Mark

While there is evidence that a form of Mark degree was extant in Scotland as early as 1599, according to the earliest known English records Mark Masonry was introduced into a speculative body at Portsmouth on 1 September 1769 at Royal Arch Chapter No. 257, when Thomas Dunckerley made a certain number of brethren Mark Masons and Mark Masters, each choosing his mark.

This degree was subsequently worked in many lodges, as well as under the old Grand Lodge at York, but the Union between the Antients and Moderns in 1813 defined specific recognition of the three Craft degrees only, including the Holy Royal Arch, and thus completely excluded the Mark ceremony.

Nevertheless, many lodges continued to work the degree, while several London brethren obtained a warrant from the Bon Accord Chapter of Aberdeen empowering them to confer the Mark degree. This action was to create considerable difficulties for the Mark lodge in London with the authorities in Scotland and, in order to legitimise their cause, many of the senior Mark Masons concerned formed their own Mark Grand Lodge in June 1856, appointing Lord Leigh as the first Grand Master.

A period of discomfort and disharmony ensued, but by 1860 a Concordat establishing a common ceremonial was eventually entered into by the English Grand Mark Lodge and the Grand Chapter of Scotland, and slowly the degree grew in popularity to make it an important facet within the structure of Freemasonry. Together with the Royal Arch, it became one of the most popularly supported degrees in Freemasonry.

Today there are over 1,570 Mark Lodges under the English Constitution, as well as seven daughter Grand Lodges, and it is interesting to note that a vast number of brethren who have attained great distinction in the Craft continue to be no less eminent in the Mark.