Freemasonry and secret histories – Ancient Prehistory

According to the official records of the Grand Lodge of England the first Grand Lodge was established in London on 24^th June 1717 at a dinner organised by four existing lodges of freemasons. The earliest masonic text has been dated to 1390 in the form of a poem known as the “Regius Manuscript” giving details of geometry and guidance as to the operation of a lodge and the role of the master. Although the exact origins of the movement that we know today as freemasonry are shrouded in mystery there are some known points of reference. It is clear that written references to the association of masons into fraternal brotherhoods was occurring on an ad hoc basis for many years before the structure of an overarching organisation was established. It is also clear from looking at the style, format and operation of masonic lodges that many of the ceremonies and offices refer back to antiquity, but what there has never been is a clearly defined link between freemasonry as it is practised today and the origins of masonry as a material construction practise.

Looking at this from the other direction we see a clear distinction between the construction techniques of early civilisations of the Indus Valley in India and the Mesopotamian area of Bablyon, Ur and Kush where buildings, both domestic and monumental were constructed of baked mud bricks and ceramic tiles, and the slightly later civilisation of Ancient Egypt where for the first time we see monumental structures created from carved stone blocks. It may seen odd that Egypt was a region that began building in stone given that, as with the Mesopotamian and Indus Valley regions, the area of occupation was largely based around fertile river flood plains, and many domestic Egyptian buildings retained the mud brick construction, as did many of the mastaba tombs and early temple structures. There have been any number of suggestions about where the inspiration to carve stone into blocks and use them to build monumental structures but the most likely source seems to be the introduction of technology from an earlier era in the late neolithic, a time when several European populations were developing the use of large blocks of worked stone to create megalithic stone circles. It is interesting to note the similarity between the construction and stone working techniques used in the construction of Stonehenge for example, and the techniques used to erect lintel stones in Egyptian Temple structure doorways.

Taking these two threads from opposite directions, the question arises, could there be a ancient European tradition of stone working, as a precursor to masonry into which the modern freemasonry movement taps? If this were the case it raises several interesting thoughts, thoughts which have parallels in accusations levelled at freemasons throughout their official history. For many years freemasons have been suspected of holding esoteric knowledge, and of practising pagan religions, these accusations rising to suggestions of Satanism and Witchcraft, and if there were a link to prehistoric stone workers then we are looking at an organisation with roots in pre-Christian Europe, a Europe described by the Christian Romans as barbaric, heathen, Pagan and known from Greek and Roman historians to practise blood sacrifices to horned deities. It certainly seems to be at least a possibility that the insistence of masonic lodges that they are not Christian organisations, venerating the “Great Architect” rather than the Christian God, and the use of ritualised ceremonies that have been used, in a modified form by Occultists for the last three hundred years at least may owe something to a retained and secret history of the religious practices of pre-Christian Europe, combined with the secret religions of Ancient Egypt with its beliefs in immanent Gods in a polytheistic pantheon.

It is unlikely that evidence for such a link would be known, even the majority of todays freemasons, given the necessity for secrecy over the last two millennia of the rise of Christianity and the Catholic Church, but it does lead to some interesting possible explanations for some of the more unusual aspects of freemasonry today.