Gavels

Gavels: What are Gavels?

Gavels are most associated with power and meetings - they are the small wood or ornate hammer-like instruments that speakers and judges use to call order and to open and close meetings. In many cases, these gavels are ornamental and in some cases made of semi-precious stones. They represent the authority and power of the person using them.

Gavels, however, are also the mauls that masons and others builders use to fit stones. In this use, gavels have a rich history. In ancient times, gavels were used in order to hammer stones into place. These large wooden hammer-like instruments were used to repair walls and build buildings. Besides stones, all that was often needed to build a wall was a gavel and perhaps a small quantity of cement-like mixture. Gavels were also used to break up stones or to chip parts of the stone off in order to make the stone fit into a building or wall. Later gavels had one flat surface and one sharpened surface. Small gavels were used for precision work and to perfect stones by smoothing away rough edges. The Masons still use the gavels in their secret meetings to symbolize the ways that new members are like stones, needing to have rough edges hewn off in order to be accepted into the lodge.