MHF

PREHISTORIC MASONRY

CHAPTER V
THE HALLIWELL POEM AND THE 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 anti-quaries 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 detailed account of it will not be deemed unnecessary. This work was first published in 1840 by Mr. James Orchard Halliwell, under the title of "A Poem on the Constitutions of Masonry,"
(1) 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."
(2) Halliwell says that the manuscipt formerly 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. Kloss
(3) thinks that it was written between the years 1427 and 1445. Dr. Oliver
(4) maintains that it is a transcript of the Book of Constitutions adopted by the General Assembly, held

(1) In a brochure entitled "The Early History of Freemasonry in England." A later improved edition was published in 1844.
(2) In Kenning's "Encyclopeadia," voc. Halliwell.
(3) "Die Freimaur in ihrer wahren Bedentung." S. 12.
(4) American Quart. Rev. of Freemasonry, vol. i., p. 547.

in the year 926, at the City of York. Halliwell himself places the date of the MS. at 1390. Woodford (1) concurs in this opinion. 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 incipiunt constitluciones artis gemetria, secundum Euclydem." The language is more archaic than that of Wicliffe's version of the Bible, which was 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.

Lines 1-86 of this MS. contain the history of the origin of geometry, or Masonry, and the story of Euclid is given at length, much like that which is in the Legend of the Craft. But no other parts of that Legend are referred to, except the portion which records the 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 unto Englond." Here the legendary story of King Athelstan 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.

Lines 87 - 470 contain the regulations which were adopted at that Assembly, divided into fifteen articles and the same number of points. There is a very great resemblance, substantially, between these regulations and the charges contained in the subsequent or second set of Manuscript Constitutions. But the regulations in the Halliwell poem are given at greater length, with more particularity and generally accompanied with an explanation or reason for the law. After an interpolation, to be referred to hereafter, the poem proceeds under the title of "Ars quatuor coronatorum,"

The Art of Preface to Hughan's "Old Charges," p. vii. 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, which ends on line 534.Now this Legend of the Four Crowned Martyrs - die Vier Gekronten - is found in none of the purely English manuscripts, but is of German origin, and peculiar to the German Steinmetzen or Stone Masons of the Middle Ages. Its introduction in this manuscript is an evidence of the German origin of the document, and, as Findel says, "must be regarded as a most decided proof of the identity of the German and English Stone Masons, and of their having one common parentage."

The details of this Legend close at the 534th line, and the poem then proceeds to give a small and imperfect portion of what is known in our later manuscripts as the Legend of the Craft.I am persuaded that all this part of the poem has been dislocated from its proper place, and that in the original the lines from 535 to 576 formed a portion of the Legend of the Craft, as it must have been inserted in the introductory part of the second manuscript. I think so, first, because in all other manuscripts the Legend forms the exordium and precedes the charges; secondly, because it has no proper connection with or sequence to the Legend of the Four Crowned Martyrs which precedes it, and which terminates on the 354th line; and lastly, because it is evidently an interruption of the religious instructions which are taken up on line 577, and which naturally follow line 534. The writer having extolled the Christian steadfastness and piety of the four martyrs whose feast he tells us is on the eighth day after Allhalloween, proceeds on line 576 to admonish his readers to avoid pride and covetousness and to practice virtue.

There is here a regular and natural connection, which, however, would be interrupted by the insertion between the two clauses of an imperfect portion of a legend which has reference to the very beginning of the history of Masonry. Hence I conclude that all that part of the Legend which described the events that were connected with Noah's Flood and the Tower of Babel is an interpolation, and belongs to another manuscript and to another place.
(1) See the full details of this Legend in Mackey's "Encyclopeadia of Freemasonry," art. Four Crowned Martyrs.
(2) "History of Freemasonry," Lyon's Trans., p. 31. In fact, the copyist 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 the other without respect to any congruity of subjects.The rest of the poem is occupied with instructions as to behavior when in church, when in the company of one's superiors, and when present at the celebration of the mass. The whole ends with what we find in no other manuscript, the now familiar Masonic formula, "Amen, so mote it be."

