists have in vain sought to solve the problem, and, after all their speculation, fail to satisfy us.
One of the most tenable theories is that of Schmitz, who thinks the Pontifices were so called because they superintended the sacrifices on a bridge, alluding to the Argean sacrifices on the Sublician Bridge.
But Varro gives a more probable explanation when he tells us that the Sublician Bridge was built by the pontifices; and that it was deemed, from its historic association, of so sacred a character, that no repairs could be made on it without a previous sacrifice, which was to be conducted by the Chief Pontiff in person.
The true etymology is, however, undoubtedly lost; yet it may be interesting, as well as suggestive, to know that in old Rome there was, even in a mere title, supposing that it was nothing more, some sort of connection between the art or practice of bridge building and the mysterious sacerdotal rites established by Numa, a connection which was subsequently again developed in the Masonic association which is the subject of the present article.
Whatever may have been this connection in Pagan Rome, we find, after the establishment of Christianity and in the Middle Ages, a secret Fraternity organized, as a branch of the Traveling Freemasons of that period, whose members were exclusively devoted to the building of bridges, and who were known as Pontifices, or Bridge Builders, and styled by the French les Fréres Pontifes, or Pontifical Brethren, and by the Germans Brückenbrüder, or Brethren of the Bridge. It is of this Fraternity that, because of their association in history with the early corporations of Freemasons, it is proposed to give a brief sketch.
In the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the methods of intercommunication between different countries were neither safe nor convenient. Travelers could not avail themselves of the comforts of either macadamized roads or railways. Stage-coaches were unknown. He who was compelled by the calls of business to leave his home, trudged as a pedestrian wearily on foot, or on horseback, if his means permitted that mode of journeying; made his solitary ride through badly constructed roads, where he frequently became the victim of robbers, who took his life as well as his purse, or submitted to the scarcely less heavy exactions of some lawless Baron, who claimed it as his high prerogative to levy a tax on every wayfarer who passed through his domains. Inns were infrequent, incommodious, and expensive, and the weary traveler could hardly have appreciated Shenstone's declaration, that:
Whoever has traveled life's dull round,
Wherever his stages may have been,May sigh to think he still has found
His warmest welcome at an inn.
But one of the greatest embarrassments to which the traveler in this olden time was exposed occurred when there was a necessity to cross a stream of water.
The noble bridges of the ancient Greeks and Romans had been destroyed by time or war, and the intellectual debasement of the dark ages had prevented their renewal. Hence, when refinement and learning began to awaken from that long sleep which followed the invasion of the Goths and Vandals and the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, the bridge less rivers could only be crossed by swimming through the rapid current, or by fording the shallow places.
The earliest improvement toward a removal of these difficulties consisted in the adoption of rafts or boats, and gilds or corporations of raftsmen and boatmen, under the names of Linuncularii, Lintrarii, and Utricularii, were formed to transport travelers and merchandise across rivers. But the times were lawless, and these watermen oftener plundered than assisted their patrons. Benevolent persons, therefore, saw the necessity of erecting hostelries on the banks of the rivers at frequented places, and of constructing bridges for the transportation of travelers and their goods.
All the architectural labors of the period were, as is well known, entrusted to the gilds or corporations of builders who, under the designation of Traveling Freemasons, passed from country to country, and, patronized by the Church, erected those magnificent cathedrals, monasteries, and other public edifices, many of which have long since crumbled to dust, but a few of which still remain to attest the wondrous ability of these Operative Brethren. Alone skilled in the science of architecture, from them only could be derived workmen capable of constructing safe and enduring bridges.
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Accordingly, a portion of these Freemasons, withdrawing from the general body, united, under the patronage of the Church, into a distinct corporation of Fréres Pontifes, or Bridge Builders. The name which they received in Germany was that of Brückenbrüder, or Brethren of the Bridge. A legend of the Church attributes their foundation to Saint Benezet, who accordingly became the patron of the Order, as Saint John was of the Freemasons proper. Saint Benezet was a shepherd of Avilar, in France, who was born in the year 1165. "He kept his mother's sheep in the country", says Butler, the historian of the saints, "being devoted to the practices of piety beyond his age; when moved by charity to save the lives of many poor persons, who were frequently drowned in crossing the Rhone, and, being inspired by God, he undertook to build a bridge over that rapid river at Avignon. He obtained the approbation of the Bishop, proved his mission by miracles, and began the work in 1177, which he directed during seven years. He died when the difficulty of the undertaking was over, in 1184. "His body was buried upon the bridge itself, which was not completely finished till four years after his decease, the structure whereof was attended with miracles from the first laying of the foundations till it was completed, in 1188". |
Divesting this account, which Butler has drawn from the Acta Sanctorum of the Bollandists, of the miraculous, the improbable, and the legendary, the naked fact remains that Benezet was engaged, as the principa1 conductor of the work, in the construction of the magnificent bridge at Avignon, with its eighteen arches. As this is the most ancient of the bridges of Europe built after the commencement of the restoration of learning, it is most probable that he was, as he claimed to have been, the founder of that Masonic corporation of builders who, under the name of Brethren of the Bridge, assisted him in the undertaking, and who, on the completion of their task, were engaged in other parts of France, of Italy, and of Germany, in similar labors.
After the death of Saint Benezet, he was succeeded by Johannes Benedictus, to whom, as Prior of the Bridge, and to his Brethren, a charter was granted in 1187, by which they obtained a chapel and cemetery, with a chaplain.
In 1185, one year after the death of Saint Benezet, the Brethren of the Bridge commenced the construction of the Bridge of Saint Esprit, over the Rhone at Lyons. The completion of this work greatly extended the reputation of the Bridge Builders, and in 1189 they received a charter from Pope Clement III. The City of Avignon continued to be their headquarters, but they gradually entered into Italy, Spain, Germany, Sweden, and Denmark.
The Swedish chronicles mention one Benedict, between the years 1178 and 1191, who was a bishop and bridge builder at Skara, in that kingdom. Could he have been the successor, already mentioned, of Benezet, who had removed from Avignon to Sweden?
As late as 1590 we find the Order existing at Lucca, in Italy, where, in 1562, John de Medicis exercised the functions of its chief under the title of Magister, or Master. How the Order became finally extinct is not known; but after its dissolution much of the property which it had accumulated passed into the hands of the Knights Hospitalers or Knights of Malta.
