Submitted by the Secretary, RWB Wesley F Revels
Annual Newsletter, Vol.166 - Issue One.
On
Tuesday September 15th 2012, the 167th year of St. Joseph
Lodge No.78’s Charter, the elected and appointed officers were installed for
the Masonic Year 2012-2013. Pictured are left front row: WB Marion H Boydston,Tiler; RWB Larry R Crawford, Lodge Education Officer; Br D Brian Carroll, Marshall; Br Mark G Crabtree, Junior
Deacon; Br Timothy Cordonnier,Chaplain; Second
row left: RWB Dennis A Bonjour, Senior Deacon; WB Carl C Jennings,Treasurer; Br Ryan
S Gerster,Junior Warden; WB LeRoy H Maxwell III,Worshipful Master and Br Nighram M Johnson,Senior Warden.
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"The History Of Freemasonry"
Its Legends and Traditions, Its Chronological History.
By ALbert Gallatin Mackey, MD., 33' Originally Published By The Masonic History Company
New York and London 1906
CHAPTER V, The Halliwell Poem,
the oldest Masonic document and legend
There is one
manuscript which differs so much from all the others in its form and in its
contents as to afford the strongest internal evidence that it is derived from a
source, entirely different from that which gave origin to the other and later
documents. I allude to what is known to
Masonic antiquaries as the Halliwell MS.
As this is
admitted to be the oldest Masonic document extant, and as some very important
conclusions in respect to the early history of the Craft are about to be
deduced from it, a complete account of it cannot be described, only an
introduction.
This work was
first published in 1840 by Mr. James Orchard Halliwell, pictured at left, under the title of “A
Poem on the Constitutions of Masonry,” from the original manuscript in
the King’s Library of the British Museum.
Mr. Halliwell, who subsequently adopted the
name of Phillips, is not a member of the Brotherhood, and Woodford
appropriately remarks that “it is somewhat curious that to Grandidier and
Halliwell, both non-Masons, Freemasonry owes the impetus given at separate
epochs to the study of its archaeology and history by non-Masons.
Hallliwell says that
the manuscript formally belonged to Charles Theyer, a well-known collector of
the 17th century. It is undoubtedly
the oldest Masonic MS, Extant. Messrs.
Bond and Egerton of the British Museum consider its date to be about the middle
of the 15th century. Floss,
thinks that it was written between the years 1427 and 1445. Dr Oliver maintains that it is a transcript
of the Book of Constitutions adopted by the General Assembly, held in the year
926, at the City of York. Halliwell himself
places the date of the MS At 1390.
Woodford, concurs in this option. I am inclined to think that this is the true
date of its transcription.
The manuscript is in rhymed verse, and consists of 794 lines. At the head of the poem is the inscription: “Hic
incipiund constituciones artis gemetrie secundum Euclydem.” The language is more archaic than
that of Wycliffe’s version of the Bible, which is written toward the end of the
14th century, but approaches very nearly to that of the Chronicles
of Robert of Gloucester, the date of which was at the beginning of the same
century. Therefore, if we admit that the
date of 1390, attributed by Halliwell and Woodford to the transcription in the
British Museum, is correct, we may, I think, judging by the language, safely
assign to the original the date of about 1300.
Further back than this, philology will not permit us to go.
The manuscript
contains the history of the origin of geometry, or Masonry, and the story of
Euclid at length, much like that which is in the “Legend of the Craft,”
and an introduction of Masonry into England.
From the narrative of the establishment of Masonry in Egypt by Euclid,
the poem passes immediately to the time when the “craft com ynto
Englond.”
Here the
legendary story of King Athelstan, pictured at left, and the Assembly called by him is given, with
this variation from the common Legend, that there is no mention of the city of
York, where the Assembly is said to have been held, nor of Prince Edwin, who
summoned it. After an interpolation,
to be referred to hereafter, the poem proceeds under the title of “Ars
quatuor coronatorum”, “The Art of the Four Crowned Ones,” a
title never applied to Masonry in the later and purely English
manuscripts. We have first an invocation
to God and the Virgin, and then the Legend of the Four Crowned Martyrs and being
of German origin, and peculiar to the German Steinmetzen or Stone Masons of the
Middle Ages, it’s introduction is an evidence of the origin of the document and
must be regarded as proof of the identity of the German and English Stone
Masons, and of their having one common parentage!
With the
manuscript including the later introduction of Masonry into England called The
Legend of the Craft, and The Art of the Four Crowned Ones, it can be deduced
that the copyist of the manuscript now known as the Halliwell Poem had two
manuscripts before him, and he transcribed sometimes from one and sometimes
from the other, apparently with but little judgment, or, rather, he copied the
whole of one and then interpolated it with extracts from both without congruity
of subjects.
As to the origin of
the manuscript with regard to its philosophic and religious preference, there is no doubt that the German “Four
Crowned Martyrs” is of Roman Catholic origin and the “Legend of the
Craft” is of the Reformed “Kirk” or Church.
It can be noticed that no where in the Legend of the Craft is there a
reference to Germany as a country in which Masonry existed. On the contrary, the Masonry of England is
supposed to have been described of the Order originating in Scotland.
Hence we
may rationally conclude that the “Legend of the Craft” was modified by
influence of the French Masons, who, as history informs us, were brought over
into England at an early period. In this
respect, authentic history and the Legend coincide, and the one corroborates the other.
What follows is a portion of the
Halliwell Poem also known as the Regius Manuscript.
“Whoever
will both well read and look He may find written in old book Of great lords and also ladies, That
had many children together, certainly; And had
no income to keep them with, Neither in town nor field nor enclosed wood;
A council together they could them take, To
ordain for these children's sake, How
they might best lead their life without
great disease, care and strife; And
most for the multitude that was coming of
their children after great clerks, to
teach them then good works; And pray we them, for our
Lord's sake. To our children some work to make, That they might get their living thereby, both
well and honestly full securely in that time of good geometry this honest Craft
of good masonry was ordained in this
manner.
Counterfeited of these clerks together, At these Lord’s prayers they
counterfeited geometry, and gave it the name of Masonry, for the most honest
Craft of all. These Lord’s children
thereto did fall to learn of him the craft of geometry, the which he made full
curiously. Through fathers' prayers
and mothers' also, this honest
craft he put them to. He learned best, and was of honesty, And passed his fellows in curiosity, If in that craft he did him pass, He should have more worship than the less,
This great clerk's name was Euclid, His name it spread
full wonder wide.”….
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