Line 471 furnishes, I think, internal evidence that the poem was originally composed of two distinct works, written, in all probability, by two different persons, but in the copy which we now have, combined in one by the compiler or copyist. Mr. Woodford also is of the opinion that there are two distinct poems, although the fact had not attracted the attention of Halliwell. The former gentleman says that "it seems to be in truth two legends, and not only one." This is evident, from the fact that this second part is prefaced by the title, "Alia ordinacio artis gemetriae," that is, "Another Constitution of the art of geometry." This title would indicate that what followed was a different Ordinacio or Constitution and taken from a different manuscript. Besides, line 471, which is the beginning of the other or second Constitution, does not fall into its proper place in following line 470, but is appropriately a continuation of line 74. To make this evident, I copy lines 70-74 from the poem, and follow them by lines 471-474, whence it will be seen that the latter lines are an appropriate and natural continuation of the former.

Line 70. He sende about ynto the londe
71. After alle the masonus of the crafte,
72. To come to hym ful evene stragfte
73. For to amende these defaultys alle
74. By good counsel gef it hyt mytgh falle.
............
471. They ordent ther a semble to be y-holde
472. Every yer, whersever they wolde
473. To amende the defautes, gef any where fonde
474. Amonge the craft withynne the londe.

The second manuscipt seems to have been copied from line 471, as far as line 496. There, I suppose, the charges or regulations to have followed, which having been given from the first manuscript the copyist omitted, as a needless repetition, but went on immediately with the "ars quatuor coronatorum." This ended at line 534. It is now evident that he went back to a preceding part of the second manuscript and copied the early account of Masonry from line 535 to 576. The bare reading of these lines will convince the reader that they are not in their proper place, and must have formed a part of the beginning of the second poem.Line 577 appropriately follows line 534, when the interpolation is left out, and then the transcription is correctly made to the end of the poem. The first manuscript was apparently copied correctly, with the exception of the two interpolations from the second MS. There is a doubt whether the Legend of the Crowned Martyrs belonged to the first or to the second poem. If to the first, then we have the whole of the first poem, and of the second only the interpolations. This is, however, a mere conjecture without positive proof. Yet it is very probable.

On the whole, the view I am inclined to take of this manuscript
is as follows:
1. There were two original manuscripts, out of which the copyist made a careless admixture.
2. The first MS. began with line 1 and went on to the end at line 794. But this is only conjectural. It may have ended, or rather the copying ceased, at line 470.
3. If the conjecture just advanced be correct, then from a second MS. the copyist made interpolations, in the following way.
4. The beginning of the second MS. is lost. But from very near the commencement, which probably described the antediluvian tradition of Lamech, the copyist had selected a portion which begins with line 535 and ends at line 576. He had previously interpolated the lines from 471 to 496.
5. We have, then, the whole of the first manuscript, from the 1st line to the 794th, with the addition of two interpolations from the second, consisting only of 68 lines, namely: from line 471 to 496, and from line 535 to 576.
6. The first manuscript is deficient in any references to antediluvian Masonry, but begins with the foundation of Masonry in Egypt, as its title imports. This deficiency was, in part, supplied by the second interpolation (535-596).

This part begins with the building of Babel. But it is evident from the words, "many years after," that there was a preceding part to this manuscript that has not been copied. The "many years after" refer to some details that had been previously made. The account of the Seven Sciences, found in all later manuscripts, is not given in the first poem. It is inserted in this from the second.
7. So of the poem in the form we now have it, the parts copied from the second MS. consist only of 68 lines, which have been interpolated in two places into the first MS. - namely, lines 471 - 496, and lines 535-576; and these have been dislocated from their proper places. All the rest of the poem constitutes the original first manuscript. If I hesitate at all in coming to the positive conclusion that the first and last parts of the poem were composed by the same author, it is because the latter is written in a slightly different metre. This, therefore, leaves the question where the first poem ends and where the second begins, still open to discussion.