The gild or corporation of Bridge Builders, like the corporation of Traveling Freemasons, from which it was an offshoot, was a religious institution, but admitted laymen into the society. In other words, the workmen, or the great body of the gild, were of course secular, but the patrons were dignitaries of the Church.
When by the multiplication of bridges the necessity of their employment became less urgent, and when the numbers of the workmen were greatly increased, the patronage of the Church was withdrawn, and the association was dissolved, or soon after fell into decay; its members, probably, for the most part, reuniting with the corporations of Freemasons from whom they had originally been derived.
Nothing has remained in modern Freemasonry to preserve the memory of the former connection of the Order with the bridge builders of the Middle Ages, except the ceremony of opening a bridge, which is to be found in the rituals of the last century; but even this has now become almost obsolete. Lenning, who has appropriated a brief article in his Encydopädie der Freimaurerei to the Brückenbrüder, or Brethren of the Bridge, incorrectly calls them an Order of Knights. They took, he says, vows of celibacy and poverty, and also to protect travelers, to attend upon the sick, and to build bridges, roads, and hospitals.
Several of the inventors of advanced degrees have, he thinks, sought to revive the Order in some of the degrees which they have established, and especially in the Knights of the Sword, which appears in the Ancient and Accepted Rite as the Fifteenth Degree, or Knights of the East; but Brother Mackey could find no resemblance except that in the Knights of the Sword there is in the ritual a reference to a river and a bridge.
He was more inclined to believe that the Nineteenth Degree of the same Rite, or Grand Pontiff, was once connected with the Order we have been considering; and that, while the primitive ritual has been lost or changed so as to leave no vestige of a relationship between the two, the name which is still retained may have been derived from the Fréres Pontifes of the twelfth century. This, however, is mere conjecture, without any means of proof. Accordingly Brother Mackey was of the opinion that all that we do positively know is, that the bridge builders of the Middle Ages were a Masonic association, and as such are entitled to a place in all Masonic histories.
The dipioma or certificate in some of the advanced degrees is so called.
A Freemason is said to be bright who is well acquainted with the ceremonies, the forms of opening and closing, and the ceremonies of initiation. This expression does not, however, in its technical sense, appear to include the superior knowledge of the history and science of the Institution, and many bright Freemasons are, therefore, not necessarily learned; and, on the contrary, some learned Freemasons are not well versed in the exact phraseology of the ceremonies. The one knowledge depends on a retentive memory, the other is derived from deep research. It is scarcely necessary to say which of the two kinds of knowledge is the more valuable. The Freemason whose acquaintance with the Institution is confined to what he learns from its esoteric ceremonies will have but a limited idea of its science and philosophy. And yet a knowledge of the ceremonies as the foundation of higher knowledge is essential.
The Scotch term for Masonic initiation.
A province in the western Dominion of Canada. The first Lodge established in this province was Victoria, No. 783, by the Grand Lodge of England, March 19, 1859. In 1871 the Grand Lodge of England had four Lodges and the Grand Lodge of Scotland five Lodges. A Convention was held on October 21, 1871; eight out of the nine Lodges were represented, and the Grand Lodge of British Columbia was duly organized. Brother Israel Wood Powell, M. D., Provincial Grand Master of Scotland, was elected the first Grand Master.
or KENYA COLONY. The Grand Lodges of England and Scotland have each chartered a Lodge in this district at Nairobi.
A country in South America. The Grand Lodge of Holland warranted Lodge Saint Juan de la Ré-Union in 1771 at Georgetown. It did not however survive very long. Lodges were also chartered by the Grand Lodges of New York, England, Scotland, etc. The Grand Lodge of Scotland has two Lodges at Georgetown.
Known also as Belize, a British colony in Central America. Amity Lodge, No. 309, was chartered at St. George's Quay by the Grand Lodge of England, but as it did not succeed it was dropped from the Register in 1813. In 1820 British Constitution Lodge was warranted by the United Grand Lodge of England at Honduras Bay but, with that of another Lodge chartered in 1831, its name was omitted from the Register on June 4, 1862.
English Red Apron Lodge, now No. 8, founded 1722, having Centenary Warrant but no special jewel. Officers permitted golden or gilt jewels, same as Lodge of Antiquity. This honor conferred when Lord Cranstoun became Grand Master, 1745. He was a member of the British Lodge and the jewels used by its Master and Wardens were those worn by the Grand Master and the Grand Wardens and these jewels were gilded before they were returned to the owners, who were permitted to continue their use of them in gold or gilded metal.
In the lectures of the early part of the eighteenth century the Immovable Jewels of the Lodge are said to be "the Tarsel Board, Rough Asmar, and Broached Thurnel"; and in describing their uses it is taught that "the Rough Ashlar is for the Fellow Crafts to try their jewels on, and the Broached Thurnel for the Entered Apprentices to learn to work upon". Much difficulty has been met with in discovering what the Broached Thurnel really was. Doctor Oliver, most probably deceived by the use to which it was assigned, says in his Dictionary of Symbolic Masonry that it was subsequently called the Rough Asmar. This is evidently incorrect, because a distinction is made in the original lecture between it and the Rough Asmar, the former being for the Apprentices and the latter for the Fellow Crafts. Krause (Kunsturkenden,1, 73), has translated it by Drehbank, which means a turning-lathe, an implement not used by Operative Freemasons. Now what is the real meaning of the word? If we inspect an old tracing board of the Apprentice's Degree of the date when the Broached Thurnel was in use, we shall find depicted on it three symbols, two of which will at once be recognized as the Tarsel, or Trestle Board, and the Rough Ashlar, just as we have them at the present day; while the third symbol will be that depicted in the margin, namely, a cubical stone with a pyramidal apex. This is the Broached Thurnel. It is the symbol which is still to be found, with precisely the same form, in all French tracing boards, under the name of the pierre cubique, or cubical stone, and which has been replaced in English and American tracing boards and rituals by the Perfect Ashlar. For the derivation of the words, we must go to old and now almost obsolete terms of architecture. On inspection, it will at once be seen that the Broached Thurnel has the form of a little square turret with a spire springing from it. Now, broach, or broche, says Parker in the Glossary of Terms in Architecture (page 97), is "an old English term for a spire, still in use in some parts of the country, as in Leicestershire, where it is said to denote a spire springing from the tower without any intervening parapet. Thurnel is from the old French tournelle, a turret or little tower. The Broached Thurnel, then, was the Spired Turret. lt was a model on which apprentices might learn the principles of their art, because it presented to them, in its various outlines, the forms of the square and the triangle, the cube and the pyramid". Brother Hawkins had somewhat different conclusions about the matter and added the following comments:
In Ars Quatuor Coronatorum (xii, 205), Brother G. W. Speth quotes from the Imperial Dictionary: "Broach, in Scotland, a term among masons, signifying to rough hew. Broached Work, in Scotland, a term among masons, signifying work or stones that are rough-hewn, and thus distinguished from Ashlar or polished work. Broaching-Thurmal, Thurmer, Turner, names given to the chisels by which broached work is executed".
