CRAFT GUILDS AND JOURNEYMEN ASSOCIATIONS: Early Roots of Fraternal Orders prior to the 1700's
CRAFT GUILDS AND JOURNEYMEN ASSOCIATIONS: EARLY ROOTS OF ENGLISH FRATERNAL ORDERS By Louie Blake S. Sarmiento Master of Arts in Industrial/Organizational Psychology Juris Doctor - III The origin of fraternity , as a principle, is as old as humankind. Humans always have that natural desire to associate with each other for a common purpose – either for social, philosophical, political, religious, charitable, mutual-benefit, or business purposes. Fraternities or so-called brotherhoods existed since the early civilizations - first among sworn kinsmen, Roman collegias, Orders of Knighthood, craft guilds, box clubs and fraternal lodges. Although ordinary men did not yet have a recognized “right to association” when absolute monarchy ruled the world, fraternity as an idea existed in so-called ‘secret societies’ or ‘secret brotherhoods’- where the working class, middle-class and even some aristocrats fraternized with each other and practiced early democracy. Early English fraternal