Kipling’s Mark

THE FREEMASON MAGAZINE

August 19, 1899.

Bro. Rudyard Kipling's Mark - ln the new edition of Kipling's works, the cover bears a particular sign, which takes the form of a maze-like cross, known as a "fylfot". The fylfot sign is of a very ancient use; it figures as a mystic symbol in early religions in India and Japan, and was woven on the mitre of Thomas A Becket. But Literature, while giving, publicity to these interesting details, does not say that there is no religious association in its use for Kipling. It is nothing more nor less than Kipling's mark as a Mark Mason, When he wrote the Hymn of the Mark Master - "My new-cut finial takes the light" - he could have added that finial was graven with a fylfot. How many people have noticed, by the way that Kipling, in many of his earlier stories - notably in "Soldiers Three" - users Masonic symbols and the very words of the Masonic ritual frequently. There is one passage "The Man Who Would be king" that must, says a writer in "St. Andrew," be Greek to the reader who has not "seen the light". Kipling was a prominent member of the Masonic lodge at Lahore; and in India, Freemasonry is a much more earnest thing than it is here. Newcastle Daily Chronicle.

Note by R. Kliaman: Kipling stopped using the Fylfot on the cover of his books and papers around when the time that the Nazi's came to power in Germany, due to its similarity to the Swastika.

My thanks to Bro. Robert Kliaman.

Ed Note: On 14th April 1887 Rudyard Kipling was advanced into the Mark Mason Degree in Fidelity Mark Lodge No 98 EC at Lahore. Like his Mother Lodge, this Lodge would not have survived the separation of India. The warrant is now held by St. Martins Lodge Stoke-onTrent, Staffordshire, England.