And therefore Brother Speth suggests that the Broached Thurnel was really a chisel for the Entered Apprentices to learn to work with. We find that the new English Dictionary explains Broached as a term used "of stone; chiselled with a broach", or narrow-pointed chisel used by Freemasons; but Brother Hawkins points out that this still leaves it uncertain what a "Thurnel" is. Brother Clegg has had the advantage of actually working with broaching tools and therefore ought to know something about broached work. The word broach in the industries is usually applied to the operation of shaping or forming some part by special tools made to produce some particular shape or design. A triangular hole in a piece of metal or any other material can for example be furnished to a considerable degree of accuracy by simply forcing the cutting tool through it as a final operation. This is called broaching and the tools for the purpose are known as broaches. A tool that is used to smooth out, a small opening by being rotated within it is often called a broach and, as will be seen, the idea is that the broach is used to form a special shape. These special shapes therefore are known as work which is broached and this agrees very closely with the understanding that underlies each of the comments made above. The exact meaning of Thurnel or Thurmal is not any too clear but has evidently been applied to the instrument as well as the product of its work. Brother Charles E. Funk of the Editorial Department of the Funk & Wagnalls New Standard Dictionary of the English Language has very kindly read the above article and favors us with the following comments:
I have gone through fifteen or more dictionaries from 1643 up to Murray's New English Dictionary, including several dialectical dictionaries and one on archaisms. None of them record any such spelling as thurnel, thurmal, nor thurmer. Broach or broche, broch, broache, broych, brooch, brotch - are not so obscure. Five centuries and more of usage still find the early senses preserved. But even so, ambiguity is not avoided in attempting to determine the expression broached thurnel, for broach may refer either (1) to the mason's tool, a narrow pointed chisel by which he furrowed the surface of stone, as in the quotation of 1703, "to broych or broach, as Masons an Atchler or ashlar when with the small point of their ax (?) they make it full of little pits or small holes"; also that of 1544, "In hewinge, brochinge, and scaplyn of stone for the chapell"; or (2) to the name of the spire itself, a current form in England today which dates from 1501", For trassying & makyn moldes to the brooch".
With this second and still current usage of broach, then, and assuming that thumel is a variant spelling of tournelle, as it might well have been, we can derive a thoroughly satisfactory explanation of the expression and one which also agrees with the old illustrations, a spired turret. This view may be further supported while we recall the old German form Thurm or tower. Murray lends further support to this view in his record of the variants of tournelle, which appeared variously from 1400 to the middle of the seventeenth century as tornel, turnelle, tornelle, toumel, tornil, and tournell. All of this may lend weight to the theory as given by Mackey. But if this theory is accepted, the mystery is still unsolved, for by which logic would the symbol of Fellow Craft be the Rough Ashlar and that of the Apprentice be such a highly finished work as the Spired Turrett One would expect a reversal of such symbolism at the least. It seems, therefore, that the explanation as a spired turret is inappropriate one would not expect an apprentice "to learn to work upon" such a structure. We are forced, then, to consider the first definition of broach and to do some more or less etymological guesswork with thurnel, which I am offering as a possible clue I can not locate the missing link to make it conclusive, for we have no reference books covering the subject of stone-dressing tools on our shelves. Dialectically th was occasionally substituted for f. We have such instances as thane for fane, thetch for fetch, and thurrow for furraw, and others. I would expect, therefore, to find some dressing tool, no longer employed, perhaps, or now under another name, which was called a furnel, fournel, fornel, or even firnel, perhaps with an m in place of the n. It may be that the firming-chisel is the present type. This tool would be a tapered handtool, set in a flat head to receive blows from a hammer, and would be used for rough dressing. Possibly it might be the former which was thus described in 1688:
"The second is termed a Former, it is a Chissel used before the Paring Chissel in all works. The Clenser, or Former, is a broad ended Iron Plate, or Old-Cold? Chessel with a broad bottom, set in an Handle; with which Tool they smooth and make even the Stone after it is cut into that form and Order, as the Work-man will have it".
Again it may have been a development from the formal referred to by Bossewell in 1572:
"A Sledge or a Hammer, of some called a formal", ( fore-mall, later called a forehammer).
A broached formal would then have been a tool, perhaps a hammer head, shaped something like the blacksmith's set hammer, with one broad flat face, the other tapering to a point. The pointed end would be used for broaching, and the flat end for hammer finishing. Note that both these descriptions might well refer to the ax in the quotation of 1703. And further, although the members of the family give Fourneaux or Fournivalle as the original form of the name. I offer the conjecture that the name Furnald, Fernald may have had its original from the occupational term furnel (thurnel). In the latter part of Brother Funk's consideration of this matter he had in mind the name of James C.Femald, who was editorially connected with his company and a distinguished author.
