Gavel
The common gavel, a stone-cutter's hammer. It is a working tool of the first degree, and a Master is handed one at his installation as the sign of his office.
Meaning
An operative mason used the common gavel to break the corners off rough stones; a Freemason is taught to use it to divest his heart and conscience of 'all the vices and superfluities of life', in the words of George Thornburgh's 1903 monitor, where it is a working tool of the Entered Apprentice, the first degree. Albert Mackey called it a symbol of 'the purification of the heart'. At his installation the Master of a lodge is presented with a gavel, and its power and use are explained to him.
Origin and history
The gavel appears early. A text of 1724 lists a 'Mell', a maul or gavel, among the tools of the lodge, and by 1760 the common gavel was used 'to knock off all superfluous Matters, whereby the Square may set easy and just', as Harry Carr of the Quatuor Coronati research lodge traced.
Write in the Freemasons’ cipher
stringmash.comPigpen cipherThe grid cipher once used for lodge records, drawn from any text you type.Read next
- Next in Masonic symbolsBeehiveA beehive, the Masonic emblem of industry.
- The same shape in Greek gods and their symbolsHadesThe Greek god of the dead and king of the underworld, brother of Zeus and Poseidon. Ancient writers give him a helmet that makes its wearer invisible and the many-headed dog Cerberus; Greek vase painters gave him a sceptre and a horn of plenty. The two-pronged bident often drawn in his hand has no secure ancient example.
See also
Square and compasses, The letter G, All-seeing eye, Double-headed eagle, Boaz and Jachin, Checkered pavement.
Sources
- Masonic Monitor of the Degrees of Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craft and Master Mason, George Thornburgh, 1903, approved by the Grand Lodge of Arkansas, Project Gutenberg, Entered Apprentice degree; installation
- The Symbolism of Freemasonry, Albert G. Mackey, 1869, Project Gutenberg, Chapter X
- Origin of the Working Tools, Harry Carr (ed.), Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, vol. 78 (1965), pp. 278–80, Grand Lodge of British Columbia and Yukon
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from lines.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed September 25, 2026. How we research
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