The Origin of Freemasonry--Does It Really Matter?

[Tamrin]

The Origin of Freemasonry--Does It Really Matter?

[Excerpt - Papers of Robert G. Davis, June 10, 2008 - Linked Above]

In my own Masonic experience, I have heard only a few speeches postulating the source of origin of our fraternity. Most Masons I have met seem comfortable with the rather simple but improbable possibility that we evolved from the operative guilds of the Middle Ages. There is a persistent and attractive attachment to the building trades since so much of our symbolism seems connected to the tools and mathematics of construction.

Yet, the city guild system of 16th century England and Scotland was very different from what survived into the 18th century. It was a system specifically designed to prevent travel and to exclude craftsmen from out of town to break into a closed shop. Our ritual emphasis on travel rights comes from a much earlier era, when craft guilds were tied to religious houses, a tie which gave men the right to travel because they were sponsored by the church. To look into origins, one may well need to look well before the English transition era.

Besides, there are a number of other possibilities which seem equally compelling and deserve our attention.

[Gaslight]

May 17, 2009 7:28:54 GMT 10 Tamrin said:

The Origin of Freemasonry--Does It Really Matter?

[Excerpt - Papers of Robert G. Davis, June 10, 2008 - Linked Above]

In my own Masonic experience, I have heard only a few speeches postulating the source of origin of our fraternity. Most Masons I have met seem comfortable with the rather simple but improbable possibility that we evolved from the operative guilds of the Middle Ages. There is a persistent and attractive attachment to the building trades since so much of our symbolism seems connected to the tools and mathematics of construction.

Yet, the city guild system of 16th century England and Scotland was very different from what survived into the 18th century. It was a system specifically designed to prevent travel and to exclude craftsmen from out of town to break into a closed shop. Our ritual emphasis on travel rights comes from a much earlier era, when craft guilds were tied to religious houses, a tie which gave men the right to travel because they were sponsored by the church. To look into origins, one may well need to look well before the English transition era.

Besides, there are a number of other possibilities which seem equally compelling and deserve our attention.

I had to read that excerpt three times and I'm still not sure what Bro. Davis is trying to say. He contradicts himself, conflates English and Scottish Masonry, then introduces 'craft guilds tied to religious houses' and sponsorship by the church -- the latter new to me.

We have a plethora of documents relating to the building of churches, castles, and stately homes in the pre-1717 era, and these give us a clear idea of how professional builder/architects were contracted, and how those builders then hired the Masons and labourers who worked under them.

As more and more scholars publish research into the history of Masonry in Scotland and England, the interaction between the two is becoming clearer (I think) but there's a significant lack of similar research into Irish Masonry.

[Tamrin]

Agreed: I suspect Bro. Davis was, at that point, alluding to (without endorsement) the Comacine legend:

Aug 9, 2008 16:57:08 GMT 10 Tamrin said:

The Comacines

[Bernard E. Jones, 1956, Freemasons' Guide and Compendium, pp.47/49]

The tradition of the travelling masons takes its most popular form in the story of the Comacines, a story which has ben accepted without question by many well-informed Brethren. It is the same story of the organized band of masons travelling under the protection of the Pope, but with a special background of its own. The Comacines are supposed to have taken their name from Como, in Lombardy, Northern Italy. The people of Como were such superior masons that they earned the name of Magistri Comacini, or 'Masters from Como.' Masons who passed through the different fixed stages of apprenticeship became Masters and formed a corporation of masons which built the edifices of Lombardy and then looked abroad for employment. They formed themselves into an association or fraternity, "seeking a monopoly, as it were, over the whole face of Christendom." An early edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica says that the Masters from Como were fraught with Papal Bulls, or diplomas, granting them the right of holding directly and solely under the Pope alone. They acquired the power to fix the price of their labour and to regulate their own internal government, exclusively in their own general chapter,

prohibiting all native artists not admitted into their Society from entering with it unto any sort of competition.... Wherever they came, they appeared headed by a chief surveyor, who governed the whole troop, and named one man out of every ten, under the name of warden, to overlook the nine others. The architects of all the sacred edifices of the Latin Church ... north, south, east or west—thus derived their science from the same central school; obeyed in their designs the dictates of the same hierarchy, and rendered every minute improvement the property of the whole body.

It is claimed that from this company of travelling masons is derived "the fraternity of adopted masons, accepted masons or free masons."

Now, as this is one of the most popular legends in freemasonry and passes in the minds of some Brethren the world over as real history, it is worth while to look into the story. The Comacine legend has been investigated by many critical writers, among them Professor Hamilton Thompson, who in The Somersetshire Archæological Transactions, 1920, says:

It is unquestionable that the term comacinus occurs in the early Lombard laws, with reference to masons, and that Como and Comcina are in the district to which those laws refer. But comacinus is not a word which can be derived from either place; an inhabitant of Como is Comensis or Comanus.

Professor Thompson believes that the Comacinus was simply a mason working at a job with others, and not a term for a member of any mysterious travelling guild.

"Not a scrap of record evidence has been found to establish the existence of this migrant fraternity," says Douglas Knoop, "and the basis seems to be mainly a mistaken etymology; for comacinus probably meant 'fellow mason' (as comonachus meant 'fellow monk'), without reference to Como or any other place."

The story of the Comacines might possibly have taken its rise from the fact that in the sixth century the Lombards, a barbarous race, overran North Italy, but when their power waned two centuries later there ensued a very considerable revival of building, under the influence of the Popes, assisted by the more settled state of the country under Charlemagne.

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To be fair to Bro. Davis, beyond the excerpt above, he proceeds to mention the usual suspects, without settling on any one. Ultimately, in his opinion, it may not be important. BTW, the excerpts provided are simply to provide a sample of the work. Often the link needs to be clicked to get the whole account.

[Gaslight]

May 17, 2009 14:57:59 GMT 10 Tamrin said:

Agreed: I suspect Bro. Davis was, at that point, alluding to (without endorsement) the Comacine legend

Ah, the Comacines. I'm afraid senility is creeping up on me. I should have made the connection.

To be fair to Bro. Davis, beyond the excerpt above, he proceeds to mention the usual suspects, without settling on any one. Ultimately, in his opinion, it may not be important. BTW, the excerpts provided are simply to provide a sample of the work. Often the link needs to be clicked to get the whole account.

Yes, I usually click on your external links, but in this case didn't find Bro. Davis' blog interesting enough to bookmark.

Among the YouTube video clips you've posted recently are some on the Scottish and York Rites. The first made me curl a little, the second not so much. The SR video reminded me of the spiels used by local SR members trawling for fresh members. "All the secrets of FM finally revealed!" "Don't stop at the Third Degree but go ever higher."

In that respect, the York Rite video was more restrained, though a little puzzling in parts. It's probably my Scottish Royal Arch Chapter/Cryptic Council background.

[Tamrin]

May 17, 2009 19:49:40 GMT 10 Gaslight said:

The SR video reminded me of the spiels used by local SR members trawling for fresh members. "All the secrets of FM finally revealed!" "Don't stop at the Third Degree but go ever higher."

With the introduction of the Lost Secrets theme as pat of the Third Degree, the proliferation of further Degrees which purported to restore them was soon likely to follow. The trouble is, at one level, they either violate the ineffable and existential nature of the theme (if their solutions are taken literally) or, if the theme had been meant as a solvable puzzle, introduce material beyond that laid out by Desaguliers, et al.