BROKEN COLUMNAmong the Hebrews, columns, or pillars, were used metaphorically to signify princes or nobles, as if they were the pillars of a state. Thus (in Psalm xi, 3), the passage, reading in our translation, "If the foundations be destroyed what can the righteous do?" is, in the original, "when the columns are overthrown", that is, when the firm supporters of what is right and good have perished. So the passage in Isaiah (xix, 10), should read: "her (Egypt's) columns are broken down", that is, the nobles of her state. In Freemasonry, the broken column is, as Master Freemasons well know, the emblem of the fall of one of the chief supporters of the Craft. The use of the column or pillars as a monument erected over a tomb was a very ancient custom, and was a very significant symbol of the character and spirit of the person interred. It is accredited to Jeremy L. Cross that he first introduced the Broken Column into the ceremonies, but this may not be true (see Monument). |
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Born at Baltimore, Maryland, August, 1823, died at Denver, Colorado, January 9, 1903. Admitted to the bar in Vandalia, Illinois, 1853. Representative to Congress from 1865 to 1869 from that State went to Colorado in 1870 and in 1879 elected a member of the Legislature and in 1881 appointed Commissioner to revise the laws of the State. Made a Freemason at Vandalia in 1854 and chosen Grand Master in 1864. Served as Grand Orator of the Grand Lodge of Colorado in 1874, and was elected Honorary Grand Master of that Body in 1889 in consideration of his distinguished services to the Craft. He was the originator of what has been styled a new branch of Freemasonry, known as the Free and Accepted Architects, the object of which was to restore and preserve the lost work of the ancient Craft. At one time there were five Lodges of Architects in the United States, and also a Grand Lodge. The instruction embodied in the Degrees was in no sense an innovation, but designed to impart to students of the Craft a knowledge of Masonic symbolism not otherwise obtainable. His famous book entitled Restorations of Masonic Geometry and Symbol, being a dissertation on the lost knowledge of the Lodge, was begun in 1884 and on it he worked for sixteen hours a day for six years and two months. One Chapter, devoted to the floors of the three Lodges, occupied two years and two months in its preparation, while the book was read and re-read fourteen times for correction and revision.
The term which Freemasons apply to each other. Freemasons are Brethren, not only by common participation of the human nature, but as professing the same faith; as being jointly engaged in the same labors, and as being united by a mutual covenant or tie, whence they are also emphatically called Brethren of the Mystic Tie (see Companion and Mystic Tie).
When our Savior designated his disciples as his Brethren, he implied that there was a close bond of union existing between them, which idea was subsequently carried out by Saint Peter in his direction to "Love the Brotherhood". Hence the early Christians designated themselves as a brotherhood, a relationship unknown to the Gentile religions; and the ecclesiastical and other confraternities of the Middle Ages assumed the same title to designate any association of men engaged in the same common object, governed by the same rules, and united by an identical interest. The association or Fraternity of Freemasons is in this sense called a brotherhood.
Admission to the Craft. Cunningham's Diary, the diary and general expenditure book of William Cunningham of Craigends, edited by the Reverend James Dodd, D.D., 1887, and published by the Scottish Historical Society., has the following entries:
June 17, 1676.
To my mail to pay his traveling. . . . . . . . . .01 2 0June 26, 1677.
To Andrew Greg his servant in part of his fee. . . . . . . . . .02 0 0
To him to pay his Brothering with. . . . . . . . . .01 4 0
Glossary at end of book explains that Brothering means admission to the Craft Fellowship.
See Kiss, Fraternal
At a very early period in the course of his initiation, a candidate for the mysteries of Freemasonry is informed that the great
principles of the Order are Brotherly Love, Relief, and Truth
. These virtues are illustrated, and their practice
recommended to the aspirant, at every step of his progress; and the instruction, though continually varied in its mode, is so
constantly repeated, as infallibly to impress upon his mind their absolute necessity in the constitution of a good Freemason.
Brotherly Love might very well be supposed to be an ingredient in the organization of a society so peculiarly constituted as that of
Freemasonry. But the Brotherly Love which we inculcate is not a mere abstraction, nor is its character left to any general and
careless understanding of the candidate, who might be disposed to give much or little of it to his Brethren, according to the
peculiar constitution of his own mind, or the extent of his own generous or selfish feelings. It is, on the contrary, closely
defined; its object plainly denoted; and the very mode and manner of its practice detailed in words, and illustrated by
symbols, so as to give neither cause for error nor apology for indifference.
Every Freemason is acquainted with the Five Points of Fellowship - he knows their symbolic meaning - he can never forget the interesting incidents that accompanied their explanation; and while he has this knowledge, and retains this remembrance, he can be at no loss to understand what are his duties, and what must be his conduct, in relation to the principle of Brotherly Love (see Points of Fellowship).
See Bridge Builders of the Middle Ages
See Rosicrucianism
See Latin Lodge
In 1798, John Browne published, in London, a work entitled The Master Key through all the Degrees of a Freemason's Lodge, to which is added, Eullogiums and Illustrations upon Freemasonry. In 1802, he published a second edition under the title of Browne's Masonic Master Key through the three degrees, by way of polyglot. Under the sanction of the Craft in general, containing the exact mode of working, initiation, passing and raising to the sublime Degree of a Master. Also, the several duties of the Master, officers, and Brethren while in the Lodge, with every requisite to render the accomplished Mason an explanation of all the hieroglyphics.
The whole interspersed with illustrations on Theology, Astronomy, Architecture, Arts, Sciences, many of which are by the editor. Browne had been, he says, the Past Master of six Lodges, and wrote his work not as an offensive exposition, but as a means of giving Freemasons a knowledge of the ritual. It is considered to be a very complete representation of the monitorial Prestonian lectures, and as such was incorporated by Krause in his Drei altesten Kunsturkuenden.
The work by Browne is printed in a very complicated cipher, the key to which, and without which the book is wholly unintelligible, was, by way of caution, delivered only personally and to none but those who had reached the Third Degree. The explanation of this "mystical key", as Browne calls it, is as follows:
| The word Browne supplies the vowels, thus: | br o w n e. a e i o u y |
| These six vowels in turn represent six letters, thus: | a e i o u y. k c o l n u |
Initial capitals are of no value, and supernumerary letters are often inserted. The words are kept separate, but the letters of one word are often divided between two or three. Much therefore is left to the shrewdness of the decipherer. The initial sentence of the work may be adduced as a specimen:
| Ubs Rplrbsrt wbss ostm ronwprn Pongth Mrlwdgr, |
| which is thus deciphered: |
| Please to assist me in opening the Lodge. |
The work is now exceedingly rare.
See Vielle Bru, Rite of
See Robert I, also Royal Order of Scotland.
The introduction of Freemasonry into Scotland has been attributed by some writers to Robert, King of Scotland, commonly called Robert Bruce, who is said to have established in 1314 the Order of Herodom, for the reception of those Knights Templar who had taken refuge in his dominions from the persecutions of the Pope and the King of France. Thory (Acta Latomorum,1, 6), copies the following from a manuscript in the library of the Mother Lodge of the Philosophical Rite:
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Doctor Oliver (Landmarks,11, 13), referring to the abolition of the Templar Order in England, when the Knights were compelled to enter the Preceptories of the Knights of Saint John, as dependents, says:
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Lawrie, or the author of Lawrie's History of Freemasonry, who is excellent authority for Scottish Freemasonry, does not appear, however, to give any credit to the narrative. Whatever Bruce may have done for the advanced Degrees, there is no doubt that Ancient Craft Freemasonry was introduced into Scotland at an earlier period. But it cannot be denied that Bruce was one of the patrons and encouragers of Scottish Freemasonry.
