The secret world of female Freemasons - BBC News

BBC News
Published on Nov 8, 2017
Think of the Freemasons and you probably think of a shadowy world of secret handshakes and dark allegations of corruption and even conspiracy.
But how true is that?
In a UK first Victoria Derbyshire reporter Claire Jones was given access to see exactly what goes on behind the scenes in the initiations, ceremonies and rituals of female Freemasons.

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As the Freemasonry of the Premier Grand Lodge of England spread in France, the French fraternity stayed within the letter of Anderson's proscription of women, but saw no reason to ban them from their banquets or their religious services.

During the 1740s, lodges of adoption began to appear. Attached to a regular (men only) lodge, wives and female relatives of the masons would be admitted to a parallel system of degrees, with a similar moral undertone to the authentic rite of the lodge. The earliest had a nautical theme.

In 1747, the Chevalier Beauchaine began the Order of Woodcutters (Ordre des Fendeurs), with rites supposedly based on an early version of the Carbonari.

In 1774, the lodges of adoption came under the jurisdiction of the Grand Orient de France, and the published regulations show a system of four degrees:
1.Apprentie, or Female Apprentice.
2.Compagnonne, or Journeywoman.
3.Maîtresse, or Mistress.
4.Parfaite Maçonne, or Perfect Masoness.

Further degrees came and went, with a ten-degree system evolving at the end of the Eighteenth century. The idea spread widely in Europe, but never appeared in England. After a brief eclipse during the Reign of Terror at the start of the French Revolution, lodges of adoption flourished, with the Empress Josephine presiding over one in Strasbourg in 1805.

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Image Credit: Christophe Dioux

Admission of a young lady into a Lodge of Adoption

Source / Image Courtesy

Annie Besant, née Wood (1 October 1847 – 20 September 1933) was a British socialist, theosophist, women's rights activist, writer, orator, and supporter of both Irish and Indian self-rule.

She was a leading speaker for both the Fabian Society and the Marxist Social Democratic Federation (SDF). She was also elected to the London School Board for Tower Hamlets, topping the poll, even though few women were qualified to vote at that time.



Annie Besant in Masonic regalia.

Source / Image Courtesy