The Royal Order of Scotland
Have you heard of the Royal Order of Scotland ? If you live in an Anglo-Saxon country, you probably do. But if you live in a Latin country, it's less likely. The Royal Order of Scotland is a Masonic order of British origin, with a very Christian sensibility, which in a way enshrines the mythical link between Freemasonry and the Crown of Scotland. The Royal Order of Scotland, which has incorporated the Rosicrucian legend, is said to be the oldest system of side degrees, second only to the ancient Craft Freemasonry. But what is this Royal Order of Scotland ? Is it really that old ? How is it organised? And in which countries was the Royal Order of Scotland established ?
The Origins of the Royal Order of Scotland
As is often the case when studying the origins of Masonic Higher and Side Degrees, legend largely competes with history. This is particularly true of the Royal Order of Scotland, which claims to combine Freemasonry with allegiance to the Scottish Crown, and therefore clearly played a role in the Stuart political project within so-called Jacobite Freemasonry.
The authentic history of the Royal Order of Scotland remains difficult to establish. Some suggest that the Royal Order of Scotland was founded in London between 1721 and 1741 with the intention of reviving the explicitly Christian heritage from which the Masonic rituals of the Grand Lodge of London (the Moderns) had strayed. It seems that such an order was mentioned in the archives of the Grand Lodge of London in 1741. The official histories of the Royal Order of Scotland do not seem to have made the connection with a relatively unknown form of Freemasonry whose existence in London is attested no later than 1732 : the so-called Harodim Freemasonry, explicitly Christian and cultivated by the Jacobites, described by Jan Snoek in British Freemasonry, 1717-1813, Volume 3: Rituals II - Harodim Material and Higher Degrees (New York: Routledge, 2016). This form of Freemasonry, distinct from both the Moderns of the First Grand Lodge of London and the Ancients, who united to form a Grand Lodge in 1751, was probably the first form of Freemasonry to take root in France from the 1725s onwards, as the first Grand Lodge of France, founded in 1728, was largely dominated by Jacobite figures in its early days.
The first degree of the Royal Order of Scotland is called the Order of Heredom of Kilwinning, and it is obviously tempting to see Heredom as a form of Harodim. But some believe that Heredom comes from the Latin Heredium, heritage : Heredom of Kilwinning would therefore refer to the Masonic heritage of the Lodge of Kilwinning, which is one of the oldest Scottish Mother Lodges and now bears the number 0 on the roll of the Grand Lodge of Scotland ; but the term Heredom could also simply refer to the lineage of the Stuarts. For others, it refers to a mythical Scottish mountain that is said to have sheltered the Holy Grail, Mount Heroden or Heredom, a transcription of the Greek Hieros Domos, which can be translated as Holy Abode or Holy Temple.
It seems unlikely to us that the second part of the Royal Order of Scotland, entitled Knighthood of the Rosy Cross, dates from the 1720s/40s, as the Masonic degree of Knight of the Rosy Cross, of French origin, did not appear until the 1760s.
In any case, in 1750 a patent was granted to a certain William Mitchell to found a lodge of this mysterious order in The Hague (Netherlands). In 1752/53, Mitchell travelled to Scotland, where he founded a Provincial Grand Lodge of the Order, the first written records of which appear in 1766. And in 1767 this structure became the Grand Lodge of the Royal Order of Scotland, which is still the governing body of the system for the world today.
Only a close study of the documents of the period and the ancient rituals, which we have not been able to do, would allow us to dispel the many uncertainties about the origin and patriotic Scottish character of this system. However, as far as we know, the following hypotheses can be made :
The first form of what was to become the Royal Order of Scotland, probably similar to the mysterious Freemasonry of the Harodim, existed in London by 1732 at the latest. Was it already an order mythically linked to the Crown of Scotland ? If it was indeed made up of Jacobites, it is more than likely. Did it already include the Rosy Cross degree ? As we wrote above, this is unlikely.