A wealthy Freemason of Hamburg, who died at an advanced age in 1748. For many years he had been the soul of the Société des ancients Rose-Croix in Germany, which soon after his death was dissolved. This is on the authority of Thory (Ada Latomorum ii, 295).
Convoked in 1775, by Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick. Its object was to effect a fusion of the various Rites; but it terminated its labors, after a session of six weeks, without success.
BRUNSWICK, FREDERICK AUGUSTUS, PRINCE OFBorn 1740, second son of Duke Charles I. In 1769 he affiliated with a Chapter of the Strict Observance; declared National Grand Master of Prussia, 1772, serving until 1799. Rendered distinguished service in the Seven Years War, and said to have written much on Rosicrucianism, alchemy and magic. |
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Born 1721 and died July 3, 1792. Served in several wars with Frederick the Great, resigning his military command in 1766 and devoting himself to Freemasonry. Initiated in 1740 in the Lodge Three Globes at Berlin; in 1743 received his Master's Degree at Breslau; became Protector of the Lodge Saint Charles, Brunswick, in 1764; and English Past Grand Master of Brunswick in 1770; Protector of Von Hund's Strict Observance in 177; declared Grand Master of the Scottish Lodges in 1772. In 1782 the Duke of Brunswick was present at the Convent at Whelmsbad when the Templar system is supposed to have been given up and when there he was declared General Grand Master of the assembled Lodges. Patronized the Nluminati and said to have been General Obermeister (Overseer) of the Asiatic Brethren. An eminent German Craftsman, presiding at the Saint John's Festival at Brunswick in 1792, when he declared that he had been a Freemason fifty years. |
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Admitted in the Saint Charles Lodge, Brunswick, Germany, in 1770, becoming its Protector. Youngest son of Duke Charles I, educated at the Collegium Carolinum and went to Italy, 1775, with the German literary Freemason, Lessing. Served Frederick the Great with military honors and lost his life trying to save a drowning man in the River Oder.
Third son of Duke Charles I of Brunswick, Germany, known to have joined the Lodge Saint Charles in 1769. Died in 1770.
BRYAN, WILLIAM JENNINGSAmerican statesman and orator, born March 19, 1860; died July 26, 1925. Three times nominated for presidency of the United States, 1896, 1900, and 1908, and twice defeated by Brother McKinley, and lastly by Brother Taft. In Spanish-American War, 1898, he became Colonel of the Third Regiment, Nebraska Volunteer Infantry. Secretary of State, 1913. He was a member of Lincoln Lodge No. 19, Lincoln, Nebraska (see New Age, March, 1925). |
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This parchment roll - one of the "Old Charges" - is so named because it was presented to the Grand Lodge of England in 1880 by Mr. George Buchanan, of Whitby, by whom it was found amongst the papers of a partner of his father's. It is considered to be of the latter part of the seventeenth century - say from 1660 to 1680. This manuscript was first published at length in Gould's History of Freemasonry (volume 1, page 93), being adopted as an example of the ordinary class of text, and since then has been reproduced in facsimile by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge of London in volume iv of the Masonic reprints published by this scholarly body.
BUCKINGHAM, GEORGE VILLIERS, DUKE OFPoet, playwright, statesman, described by Dryden as the "epitome of mankind", but really a spendthrift of time. Doctor Anderson says he was Grand Master of England in 1674. Born January 30, 1628, and died April16, 1687. |
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The religion of the disciples of Buddha. It prevails over a great extent of Asia, and is estimated to be equally popular with any other form of faith among mankind. Its founder, Buddha - a word which seems to be an appellative, as it signifies the enlightened - lived about five hundred years before the Christian era, and established his religion as a reformation of Brahmanism.
The moral code of Buddhism is excellent, surpassing that of any other heathen religion. But its theology is not so free from objection. Max Müller admits that there is not a single passage in the Buddhiat canon of scripture which presupposes the belief in a personal God or a Creator, and hence he concludes that the teaching of Buddha was pure atheism.
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Yet Upham (Histom and Doctrine of Buddhimn, page 2 ), thinks that, even if this be capable of proof, it also recognizes "the operation of Faith called Damam, whereby much of the necessary process of conservation or government is infussed into the system". The doctrine of Nirvana, according to Burnouf, taught that absolute nothing or annihilation was the highest aim of virtue, and hence the belief in immortality was repudiated. Such, too, has been the general opinion of Oriental scholars; but Müller (science of Religion, page 141), adduces evidence, from the teachings of Buddha, to show that Nirvana may mean the extinction of many things - of selfishness, desire, and sin - without going so far as the extinction of subjective consciousness. |
The first and second Baskets also receive the general name of Dharma, or the Law. The principal seat of Buddhism is the island of Ceylon, but it has extended into China, Japan, and many: other countries of Asia (see Aranyaka, Aryan, Atthakatha, Mahabharata, Mahadeva, Mahak asyapa, Pitaka, Puranas, Ramayana, Sakti, Sastra, Sat B'hai, Shaster, Shesha, Sruti, Upanishad, Upadevas, Vedas, Vedanga, Zenana and Zennaar).
A Lodge was chartered in this city, and named the Southern Star, by the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania in 1825. Others followed, but in 1846 in consequence of the unsettled state of affairs their labors were suspended. A revival occurred in 1852, when a Lodge named L'Ami des Naufragés was established in Buenos Ayres by the Grand Orient of France; and in 1853 the Grand Lodge of England erected a Lodge named Excelsior (followed in 1859 by the Teutonia, which worked in German and was erased in 1872), and in 1864 by the Star of the South. In 1856 there was an irregular Body working in the Ancient and the Accepted Scottish Rite, which claimed the prerogatives of a Grand Lodge, but it was never recognized, and soon ceased to exist. On September 13, 1858, a Supreme Council and Grand Orient was established by the Supreme Council of Uruguay.
