In 1731, the only surviving copy of King John’s Magna Carta bearing the royal seal was damaged in a fire. To record its appearance before it further deteriorated, an engraving of the document was made. An alderman of the city of London was so delighted with the result that he gave the artist twenty guineas.
    The artist who made this facsimile was Freemason, John Pine (1690-1756), one of the most accomplished English engravers, who created some of the most celebrated images of eighteenth-century England. At the age of nineteen, with another London engraver, John Clark, he produced the frontispiece of one of the best-selling books of the century, Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. Our modern conception of Crusoe is still shaped by Clark and Pine’s portrayal of him dressed in goatskin with a roughly-made hat.
    Towards the end of his life, Pine used his skills as an engraver and businessman to help the surveyor John Rocque produce a detailed plan of the streets of London - at that time the largest city in the world - a project which many had thought impracticable. Pine and Rocque’s spectacular 1747 map of London, comprising twenty-four sheets and measuring thirteen feet by six, is the definitive image of Dr. Johnson’s London.
    Rocque was a Huguenot refugee who had prepared surveys for the Prince of Wales. He had wanted to produce a map of London for some time but it was only when he got in touch with Pine that the project began in earnest. Pine persuaded the city corporation to give Rocque its support and Pine’s connection with Grand Lodge doubtless helped secure the assistance of the President of the Royal Society, Martin Folkes, who had been Deputy Grand Master. Pine’s masonic connections also helped build up the subscription list for the map.
    Pine’s interest in preserving antiquities is also evident in his sumptuous engravings of a series of sixteenth-century tapestries showing the defeat of the Spanish Armada which then hung in the House of Lords but were later destroyed by fire. Pine’s engravings were said to be more impressive than the original tapestries and are among the most famous depictions of the Armada.
    Pine’s greatest feat was an edition of the works of the Latin poet Horace. This was remarkable because the entire book, including its elegant classical illustrations and the text of the poems themselves, was engraved. Pine’s Horace is one of the outstanding achievements of eighteenth-century book art. The Prussian King Frederick the Great was so impressed that he wanted Pine to produce a similar edition of a text by Voltaire.
    Pine has been studied by many art historians; amazingly, however, they have not noticed that Pine, like his friend William Hogarth, was an enthusiastic Freemason. Pine placed his artistic gifts at the service of the Craft, and the summer exhibition at the Library and Museum of Freemasonry, London, John Pine: The Sociable Craftsman, shows for the first time Pine’s masonic works side by side with his other masterpieces.
    Pine’s most familiar masonic work is the frontispiece to the first Book of Constitutions, published in 1723. This shows the 2nd Duke of Montagu, Grand Master from 1721-2, handing the Constitutions and a pair of compasses to his successor as Grand Master, the Duke of Wharton; each Grand Master is flanked by his Deputy and Wardens.
    Pine’s most important masonic achievement, and among his most charming works, are the little lists of lodges which he produced for Grand Lodge between 1725 and 1741. These give details of the meeting place of each lodge. Each lodge is distinguished by beautiful little symbols representing the name of the tavern where the lodge met. The engraved lists provide key evidence for the early development of masonic lodges in England. The exhibition displays, for the first time, all the copies of Pine’s engraved lists held by the Library and Museum of Freemasonry.
    Pine’s Freemasonry is important in understanding his achievements as an artist. The lists of patrons who financed major projects such as the engraved Horace or Rocque’s map include many men who Pine met in masonic lodges. However, Pine’s interest in Freemasonry went beyond business networking: he enjoyed its sociable aspects. The minutes of Grand Lodge record how, at the Grand Feast in 1730, he acted as Marshal ‘with his truncheon blew, tipt with gold’.
    Unfortunately, we do not have any letters or direct evidence to tell us more about what Freemasonry meant for Pine. This is a reminder that historical evidence for Freemasonry before 1750 is very piecemeal. Hogarth served as a Grand Steward but never wrote anything about Freemasonry. We have to infer his views on the Craft from his pictures which suggest that he had a troubled relationship with Grand Lodge and was doubtful about many of the innovations being made in English Freemasonry by Desaguliers and his associates.
    Likewise, our only information about Pine’s view of Freemasonry comes from his pictures. These suggest that, despite Pine’s friendship with Hogarth, his view of Freemasonry was perhaps closer to that of Desaguliers. Pine was interested in the new Newtonian philosophy, illustrating a book by Henry Pemberton which provided a popular introduction to Newton’s ideas. In his illustrations of Horace, Virgil and Plutarch, Pine popularised the use of classical styles of decoration. Hogarth was antagonistic towards the fashionable use of classical orders in architecture and would have been critical of the discussion of architecture in Anderson’s Constitutions. Pine, by contrast, was more imbued with classical ideals and was concerned, both in his art and in his Freemasonry, to re-establish ‘the beautiful Augustan stile’.

Professor Andrew Prescott of the Centre for Research into Freemasonry, Sheffield University, has developed this exhibition in Freemasons’ Hall in conjunction with the Library and Museum of Freemasonry, London. The exhibition runs from 5 July to 15 September. A book by Professor Prescott, John Pine (1690-1756): the Sociable Craftsman, will be available at The Shop at Freemasons’ Hall, London.