Cowan, 1. A term of contempt; applied to one who does the work of a mason, but has not been regularly bred. 2. Also used to denote one who builds dry walls, otherwise denominated a dry-dyker. 3. One unacquainted with the secrets of Freemasonry. In its purely Masonic context a cowan is an interloper, and for this reason the definition is forever linked with the term eavesdropper. The word is not to be found in the old manuscripts in English Freemasonry before the 18th Century. It does however occur in the Schaw Statute of 1598: "That no Master of Fellow of Craft receive any cowans to work in his society or company, nor send none of his servants to work with cowans." There can be little doubt that the word, as a Masonic term originates from Scotland, specifically from the Operative Masons, among whom it was used to denote a pretender.