History of the Ancient and Honorable Fraternity of Free and Accepted Masons

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PRESENTATION INSCRIPTION FROM ONE MASON TO ANOTHER ON FREE END PAPER
DATING TO THE 14TH CENTURY THIS BOOK IS ONE OF THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE MANUSCRIPTS YOU WILL FIND
CONTAINING A MASSIVE COMPENDIUM OF FREEMASONRY WITH OVER 900 PAGES AND COUNTLESS WORKS OF ART
CEREMONIES, HISTORY OF THE MASONS, SECRET DOCTRINES, INNER WORKINGS OF THE MASONS, & MUCH MORE

Without any question one of the most thorough books of Freemasonry ever created. Containing everything from the highest degrees to the beginnings of masonry itself. Heavily illustrated with a plethora of gorgeous illustrations. A massive book containing 904 pages "to be exact." Just for an age reference, this book was printed six years before the first world war!
This is one of the most in-depth and accurate publications on the Freemasons you will come across. Encompassing everything from its original origins to some of its innermost secrets. This book is an exceptional find for any mason or even someone who just wants to understand the inner workings of this rather secret society. I would snag this one before someone else does.

The history of Freemasonry encompasses the origins, evolution, and defining events of the fraternal organization known as Freemasonry. It covers three phases. Firstly, the emergence of organized lodges of operative masons during the Middle Ages, then the admission of lay members as "accepted" (a term reflecting the ceremonial "acception" process that made non-stone masons members of an operative lodge) or "speculative" masons, and finally the evolution of purely speculative lodges, and the emergence of Grand Lodges to govern them. The watershed in this process is generally taken to be the formation of the first Grand Lodge in London in 1717. The two difficulties facing historians are the paucity of written material, even down to the 19th century, and the misinformation generated by masons and non-masons alike from the earliest years.

Freemasonry's long history includes its early development from organized bodies of operative stonemasons to the modern system of speculative lodges organized around regional or national "Grand Lodges".

The earliest masonic texts each contain some sort of a history of the craft of masonry. The oldest known work of this type, The Halliwell Manuscript, also known as Regius Poem, dates from between 1390 and 1425. This document has a brief history in its introduction, stating that the "craft of masonry" began with Euclid in Egypt, and came to England in the reign of King Athelstan (924–939).[1] Shortly afterwards, the Matthew Cooke Manuscript traces masonry to Jabal, son of Lamech (Genesis 4: 20–22), and tells how this knowledge came to Euclid, from him to the Children of Israel (while they were in Egypt), and so on through an elaborate path to Athelstan. This myth formed the basis for subsequent manuscript constitutions, all tracing masonry back to biblical times, and fixing its institutional establishment in England during the reign of Athelstan.

Shortly after the formation of the Premier Grand Lodge of England, James Anderson was commissioned to digest these "Gothic Constitutions" in a palatable, modern form. The resulting constitutions are prefaced by history more extensive than any before, again tracing the history of what was now freemasonry back to biblical roots, again forging Euclid into the chain. True to his material, Anderson fixes the first grand assembly of English Masons at York, under Athelstan's son, Edwin, who is otherwise unknown to history. Expanded, revised, and republished, Anderson's 1738 constitutions listed the Grand Masters since Augustine of Canterbury, listed as Austin the Monk. William Preston's Illustrations of Freemasonry enlarged and expanded on this masonic creation myth.

In France, the 1737 lecture of Chevalier Ramsay added the crusaders to the lineage. He maintained that Crusader Masons had revived the craft with secrets recovered in the Holy Land, under the patronage of the Knights Hospitaller. At this point, the history of the craft in Continental Freemasonry diverged from that in England.