William Mitchell founded a first Provincial Lodge in The Hague around 1750, and then did the same in Edinburgh between 1752/53 and 1766. It was perhaps in The Hague, where many Jacobite exiles resided, that the decidedly Scottish dimension of the Order was introduced, if it was not already there.
The Grand Lodge of the Royal Order of Scotland was officially founded in 1767. The date is perhaps significant : the previous year had seen the death of James Francis Stuart (the Old Pretender), son of James II Stuart. Could the Royal Order of Scotland as we know it today, with its insistence on the hereditary Grand Mastership of the Kings of Scotland, be a tribute to the late Pretender and an attempt to rekindle the zeal of the supporters of his son Charles Edward (the Young Pretender), who had lost all international credibility after his defeat at the Battle of Culloden in 1746 ?
The Grand Lodge of Edinburgh in 2020
As for the degree of Rosy Cross, we believe that it could not have been introduced into the Order until the 1760s, and perhaps as late as 1767. There was certainly no shortage of Jacobite Masons who had received the degree of Knight of the Rosy Cross in France and who were able to incorporate it into the Order at that time.
The Royal Order of Scotland is often presented as the oldest system of Masonic higher degrees and possibly the origin of all higher degrees, including the Knight of the Rosy Cross. In our opinion, this is not quite the case. In its present form, the Royal Order of Scotland is a late form of the Harodim stream of Freemasonry, which developed in other branches: in France, it seems to have been behind the rather surprising ritual published in 1744 under the title Le Parfait Maçon and the Rituals of Adoption Freemasonry. In England, it developed from 1733 in the county of Durham (north-east England), where it finally became a Grand Lodge in 1787.
The decline and rebirth of the Royal Order of Scotland
The Order was present in the Netherlands as early as 1750 and was established in France in 1786, where it seems to have been active until 1873. But it does not appear to have spread elsewhere at the time, and its development was short-lived. By 1819 it had virtually disappeared. This is understandable, given that the Order was born largely out of Jacobite fervour : after Charles Edward had died in exile in Rome in 1788, abandoned by all and dumped by the King of France, who cared for it some thirty years later ?
In 1839, the Order was revived by a coachbuilder named Houston Rigg Brown and the renowned botanist George Arnott Walker Arnott (1799-1868), who established new Provincial Grand Lodges in Scotland and England from 1843.
The Royal Order of Scotland has now spread throughout the world, with over 90 Provincial Grand Lodges established in the United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Singapore, Gibraltar, Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Germany, Bermuda, Philippines, Barbados, Bahamas, Jamaica, Trinidad, South Africa, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Zambia and France. Total membership is estimated at around 15,000.
Although the Provincial Grand Lodges are attached to the Grand Lodge of the Order, based in Edinburgh, and recruit only from the regular Craft Grand Lodges (i.e. those recognised by the United Grand Lodge of England), there is one exception : the English Federation of the Intrnational Co-masonry “Le Droit Humain” also practises the rituals of the Royal Order of Scotland.
Characteristics and customs of the Royal Order of Scotland
The Royal Order of Scotland has at least five distinctive features that are worth mentioning.
Firstly, the Royal Order of Scotland has only one Grand Lodge, that of Edinburgh, and all other structures are Provincial Grand Lodges. Nothing surprising at first glance, but what is very special is that there are no particular Lodges and that the Order only assembles at Grand Lodge and Provincial Grand Lodge level.
Secondly, the hereditary Grand Master of the Order is the King of Scotland. The Chairman of the Grand Lodge therefore takes the title of Deputy Grand Master. Furthermore, during the proceedings of the Grand Lodge, an empty seat, adorned with an ermine coat, is placed to the right of the Deputy Grand Master, to signify the Grand Mastership of the King of Scotland. At Provincial Grand Lodge level, however, there is a Provincial Grand Master.
Thirdly, members of the Royal Order of Scotland were originally required to be Scottish or of Scottish descent. This requirement has now been removed.
