When did Freemasonry start?

Historical evidence places the origins of modern Speculative Freemasonry in the evolution of medieval operative building guilds into symbolic lodges, culminating in its formal modern organization following the Revival of 1717 23. Written references to operative "Freemasons" appear in English records by at least 1563 3, while manuscript Constitutions such as the Matthew Cooke Manuscript (c. 1400) record the early distinction between operative work and speculative theory 3.

Traditional Masonic legend traces the Craft in England to a much earlier date. The York Legend, preserved in the Regius Manuscript (c. 1390), attributes the formal origin of English Masonry to a General Assembly convoked at York in 926 AD under King Athelstan 3.

Beyond documentary history, theories regarding the origin of the Order divide Masonic writers:

Osborne Sheppard highlights a theory, defended by Albert Pike, asserting that Freemasonry is the direct successor to the Ancient Mysteries of Egypt and Samothrace from thousands of years before the Christian era 1.

Arthur Edward Waite dismisses claims of ancient continuity as idle hypotheses and imaginative tradition, arguing that early Masonic writers elevated building guilds into secret channels for the Mysteries without historical foundation 2.

Walter Leslie Wilmshurst similarly maintains that the present organizational system has no direct continuity with ancient Egypt or King Solomon's Temple, though he holds that the core spiritual doctrine hidden within its architectural symbolism is genuinely ancient 4.