Freemasonry started off as the domain of skilled working men, the operative builders of cathedrals, churches and castles in the Middle Ages. These were men - rarely but on a few odd occasions women too- who without being members of the royal household or the nobility, enjoyed certain privileges and mobility in a time when most people lived and died in the same village or hamlet where they had been born and rarely would ever set foot outside of it. These Master Builders were the forerunners of the Freemasons and celebrated the new apprentices and members of the guild in ritual ceremonies such as the ones described in the Halliwell Manuscript, where references to Sacred Geometry, Euclid and Ancient Egypt are made in relation to the building trade. Eventually, with the advent of the Renaissance, these operative lodges opened up and started to accept non operative masons such as Elias Ashmole for example, who was initiated in 1646 attracted by the discreet atmosphere and fr...