Most of the "additional" degrees worked in England in the early part of the nineteenth century originally came under the aegis of warrants granted by the "Antients", who held that Craft Warrants entitled Lodges to work any Masonic degree of which they had knowledge and members available who could work it (although the rituals were not always what could be considered as a standard).
After the formation of the United Grand Lodge various groups of degrees were gradually organized into separate Orders each with their own governing bodies, but during the last quarter of the 1800s a large number of unrelated Degrees of no real interest to any Grand Body were still being worked in different parts of the country.
Eventually, in the late 1870s and according to oral tradition, it was decided to form a "Grand Council of the Allied Masonic Degrees in England and Wales and the Colonies and Dependencies of the British Crown". This Grand Council would give some sort of cohesion to a few of the "additional degrees" and ensure working with standard rituals.
Almost immediately the "Orders" of the Grand High Priest, St Laurence the Martyr (note Laurence and not, as nowadays, Lawrence), the Red Cross of Babylon and Knights of Constantinople acknowledged the supremacy of Grand Council, which recognized some Councils as "Time Immemorial" and began, in 1880, to grant warrants to others.
In 1892 a similar Grand Council, called the Sovereign College of Allied Masonic Degrees for the United States of America was formed. One of the degrees coming under this Grand Council was the Grand Tilers of King Solomon. By special arrangement with the Sovereign College, the Degree of Grand Tilers of Solomon was conferred on the Grand Master and other members of the Grand Council in 1893 and added to the original four authorized to be worked in Councils under Grand Council. It would appear that King Solomon became plain Solomon in the transfer.
In 1895 the then Grand Master authorized Councils to work the (American) single Degree of Secret Monitor, despite a Grand Council for that Order being in existence since 1897. Peace was declared in 1931 when the Grand Council of the Allied Masonic Degrees agreed to cease practicing the Degree of Secret Monitor.
This means that Warrants granted before 1893 authorized Councils to work four degrees, those granted from 1895 to 1924 six degrees and, as no warrants were issued between 1924 and 1934, later warrants authorize five.
Grand Council Constituted on : 9th August.1879
Warranted Councils : 244
Time Immemorial Council : Metropolitan AMD Council meeting at MMH
AMD Council No.1 : Portal, Liverpool - Warranted 1.1.1880
No of AMD Districts including India : 24
Unattached Councils : 6
Countries with AMD Presence : U.K, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Spain, Channel Islands, West Indies, Bahamas, Portugal, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, & India