In 1861 a treaty was concluded between the Grand Lodge of England and the Grand Orient of the Argentine Republic, which empowered the former to establish Lodges in La Plata and to constitute a District Grand Lodge therein, which had some Lodges under its rule, when many more acknowledged the authority of the "Supreme Council and Grand Orient of the Argentine Republic in Buenos Ayres", which was formed in 1895 by combination of the Grand Orient and Supreme Council.
See Cody, Colonel William Frederick
A corruption, in the American Royal Arch, of the word Bel. Up to a comparatively recent period says Doctor Mackey, it was combined with another corruption, Lun, in the mutated form of Buh-Lun, under which disguise the words Bel and On were presented to the initiate.
Professor of Phnosophy in the University, of Güttingen, who, not being himself a Freemason, published, in 1804, a work entitled Ueber den Ursprung und die vornehmsten Schieksale des Ordens der Rosenkreuzer und Freimaurer, that is, On the Origin and the Principal Events of the Orders of Rosicrucianism and Freemasonry. This work, logical in its arguments, false in many of its statements, and confused in its arrangement, was attacked by Frederick Nicolai in a critical review of it in 1806, and is spoken of very slightingly even by De Quincey, himself no very warm admirer of the Masonic Institution, who published, in 1824, in the London Magazine (volume ix), a loose translation of it, "abstracted, re-arrenged, and improved", under the title of Historicocritical Inquiry into the Origin of the Rosicrucians and the Freemasons. Buhle's theory was that Freemasonry was invented in the year 1629, by John Valentine Andreä. Buhlu was born at Brunswick in 1753, became Professor of Phnosophy at Güttingen in 1787, and, having afterward taught in his native city, died there in 1821.
The chief architect of the Temple of Solomon is often called the Builder. But the word is also applied generally to the Craft; for every speculative Freemason is as much a builder as was his operative predecessor. An American writer, F. S. Wood, thus alludes to this symbolic idea:
"Freemasons are called moral builders. In their rituals, they declare that a more noble and glorious purpose than squaring stones and hewing timbers is theirs, fitting immortal nature for that spiritual building not made with hands, eternal in the heavens".
And he adds:
"The builder builds for a century; Freemasons for eternity".
In this sense, the Builder is the noblest title that can be bestowed upon a Freemason.
See Stone Masons o f the Middle Ages
Some thirty miles southwest of Cairo, west of the Nile, and on the Libyan desert, is an oasis in a sunken depression of many hundreds of square miles, in which from 300 B.C. to 300 A.D. circa existed a number of cities and a rich civilization.
This region was sustained by an irrigation system comparable in size and as an engineering achievement with our TVA; when that irrigation system was destroyed the Fayum, as its name was, reverted to desert, and its towns were covered by sand. In 1888 Dr. W.M. Flinders Petrie excavated a tomb at Hawara and made the astounding discovery that mummy cases there were built up of and stuffed with written papyri. Later on he had among his assistants B.P. Grenfell and Arthur S. Hunt. These two young men began in 1896 to excavate the whole Fayum, and with such success that in 1897 in the ruins of the town of Oxyrhynchus they came upon the greatest find of written manuscripts ever made in the whole history of archeology, and sent back to England tons of documents.
These had been written, most of them, in the Koine, a form of Greek in use throughout the Eastern Mediterranean during the general period of the first three centuries of our era.
These documents were not of scholarly writings but were such as could be recovered from the wastebaskets of any modern city:
letters, business ledgers, wills, recipes, poems, and songs, daily papers, sermons, pamphlets, financial reports, tax receipts, etc.,
etc.
For the first time they gave historians a detailed, day by-day picture of men and their affairs in Egypt, Palestine, Greece, and Rome as things were in the first centuries of the Christian era. The students and historians of Freemasonry will henceforth have to examine the Fayum papyri in their studies of ancient builder gilds and of that once favorite subject of Masonic writers, the Ancient Mysteries, because among these tens of thousands of documents are many which for the first time furnish written records of gilds of that period and of the Ancient Mystery cults. In the volumes of the papyri published in 1907 and in 1910 by the British Museum are a number of documents relating to the mason crafts. Legal forms used by the ironworkers, the carpenters, and the gild of masons show that such gilds (or collegia) of the years 100 A.D. to 200 A.D. were very like the gilds of masons in the Middle Ages.
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It is only now beginning to be realized that the Mason gilds of the Middle Ages from which our Fraternity is descended were of dual nature, a fact made especially evident in the body of Medieval law; on the one side a Mason gild was a trade association for the purpose of controlling hours, wages, the rules of daily work, etc.; on the other side it was a fraternity, with a Patron Saint, a chapel to attend, with feasts at set times, with relief for widows, orphans, etc., and for Masons in distress. The Oxyrynchus manuscripts make it clear that the builder gilds of 2000 years ago also were dual organizations of the same kind; they met in their own rooms, had the equivalent of masters and wardens, gave relief, had feasts, also acted as burial clubs, and also were trade, or craft, organizations.
The Egypt Exploration Fund (Graeeo-Roman Branch) published Part I of the documents found by Hunt and Grenfell as The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, by Grenfell and Hunt; London; 1898; 37 Great Russell St., W.C., and 59 Temple Street, Boston, Mass. The latest volume at hand is Greek Shorthand Manuals, edited by H.J.M. Milne (from a family famous in Freemasonry for three centuries); London; 1934. For non-archeologists one of the best introductions is the fascinatingly written The New Archaeological Discoveries, and Their Bearing Upon the New Testalnent, etc., by Camden M. Cobem; Fttnk & Wagnalls Co.; New York; 1917. The Twentieth Century New Testament was based on the Fayum discoveries; some authorities believe that the books of the New Testament were written in the Koine, others that it was written first in Aramaic and then translated into the Koine, in either event New Testarnent Greek was the Koine instead of the Greek of Plato and Euripides.
(The shiploads of documents unearthed since 1885 in Egypt, Palestine, and Greece have swept away once and forever mountains of nonsense about the pyramid builders and the Egyptian Mysteries. Scores of Masonic writers, exercising their rights to guess, wrote pseudo-learned volumes to prove that Freemasonry began with the pyramids [a very common type of structure] or the Book of the Dead, etc.; their theories are now rendered forever impossible. It is not an exaggeration to say that when the last of the tons of mss. are translated, edited, and published scholars can write a day-by-day history of the eastern Mediterranean countries from 300 B.C. to 300 A.D. It is an astonishing fact that less is known about the Twelfth Century in England and Europe than about that much more ancient period.)
