Our Constitutions are a natural evolution of the ancient charges of the operative Freemasons. These ancient or old charges and regulations, as they are referred to, are far from being exclusive to freemasonry. Many of the London Guilds, the medieval equivalent of the modern Trade Unions, had ancient charges to guide the moral comportment of their members.
    By 1987 a total of some 128 such documents had been discovered or identified. They are all true rarities and museum pieces. They are often in the form of 6 foot, or longer, parchment rolls, some 9 inches in width and stitched together. The earliest and most famous example extant is the late 14th century Regius Poem or Manuscript now housed in the British Museum. It is a wonderful aspect of the continuity of our Masonic traditions to consider that the Ancient Charges And Regulations with which our current book of Constitutions opens, and which are read out to every Master elect before his installation into the chair of his Lodge, trace their origins to these early medieval documents.
    The first Constitutions of the Free-Masons was written and published by the Reverend James Anderson in January 1723. This same year, the first Secretary, William Cowper, was appointed and minutes of Grand Lodge began to be kept. In these Constitutions, Anderson states that the original rules were compiled by the second Grand Master, George Payne, in 1720 and approved by Grand Lodge on 24 June 1721. There is, however, no other evidence of George Payne’s General Regulations to which Anderson refers. Records show that in September 1721, which, incidentally, is the first date on which Anderson appears in Grand Lodge, he was commissioned to “digest” the ancient charges and regulations. On his presentation of the first completed and printed version of the book in Grand Lodge in January 1723 he was appointed a Grand Warden.
    Anderson’s contributions to the early development of Freemasonry are unrivalled. He was born around 1680 in Scotland and as a young man received a Doctorate in Divinity at Aberdeen University. Although a member of the fourth of the lodges which formed the premier Grand Lodge in 1717, his masonic activities, beyond the mammoth task of the two editions of his Constitutions published in his lifetime, appear to be limited. As mentioned, we first hear of him in 1721 and he effectively disappears from the masonic scene between 1723 – the time of his publication – and 1730. He is identified as the Master of Lodge XVII in the list of lodges in the 1723 Constitutions. Rather curiously this is the only mention of Anderson’s name in the whole book. He is referred to as James Anderson AM, Master, the author of this book. He is listed as a member of several lodges in 1725 and appears in Grand Lodge a total of just 13 times between 1731 and 28 May 1739, the date of his death.
    From the beginning there are records revealing misgivings about the Constitutions. All the necessary authority and legitimacy of the publication was sanctioned by the preface to the first edition which was written by the third Grand Master (1719), the Rev John Theophilus Desaguliers, who acted as Deputy to the Duke of Wharton in 1723, the time of the publication of the Constitutions. It is, however, the supposed “History of our Craft” as detailed by Anderson that was always queried and criticised. It should be remembered that Anderson was using external sources for his legends and myths about the Freemason’s origins in particular. In attributing masonic ranks to both real and fictitious historical characters, he was creating legends of value to Freemasons not unlike biblical stories being of value to believers. Nevertheless, it is quite surprising that it was not until the 6th edition of the Constitutions, published in 1815, two years after the union of the rival Grand Lodges, that Anderson’s fictitious history of Freemasonry was finally omitted.
    Incidentally, the word constitutions, which has been used by Grand Lodge since 1723, is also mentioned in several of the old charges, including the Regius Manuscript, which is headed, in Latin ‘Hic Incipiunt constituciones artis...’ Although in England we use the plural for ‘constitutions’, it would in fact be more correct if we were to call our book of rules, The Book of Constitution and Laws, as is the case with most other Grand Lodges. The explanation for the use of the plural is that – we have done it since time immemorial!
    One of the most attractive aspects of the first book of Constitutions is the wonderful steel engraved frontispiece by John Pine. Ironically, it is possibly the only reliable source of information to be found within the book. The design represents actual portraits. On the left, the Duke of Montagu, in his robes of the Garter, is handing a pair of compasses and the Constitutions to the Duke of Wharton. Montagu was the fifth Grand Master and Wharton his successor in 1722. Each of the two Grand Masters is accompanied by his Officers: The Duke of Montagu is flanked by Dr John Beal the Deputy Grand Master, Josias Villeneau his Senior Warden who holds a group of aprons and gloves, and Thomas Morris, the Junior Warden. Behind the Duke of Wharton
    stand his Deputy, Dr John Theophilus Desaguliers, in his clergy dress, and the two Wardens, Joshua Timson and William Hawkins.
    Centrally placed on the floor, between the two Grand Masters, is the diagram of the forty-seventh proposition of Euclid beneath which the word Eureka is written out in Greek script. Anderson refers to the formula on page 20 of the Constitutions when, with regard to Geometry, he states: the Greater Pythagoras, prov’d the Author of the 47th Proposition of Euclid’s first Book, which, if duly observ’d, is the Foundation of all Masonry, sacred, civil, and military. Clearly Anderson chose Euclid’s theorem, attributed to Pythagoras (that in a right angled triangle the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two sides) because of its symbolising Geometry, traditionally the most important of the seven liberal arts and sciences.
    However, the Greek word Eureka under the emblem is curious. It is possibly an error, the engraver John Pine, or maybe Anderson himself, having confused Archimedes’ famed outcry with the Pythagorean theory. On the other hand it may have been intentional: ‘Eureka’, which literally translates from the Greek as ‘I have found, was first used by Archimedes but there is no reason - at a time when Greek was a popular language in Europe - for the word not to be applied to other major achievements. Thus the association of word Eureka with the emblem of a most important discovery, the 47th proposition, may well have been intentional.
    Since 1815, and without explanation, Euclid’s diagram on the frontispiece has also been used as an emblem of a Past Master in the Craft and on the aprons of those holding London and Overseas Grand Rank.
    The first Book of Constitutions is a highly prized book. It is unknown how many copies may have been printed; the figures guessed at by various historians vary between 250 and 700 copies. They are beautiful and interesting rarities indeed but do appear at auctions and their price is very dependent upon condition: recently, a copy of the first edition, in pristine condition, changed hands at £2,200.
    The 1738 edition reaches £500-£700; later editions £200-£700 and the 1815 edition, around £200.

Yasha Beresiner, LLB, is a Past Master of Quatuor Coronati Lodge, No. 2076.