Freemasons: Grand National Mother Lodge "The Three Globes"

A total of 459 titles of Masonic literature could be identified on the basis of acquisition files and the search of the Masonica collection. They had come to the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek through a swap transaction with the SS school "Haus Wewelsburg" in the years 1937/ 38.

In the course of this transaction, the library had acquired books from plundered freemasons' libraries from the Reich Main Security Office in Berlin in return for ceding duplicates from its own collections. These works had previously been owned by lodges from the overall German language area. All titles can be allocated to this transaction on the basis of the swap or donor number "13360" entered in the books. The complete collection could in the meantime be digitized with the aid of funds of the Bavarian Ministry of Education and Culture, Science and the Arts.

Bavarian State Ministry of Education and Culture, Science and the Arts

A total of 45 books from the former libraries of the Grand National Mother Lodge "The three globes" (GNML) in Berlin and of the lodge "Carl zu den drei Adlern", Erfurt, and the lodge "Glückauf zur Einigkeit und Treue" in Staßfurt formed part of this convolute.

Grand National Mother Lodge "The Three Globes" (GNML)

39 volumes bear ownership notations of the GNML, five books contain stamps of the library of the Staßfurt lodge and one work can be allocated to the lodge in Erfurt on the basis of the exlibris.

The lodges "Carl zu den drei Adlern" and "Glückauf zur Einigkeit und Treue" were abolished already in 1933, while the GNML ceased its activities in the year 1935. After the war, merely the GNML was re-established. It acts as the legal successor of the other two lodges today.

On 27 July 2017 the 45 volumes were handed to the National Grand Master Thomas Engel in the house of the GNML in Berlin.

The restituted volumes have been digitized and continue to be searchable in BSB DISCOVER!.