[318.] Oration of Chevalier Ramsay (1737); Baron Tschoudy, L'Étoile Flamboyante, I. 20 (1766).
[319.] The description of the Vehmic Tribunals that follows here is largely taken from Lombard de Langres, Les Sociétés Secrètes en Allemagne (1819), quoting original documents preserved at Dortmund.
[320.] Clavel derides this early origin and says it was the Francs-juges themselves who claimed Charlemagne as their founder (Histoire pittoresque, p. 357).
[321.] Lecouteulx de Canteleu, Les Sectes et Sociétés Secrètes, p. 100.
[322.] According to Walter Scott's account of the Vehmgerichts in Anne of Geierstein, the initiate was warned that the secrets confided to him were "neither to be spoken aloud nor whispered, to be told in words or written in characters, to be carved or to be painted, or to be otherwise communicated, either directly or by parable and emblem." This formula, if accurate, would establish a further point of resemblance.
[323.] Lombard de Langres, Les Sociétés Secrètes en Allemagne, p. 341 (1819); Lecouteulx de Canteleu, Les Sectes et Sociétès Secrètes, p. 99.
[324.] A. le Plongeon, Sacred Mysteries among the Mayas and the Quichas (1886).
[325.] Findel, History of Freemasonry (Eng. trans., 1866), pp. 131, 132.
[326.] John Yarker, The Arcane Schools, p. 216, 431.
[327.] Lexicon of Freemasonry, p. 298.