Builders Corporations in Italy, Germany, and Switzerland 173tions first, followed by brotherhoods whose formation was prompted
by the vast groups of craftsmen required to construct the cathedrals.
The oldest of these brotherhoods, which were known as Hutten
(lodges) after the name of the locations in which they held their meet-
ings, is the one in Cologne, which was formed around the year 1250.*
Hutten recognized the supremacy of large lodges called Haupthutten
(principal lodges). In 1275, a veritable masonic congress met in
Strasbourg to coordinate efforts toward the continuation of long-inter-
rupted work on the cathedral. There the assembly formed a principal
lodge and named Erwin von Steinbach as the head architect of con-
struction and the master who held the chair (Meister vom Stuhl).^7
In total, there were five principal lodges in the area including
Germany and Switzerland. They were located in Cologne, Strasbourg,
Vienna, Bern (then Zurich), and Magdebourg. Cologne was the first
and foremost among them and the master builder of the cathedral there
was recognized as the head of all the masters and workers of Lower
Germany. Similarly, the person holding this position in Strasbourg was
recognized as the head of all masters for Upper Germany. A central
mastery association later established in Strasbourg disputed the primacy
of Cologne on the basis that construction was less extensive there than
in Strasbourg. The jurisdiction of this central association encompassed
lodges from part of France, Hesse, Suavia, Thuringia, Franconia, and
Bavaria. Subordinate to the principal lodge of Cologne were the work-
shops of Belgium and another part of France. The great lodge of Vienna
governed the lodges of Austria, Hungary, and Styria, while those of the
Swiss were subject to the grand lodge of Bern during the time the cathe-
dral of that city was under construction, and then to that of Zurich
when Bern's seat was transferred there in 1502. This principal lodge in
Zurich, whose jurisdiction included all the Swiss Hutten, could turn to
the Strasbourg brotherhood to resolve serious and tricky questions. The
Saxon lodges, which in principle had recognized the supremacy of the
grand lodge of Strasbourg, were later placed under the jurisdiction of
the grand lodge of Magdebourg.^8
- Findel c l a i ms seniority for the brotherhood that was created to build the cathedral
of Magdebourg, whose construction began in 1211 (Histoire de la Franc Maconnerie,
vol. 1, 57). For interesting information on the Bauhurte, see Franz Bziha's notes pub-
lished in Le Symbolisme, no. 375 and 376, June-September, 1966.