These have been summarized in two lectures published at Margate, England, 1894, by Brother George IV. Speth on October 30, and November 13, 1893, in discussing the Folklore of Freemasonry. Brother Speth says that for those of his Brethren who would take the trouble to read between the lines, a matter by no means difficult, he ventures to hope that the facts may not prove dumb guides, but direct their thoughts to the true significance of our ceremonial customs, and confirm in their minds the certainty of the marvelous antiquity, in its essence, although perhaps not in its exact outward form, of the solemn climax of our beloved ritual. Many of us have seen a foundation-stone laid, and more have read of the proceedings. When conducted by Freemasons the ceremony includes much beautiful symbolism, such as trying and pronouncing the stone well laid, pouring wine and on and corn over it, and other similar rites, but in almost all cases, whether the ancient Craft be concerned in the operation or not, there are placed in a cavity beneath the stone several objects, such as a list of contributors to the funds, a copy of the newspaper of the day, and above all, one or more coins of the realm. Should you ask the reason for this deposit, you will probably hear that these objects were placed there for a future witness and reference.
Although this alleged motive is apparently reasonable, yet it is obviously absurd for surely the hope of all concerned is that the foundation-stone never would be removed and that the witness would for ever remain dumb.
Grimm puts it in this way:
"It was often though necessary to immure live animals and even men in the foundation on which the structure was to be raised, as if they were a sacrifice offered to the earth, who had to bear the load upon her: by this inhuman rite they hoped to secure immovable stability or other advantages." (See Teutonic Mythology, 1884, translated, Stalleybrass, 1883 page 1141.)
Baring-Gould says:
"When the primeval savage began to build he considered himself engaged on a serious undertaking. He was disturbing the face of Mother Earth, he was securing to himself in permanency of portion of that surface which had been given by her to all her children in common. Partly with the notion of offering a propitiatory sacrifice to the Earth, and partly also with the idea of securing to himself for ever a portion of son by some sacramental act, the old pagan laid the foundation of his house and fortress in blood." (See On Foundations, Murray's Magazine, 1887).
In Bomeo, among the Mnanau Dyaks, at the erection of a house, a deep hole was dug to receive the first post, which was then suspended over it; a slave girl was placed in the excavation; at a signal the lashings were cut, and the enormous timber descended, crushing the girl to death (see E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture, 1871, page 96).
The following accounts would show how widespread was this sacrificial rite. It was, in fact, universal a rite practiced apparently by all men at all times in all places. King Dako bunt his palace on the body of Danh. The name of his chief town, Dahomey, means on the body of Danh (see F. Liebrecht, Zur Folkskunde, 1879, page 287).
In Polynesia, the central pillar of one of the temples at Maeva was planted on the body of a human victim (see G. L. Gomme, Folklore Relics of Early Vnlage Life, 1883, page 27).
A seventeenth century account of Japan mentions the belief there that a wall laid upon the body of a willing human victim would be
secure from accident:
accordingly when a great wall was to be bunt, some wretched slave would offer himself as a foundation, lying down
in the trench to be crushed by the heavy stones lowered upon him (see Tyler, Primitive Culture, 1871, page 87).
Formerly in Siam, when a new city gate was being erected, it was customary for a number of officers to lie in wait and seize the first four or eight persons who happened to pass by, and who were then buried alive under the gate posts to serve as guardian angels (see Folk-lore Relics, page 28).
In the year 1876, the old church at Brownsover, about two miles from Rugby, England, was restored:
The earlier parts of the
building were of Norman, the later of early 13th century architecture. It was found necessary to lower the foundations of the north and
south walls of the church, and in doing so, two skeletons were discovered, one under each wall, about one foot below the original
foundations, exactly opposite each other and about six feet from the chancel wall which crosses the north and south walls at right
angles. Each skeleton was covered with an oak slab about six feet in length by ten inches wide and two inches thick of the color of
bog-oak. These pieces of plank had evidently been used as carpenters' benches, from the fact that each of them had four mortice
holes cut in such a form as to throw the legs outwards, and from the cuts made in them by edged tools. The skeletons were found in
a space cut out of the solid clay which had not been moved on either side, just large enough to take the bodies placed in them.
The skeletons were seen in situ:
they could not have been placed there after the original walls were bunt (see Antiquary
iii, page 93).
Some substitutions are curious. Animals are to be met with of many kinds. In Denmark a lamb used to be bunt in under the altar, that the church might stand.
Even under other houses swine and fowls are buried alive. (See Grimm page 1142.) The lamb was of course very appropriate in a Christian Church, as an allusion to "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world".
In the Book of Revelation this epithet is only a metaphor, yet Brother Speth says it would scarcely have been understood unless the rite we are treating of had been known to the Jews. That it was known, the curse pronounced by Joshua upon the man who should adventure to rebuild Jericho, proves to demonstration. "And Joshua adjured them at that time, saying, Cursed be the man before the Lord, that riseth up and buildeth this city of Jericho; he shall lay the foundation thereof in his first-born, and in his youngest son shall he set up the gates thereof", (See Joshua vi, 26, also First Kings xvi, 34.)
The population of India believe at the present day that to give stability to new construction, a human being should be sacrificed and buried in the foundations (see Folk-lore Journal, 1, page 23). All the great engineering works are believed by the common people to be protected against the angry gods of winds and rivers by animal and human sacrifices being performed under the direction of English officers at the beginning or conclusion of the undertaking (see Folk-lore Journal 1, page 92). A correspondent of the Times, dating from Calcutta, August 1, 1880, writes:
"A murmur has got abroad and is firmly believed by the lower classes of the natives, that the government is about to sacrifice a number of human beings in order to ensure the safety of the new harbor works, and has ordered the police to seize victims in the streets. So thoroughly is the idea implanted, that people are afraid to venture out after nightfall".
There was a similar scare in Calcutta some seven or eight years ago, when the Hooghly bridge was being constructed. The natives then got hold of the idea that Mother Ganges, indignant at being bridged, had at last consented to submit to the insult on the condition that each pier of the structure was founded on a layer of children's heads" (see Folk-lore Record iii, page 283).
But we need not go to India for such accusations. In Nature, under date June 15, 1871, we find:
"It is not many years since the present Lord Leigh was accused of having built an obnoxious person-one account, if we remember right, said eight obnoxious persons-into the foundation of a bridge at Stoneleigh".
