Title: Working the rough stone
First published: 1999
Description: Using a wealth of archival sources previously unavailable, this first study of eighteenth-century Russian Freemasonry to appear in English examines the Masonic lodges and their meaning for the men who were drawn to them. As some of the earliest organizations in Russia to open membership beyond social class, the lodges offered the opportunity for social interaction, personal discipline, and a free exchange of ideas.

Teaching new standards of civility and politeness, they helped to prepare the way for the birth of a civil society in Russia.
Subjects: Freemasonry, Intellectual life, Social conditions, Enlightenment, History, Freemasons, history, Soviet union, history, 1689-1800
Places: Russia
Time periods: 18th century, To 1801
LC classification: HS624 .S58 1999