Mark Coleman Wallace PhD Thesis - University of St Andrews

Table 3.1. Number of Scottish Lodges 1736-1800 13
1736 1750 1765 1785 1800
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Edinburgh 6 11 15 19 20
Provincial 43 76 127 204 254
Colonial/Abroad 0 1 13 22 31
Military 0 3 12 21 25
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TOTAL 49 91 168 267 330
As Table 3.1 shows, overall totals increased by an average of 77 lodges
during the three periods listed from 1736 until 1785. By 1800, the Grand Lodge
of Scotland had chartered almost the same number of provincial lodges as the
Modern Grand Lodge of England. 14 Although this average growth rate dropped
to 24 per cent by 1800, external factors such as the French Revolution and
government legislation aimed at suppressing secret societies certainly affected
lodge growth.
Unlike English freemasonry, however, the metropolitan impetus – at
least from a numerical standpoint – was negligible. Clark’s analysis of English
lodges shows that by 1780, almost 35 per cent of all Modern lodges were
located in London; and, by 1807, lodges in London accounted for almost 50 per
13 The figures are taken from George Draffen, Scottish Masonic Records 1736-1950: A List of
All the Lodges at Home and Abroad (Edinburgh, 1950). The Edinburgh category includes only
those lodges in the city of Edinburgh.
14 Clark, British Clubs, 310. The number of Provincial Modern Lodges in 1800 stood at 263.
For the remainder of the chapter, percentages of Scottish lodges will not include lodges abroad
or those which are military in origin. Military lodges were often peripatetic, their records were
incomplete, and frequently the lodges had no fixed meeting place.
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