Fourthly, admission to the Royal Order of Scotland is by invitation only, on the condition that one has been a Master Mason for at least five years and professes the Trinitarian Christian faith, which excludes a certain number of so-called Unitarian Protestants. This last requirement may come as a surprise to continental Freemasons, but it is found in other systems of Higher or Side Degrees used in Anglo-Saxon countries. It should be noted that the Royal Order of Scotland used in the English Federation of "Le Droit Humain" does not require a commitment to the Trinitarian faith.
Fifthly, the Provincial Grand Lodges have real autonomy and can add other conditions to the admission of new members. In some, it is necessary to be a Mark Master, Royal Arch, 18th or 32nd degree of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite, or a Knight Templar of the York Rite.
Emblem of the Royal Order of Scotland
In terms of ritual, the Royal Order of Scotland has two degrees. The first, entitled Heredom of Kilwinning, is conferred in a rather lengthy ceremony, with numerous lectures in the form of questions and answers. This degree is a great fresco, encompassing the symbolism of Craft Freemasonry, the Temple and, more generally, the history of salvation from a biblical perspective. It includes many biblical figures, most of whom appear in other Masonic Higher or Side Degrees (Noah, Moses, Solomon, Betsalel, Cyrus, Zorobabel, Enoch, etc.), but in a highly religious atmosphere. This degree culminates in the evocation of the Sacrifice of Christ.
The second degree is the Knighthood of the Rosy Cross, which is much shorter and simpler than the first. Most of the teachings of the Order are contained in the first degree, and the Knighthood degree is no more than a kind of honorary consecration. The ceremony consists of verifying that the candidate is indeed a member of the Order of Heredom of Kilwinning, taking the oath, reading a lecture and passing on the secrets of the degree. The word for this degree is the same Christic monogram as that used for the degree of Knight of the Rosy Cross in other rites (Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite, Traditional French Rite, Rite of Memphis-Misraim, etc.), thus demonstrating a kinship with the Rosy Cross degree that appeared in France around 1760. However, this relationship seems rather distant in view of the great differences between the two ritual forms.
In studying the Royal Order of Scotland, there is a sense of both familiarity and strangeness. It is, of course, a Masonic Order, and there are elements of the three Craft Degrees, as well as allusions to many of the episodes told by the Higher and Side Degrees of other systems. But at the same time, the atmosphere is completely different and the ceremonies, in rhyme, have an incantatory and mystical character not found in any other Masonic ritual in use today.
Heredom or Harodim?
The terms Heredom and Harodim, discussed above, require a little digression, as these two terms are also known in other Masonic rites and systems of Higher Degrees. Heredom rarely appears except in documents relating to the degree of Knight of the Rosy Cross, where it generally refers to the specific customs of the Royal Order of Scotland. This is the case, for example, in Vuillaume's Tuileur (1830).
But the word Harodim has his own existence in the world of the Higher Degrees of Freemasonry : it is found, in particular, in the 7th and 8th degrees of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite. A persistent Masonic legend, albeit completely erroneous, claims that the Harodim were the 3600 overseers of the works of the Temple of Solomon, according to 1 Kings. According to the usual Masonic literature, Ha-RoDiYM means those who govern, those who direct, which is correct in itself. But on the other hand, there is never any mention of Harodim in the Book of Kings : those in charge of overseeing the work of the Temple are called Sārim, i.e. princes or chiefs, and I Kings 5:30 describes them precisely as the SāRéY HaNīTSāBiYM LiSHeLoMoH, i.e. the princes established by Solomon. Nor is there any mention of Harodim in the Second Book of Chronicles, which presents a later version of the account of the building of the Temple : the famous overseers there are called Menatsim (MeNaTSeCHiM), literally those who are established (II Chronicles 2:17).
So where does the Masonic Harodim come from ? Certainly from the mysterious movement that was Harodim Freemasonry. But where does the term itself come from ? Does Harodim come from Heredom, or does Heredom come from Harodim ? This is a historical mystery that we will not be able to solve today.
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