The variations which exist between the Halliwell poem, or, rather, poems, and other Masonic manuscripts of later date, are very important, because they indicate a difference of origin, and, by the points of difference, suggest several questions as to the early progress of Masonry in England.
1. The form of the Halliwell MS. differs entirely from that of the others. The latter are in prose, while the former is in verse. The language, too, of the Halliwell MS. is far more antiquated than that of the other manuscripts, showing that it was written in an earlier stage of the English tongue. It belongs to the Early English which succeeded the Anglo-Saxon. The other manuscripts were written at a later period of the language.
2. The Halliwell MS. is evidently a Roman Catholic production, and was written when the religion of Rome prevailed in England. The later manuscripts are all Protestant in their character, and must have been written after the middle of the 16th century, at least, when Protestantism was introduced into that country by Edward VI. and by Queen Elizabeth. (1)

The different religious character of the two sets of manuscripts (1) Edward VI. reigned from 1547-1553; Elizabeth reigned from 1558-1603; the interval was occupied by the Roman Catholic reign of Mary. But the archaic style of the "Halliwell MS." forbids any theory of its having been written during that intermediate period. is very patent. We see ecclesiastical influence very strongly manifested in the Halliwell MS. So marked is this that Mr. Halliwell supposes that it was written by a priest, which, I think, is not impossible, although not for the reason he assigns, which is founded on his incorrect translation of a single word.

(1)But the Roman Catholic character of the poem is proven by lines 593-692, which are occupied in directions how the mass is to be heard; and, so ample are these directions as to the ritual observance of this part of the Roman Catholic worship, that it is very probable that they were written by a priest.In the subsequent manuscripts we find no such allusions. Freemasonry, when these documents were written, was Christian in its character, but it was Protestant Christianity. The invocation with which each one begins is to the Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; but no mention is made, as in the Halliwell MS. of the Virgin and the saints. The only reference to the Church is in the first charge, which is, "that you shall be a true man to God and the holy Church, and that you use no heresy nor error by your understanding or teaching of discreet men" - a charge that would be eminently fitting for a Protestant Christian brotherhood.
On referring to the first charge adopted after the revival in 1717 by the Grand Lodge of England, we find that then, for the first time, the sectarian character was abandoned, and the toleration of a universal religion adopted.

Thus it is said in that charge: "Though in ancient times Ma (1) A philological note may, here, be not uninteresting. Mr. Halliwell, in support of his assertion that the writer of the poem was a priest, quotes line 629: "And, when the Gospel me rede schal" - where he evidently supposes that me was used instead of I, and that the line was to be translated- "when I shall read the Gospel." But in none of the old manuscripts is the flagrant blunder committed of using the accusative me in place of the nominative Y or I.

The fact is, that the Anglo-Saxon man, signifying one, or they, like the French on in "on dit," as "man dyde," one or they did, or it was done, gave way in Early English to me, used in the same sense. Examples of this may be found in the writers who lived about the time of the composition of the "Halliwell MS." A few may suffice. In the Ayenbite of Inwyt is the following line: "Ine the ydele wordes me zeneyeth ine vif maneres," that is, "In the idle word one sinneth in five ways." Again, in Robert of Gloucester's Chronicle are these phrases "By this tale me may yse," i.e.: "By this tale may be seen," Story of Lear, line 183. And best me may to hem truste," i.e.: "And they may be trustedliest," ib., 1. 184. "The stude that he was at yslawe me cleputh yet Morgan," i.e.: "The place where he was slain is called Morgan still," ib., 1. 213. And the line in the Halliwell poem, which Mr. Halliwell supposed to mean, "And when I shall read the Gospel," properly translated, is, " And when the Gospel shall be read." It furnishes, therefore, no proof that the writer was a priest.

sons were charged in every country to be of the religion of that country or nation, whatever it was, yet 'tis now thought more expedient only to oblige them to that religion in which all men agree, leaving their particular opinions to themselves." (1) Now, comparing the religious views expressed in the oldest Masonic Constitution of the 14th century, with those set forth in the later ones of the 16th and 17th, and again with those laid down in the charge of 1717, we find an exact record of the transitions which from time to time took place in the religious aspect of Freemasonry in England and in some other countries. At first it was Roman Catholic in its character, and under ecclesiastical domination. Then, after the Reformation, rejecting the doctrines of Rome and the influence of the priesthood, it retained its Christian character, but became Protestant in its peculiar views. Lastly, at the time of the so-called Revival, in the beginning of the 18th century, when Speculative Masonry assumed that form which it has ever since retained, it abandoned its sectarian character, and adopted a cosmopolitan and tolerant rule, which required of its members, as a religious test, only a belief in God. (1) Anderson's " Constitutions," 1st ed, 1723, P. 50.