jbarr

Regarding South Carolina's use of AFM, I saw this the other day (Forgot the site)...

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Why is SC Grand Lodge AFM?

Most grand lodges are styled F&AM (Free & Accepted Masons) or AF&AM ( Ancient Free & Accepted Masons). So why is South Carolina the only grand lodge called Ancient Free Masons (AFM)?

Before December 26, 1818, there where two grand lodges in South Carolina - the Grand Lodge of Ancient York Masons and the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of South Carolina (Modern Masons). They took the name Grand Lodge of Ancient Free Masons of South Carolina as one of the compromises made to merge the two bodies.

-- Masonic Light
April 1995

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-Jim
MasonicTips.com

grandsecretary

You know, the history of Freemasonry in England is clearly set out and very carefully sourced on our website www.grandlodgeofallengland.org

To continue to suggest, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that The Grand Lodge of London (now known as The United Grand Lodge of England) was the first Grand Lodge in England is not acceptable to the thinking Mason.

The days are gone where the simple repetition of an obvious and tiresome calumny which denies the history of England itself, will be believed and it does no credit to those who continually repeat it in the hope that it will be believed.

If any brother wishes to know what happened in England from Anglo-Saxon times to today then the Webpage: Grand Lodges in England is available to him.

This is just one, but a typical quoted and documented source:

"Edward was succeeded, in 924, by his son, Athelstan, whose brother, Edwin, procured from the king a charter for masons, by which they were empowered to meet annually in a general assembly, and to have power to regulate their own order. And, according to this charter, the first grand lodge of England met at York, in 926. But here it is to be remarked that the grand lodge is not to be understood as the same in those times that it is now; it was not then restricted to the masters and wardens of private lodges, but was open to as many of the fraternity as could attend: for, until late years, the grand lodge as now constituted did not exist, but there was but one family of masons; and any sufficient number of masons met together, with the consent of the civil magistrate, to practice the rites of masonry, without warrant of constitution as a lodge.

"On the death of Prince Edwin, Athelstan himself presided over the lodges; but after his decease, we know little of the state of the masons in Britain, except that they were governed by Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury, in 960, and Edward the Confessor in 1041. But in 1066, William the Conqueror appointed Gondulph, Bishop of Rochester, to preside over the society. In 1100, Henry the First patronised them; and in 1135, during the reign of Stephen, the society was under the command of Gilbert de Clare, Marquess of Pembroke."

(SOURCE: The Freemasons' Pocket Companion - Apollo Lodge, Oxford University, Jurisdiction of the United Grand Lodge of England, independently reported by The Mirror of Literature, Amusement and Instruction, Vol. 17, Issue 491, May 28 1831).