In Scotland there is a current belief that the Picts, to whom local legend attributes building of prehistoric antiquity, bathed their foundation stones with blood (see Folk-lore Relics, page 29). Brother Speth heard people in Kent, of certainly not the least educated classes, assert that both the strength and the peculiar pink tinge which may sometimes be detected in Roman cement, is owing to the alleged practice of the Romans mixing their cement with blood. Did Shakespeare speak only metaphorically, or was he aware of the custom when he makes Clarence say...
I will not ruinate my father's house,
Who gave his blood to lime the stones together,
And set up Lancaster.
Henry vi, part iii, act v, scene 1.
Note the words of King John as given by Shakespeare...
There is no sure foundation set in blood,
No certain life achieved by others' death.
King John iv, 2.
Brother Speth gives an experience of the Rev. Baring-Gould. He writes:
"It is said in Yorkshire, that the first child baptized in a new font is sure to die a reminiscence of the sacrifice which was used at the consecration of every dwelling and temple in heathen times, and of the pig or sheep killed and laid at the foundation of churches. When I was incumbent at Dalton a new church was built. A blacksmith in the village had seven daughters, after which a son was born, and he came to me a few days before the consecration of the new church to ask me to baptize his boy in the old temporary church and font. 'Why, Joseph', said I, 'if you will only wait till Thursday the boy can be baptized in the new font on the opening of the new church'. 'Thank you, Sir,' said the blacksmith, with a wriggle,'but you see it's a lad, and we should be sorry if he were to deem, if he'd been a lass instead, why then you were welcome, for 'twouldn't ha' mattered a ha'penny. Lasses are ower mony and lads ower few wi' us'".
Now, it is surely unnecessary, continues Brother Speth, to explain why we bury coins of the real under orum foundation stones.
"Our forefathers, ages ago, buried a living human sacrifice in the same place to ensure the stability of the structure:
their sons substituted an animal:
their sons again a mere effigy or other symbol:
and we, their children, still immure a substitute, coins bearing the effigy, impressed upon the noblest of metals, the pure red gold, of
the one person to whom we all are most loyal, and whom we all most love, our gracious Queen. I do not assert that one in a hundred is
conscious of what he is doing:
if you ask him, he will give some different reason:
but the fact remains that unconsciously, we are following the customs of our fathers, and symbolically providing a soul for the
structure. Men continue to do what their fathers did before them, though the reasons on which their fathers acted have been long
forgotten.
A ship could not be launched in the olden times without a human sacrifice:
the neck of the victim was broken across the prow, and his blood besprinkled the sides, while his soul entered the new home provided for
it to ensure its safety amid storm and tempest:
today we symbolize unconsciously the same ceremony, but we content ourselves with a bottle of the good red wine, slung from the dainty
fingers of English womanhood".
Brother Speth gives numerous facts from various parts of the world and of widely separated times.
Perhaps as significant as any and certainly as interesting are the particulars brought to his attention by Brother William Simpson and dealing with Old Testament days. Referring to Assyrian foundation stones in the reign of Sennacherib who was on the throne 705-681 B.C., we have the roya1 message from Records of the Past (new series, volume vi, page 101), the words "my inscription" relating in Brother Simpson's note to the foundation stone, the latter probably being a brick or clay cylinder:
I bunt that palace from foundation to roof and finished it.
My inscription I brought into it.
For future days, whoever-among the kings, my successors, whom ASSUR and ISTAR
Shall call to the rule over the land and the people the prince may he, if this palace becomes old and mined, who builds it anew
May he preserve my inscription, anoint it with oil, offer sacrifices, return it to its place;
then will Assur and Istar hear his prayer.
The same work (Records of the Past, new series, volume v, page 171) contains an inscription of Cyrus the Persian King mentioning his discovery of the foundation stone of the Assyrian Assurbanipal, 668-626 B.C., usually identified with the Asnapper of Ezra iv, 10. Here we find a foundation stone instead of the "inscription" and a significant ceremony is described that agrees with that of Sennacherib's and is truly very like the modern Masonic Rite when dedicating hall or temple or laying a corner-stone:
.... the foundation-stone of Assur-bani-pal King of Assyria,
who had discovered the foundation stone of Shalmaneser son of Assur-natsir-pal,
I laid its foundation and made firm its bricks. With beer, wine, on (and) honey.
A similar announcement by Cyrus is also given on page 173 of the above work:
.... the inscription containing the name of Assan-bani-pal I discovered anddid not change; with oil I annointed (it); sheep I sacrificed; with my own inscription I placed (it) and restored (it) to its place.
Foundation sacrifices and the substitution of various kinds used for them are considered freely by several authorities and there is a bibliography of them to be found in Burdick's Foundation Rites, 1901. We may note that in folklore customs persist and explanations change or as Sir J.G. Frazer (Golden Bough, 1890, ii, page 62) says "Myth changes while custom remains constant; men continue to do what their fathers did before them, though the reasons on which their fathers acted have long been forgotten". That so many legends contain allusions to foundation sacrifices is ample proof that such existed. Brother Speth says further "Had we never found one single instance of the rite actually in practice, we might still have inferred it with absolute certainty from the legends, although these do not always give us the true motive".
When it may have become unlawful or otherwise impracticable to bury a body, then an image, a symbol of the living or the dead, was laid in the walls or under them. The figure of Christ crucified has been found built into an old church wall. Representations of children, candles the flame being a symbol of life even as a reversed torch is a type of death, empty coffins, bones of men and animals, and so on, have been discovered in or under the masonry when taking down important structures. Freemasons will understand the significance of these old customs. Every laying of a corner-stone with Masonic ceremonies is a reminder of them, and every completed initiation a confirmation.
The subject may be studied further in Jew and Human Sacrifice, Herman L. Strack, English translation of eighth edition, page 138, with bibliographical notes on page 31; Blood Covenant, H. Clay Trumbull, and particularly pages 45-57 of his other book the Threshold Covenant, the first of these works discussing the origin of sacrifice and the significance of transferred or proffered blood or life, and the second treating of the beginning of religious rites and their gradual development; Foundation Rites, Louis Dayton Burdick; Bible Sidelights, Dr. R.A. Stewart Macalister, Director of Excavations for the Palestine Exploration Fund; James Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible, page 368, and in Doctor Mackey's revised History of Freemasonry, page 1072.
See Smitten Builder
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