Foundations: The Prestonian Lecture

Foundations - new light on the formation and early years of the Grand Lodge of England, the Prestonian Lecture for 2016, explores the evolution of Freemasonry from the fourteenth century to the creation of the first Grand Lodge of England in 1717. Ric Berman challenges old Masonic myths, explains the interconnections between Freemasonry, Grand Lodge and Britain's new Hanoverian government, and outlines how and why its leaders positioned the Craft as a bastion against Jacobitism. The book celebrates and provides a context for the 300th anniversary of the formation of the world's first Grand Lodge.