Through the Key Hole - RoseCroix.org.au

61
A FICTITIOUS GRAND LODGE?
By Keith Stockley
In his Constitutions of 1738, Dr Anderson states that a General
Assembly of the Craft was held on 27 December 1663 at the
instance of Henry Jermyn , the Earl of St Albans, who in his purported
position as Grand Master of English Freemasons appointed
as his deputy, Sir John Denham and his Wardens, Sir
Christopher Wren and John Webb and then promulgated Rules
known as the Regulations of 1663.
The Regulations referred to by Anderson are those contained in
the Harleian Ms. No. 1942 as well as a few other Mss and are
now called the New Articles which have been dated around
1670.
Did such an assembly meet as stated by Anderson? It is certain
that no such Grand Lodge existed at that time, so was the assembly
and the appointment of the personages named merely a
work of fiction dreamt up by Anderson?
MALCOLM CANMORE DUNCAN
By Keith Stockley
Duncan’s Ritual & Monitor of Freemasonry is perhaps the most
widely read book on Masonic ritual, in the USA. Yet the author
Malcolm Canmore Duncan is totally unknown.
Thorough research has been undertaken to try and establish the
identity of the brother who clearly had considerable and significant
knowledge of the Craft, as his book is in great detail and is
amazingly accurate in respect of the EAF, FC , MM , PM, Most
Excellent Master and the RA.
Such knowledge can only come from a Freemason of many
years standing and experience.
The name of the author is I feel, more symbolic than factual. In
other words it is a nom de plume for the author’s real name.
114
SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN AND
FREEMASONRY– NEW EVIDENCE
Br Bro. Bernard Williamson & Bro. Michael Baigent
A search through the archives of the Royal Society has provided new
information regarding the claim that Sir Christopher Wren was initiated
into Freemasonry in London on 18 May 1691. This claim was advanced
in a handwritten note added to the manuscript of John Aubrey;’s
“Naturall Historie of Wiltshire in 16185, now in the Bodleian
Library, Oxford.
This manuscript is in two parts, bound and filed separately as MS Aubrey
1 and MS Aubrey 2. In the second part a short account of Freemasonry
appears:
“Sr. William Dugdale told me many years since, that about Henry the
third’s time, the Pope gave a Bull, or Diploma to a company of Italian
Architects to travell up and down over Europe, to build churches. From
those are derived the Fraternity of Free-Masons. They are known to
one another by certain Signes and ( ‘Markes’
Erased) and Watchwords; it continues to this day. They have severall
lodges in severall Counties for their reception; and when any of them
fall into decay, the brotherhood is to relieve him & c. The manner of
their Adoption is very formall and with an Oath of secrecy.”
The page to the left of this account was originally left blank and on
this, at some later time, were added three additional notes in Aubrey’s
hand. One of these notes concerns Freemasonry. It reads”
MDM, this day (May 1691 the 18th being Monday after Rogation Sunday)
is a great convention at St. Paul’s—church of the fraternity of the
Accepted (‘Free’ being struck out) Masons where Sr.
Christopher Wren is to be adopted a Brother ; and Sr. Henry Goodric…..of
ye Tower, & divers ( ‘Sev’al’ being struck out) others—there
have been Kings, that have been of this—Sodalite.”
Of those who have studied the text, Clarke in Ars Quatuor Coronatorum
1965 concluded that Wren was ‘almost certainly’ a Freemason.
John Hamill in 1986 in his book “The Craft” is more cautious, concluding
that mo matter how possible it might be, Wren’s membership was
‘not proven’.