Dog

Below you see “First and second boards of the Elu of the Nine degree, featuring the dog. Boards from the collection of Baron von Löwen.” (1) (In the manuscript itself it says: “Elu de g. Chevalier de C.”) This 9th degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite appears to be a merge of the “Little Elu (Petit Élu) and Elu of Perignan (Élu de Pérignan), also called Elu of the Unknown (Élu de l’Inconnu).” It is probably there where the dog came from.

The old ‘elect’ degrees have become the ‘vengeance’ degrees of the AASR. The dog alternally is the guard of the cave of the first found murderer of Hiram or the dog of the pilgrim (perignan) who led the masters to that very murderer.

Below an image from the fascinating French book Mutus Liber Latomorum which is supposedly from 1765. The following two images suggest that we are looking at something in the first degree, but I´m not sure about that. Note the dog on the bottom left.

In the Régulateur des Maçons Chevalier (printed in 1801, but there have been drafts since 1784), there is an instruction just before the closing of the “1st order” (4th degree) where the dog comes quite out of the blue:

Q. What does the dog mean?
A. That the slightest clue is often used to detect the culprit.

Unfortunately there appears to be no tracing board in the publication. The degree of “Elect, Most Wise” is about the vengeance on a murderer of Hiram Abiff, but not exactly in the same way as in the earlier AASR degrees.

(1) Ancient Freemasonry, accessed 1/5/2024

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