How does the Mark Master Mason degree relate to the Fellow Craft degree?

The symbolic connection between the Fellow Craft degree and the Mark degree rests on the distinction between performing life's duties and organizing them. While the Fellow Craft degree teaches the general exercise of all the duties of life, the Mark degree teaches the importance of performing those duties with systematic regularity 1.

Historically, the practice of choosing a mark was directly tied to the status of a Fellow Craft. An operative craftsman, upon advancing to Fellow Craft, selected a distinctive mark to identify his workmanship on fashioned stones 21. The Schaw Statutes of 1598 formally mandated that upon receiving a Fellow Craft or master, his name and mark were to be entered into the lodge record 1. Speculative Masons preserved this custom throughout the seventeenth century by recording their selected marks in lodge registers 1.

In terms of degree structure, early Scottish practice maintained a explicit functional division: the degree of Mark Man was conferred upon a Fellow Craft, whereas the degree of Mark Master was given to a Master Mason 1. The two were subsequently amalgamated into a single degree conferred upon Master Masons under both Grand Lodge and Supreme Grand Chapter agreements 1.