Few American symbols have accumulated more mythology than the unfinished pyramid topped by a floating eye.
It appears on the reverse of the Great Seal of the United States and, more familiarly, on the back of the one-dollar bill. Over time, the image has become associated with Freemasonry, secret societies, hidden governments, and elaborate theories about the founding of the United States.
The documented history is considerably more interesting.
The pyramid and eye were not secretly inserted into the Great Seal by Freemasons. They emerged from a six-year design process involving three different committees, numerous proposals, and a final synthesis prepared in 1782 by Charles Thomson, secretary of the Continental Congress.
The symbol was not created in secrecy.
It was created by committee.
Six Years to Design a Seal
The effort began almost immediately after American independence.
On July 4, 1776—the same day the Continental Congress approved the Declaration of Independence—a committee consisting of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and John Adams was appointed to develop a national seal.
Their proposal was rejected.
A second committee tried in 1780.
That failed too.
A third committee was appointed in 1782. Its consultant, heraldic artist William Barton, introduced several elements that would eventually influence the finished design, including a pyramid.
Congress then handed the accumulated proposals to Charles Thomson, who combined and simplified ideas from the previous committees into a final design. Barton subsequently made adjustments to Thomson's proposal.
Congress adopted the Great Seal on June 20, 1782.
One historical detail is particularly important given the mythology that later surrounded the design: neither Thomson nor Barton—the two men principally responsible for the final reverse—has been established as a Freemason.
Benjamin Franklin was a Freemason, but the imagery he proposed for the first committee was entirely different. Franklin suggested a scene depicting Moses and the Israelites crossing the Red Sea.
The famous eye and pyramid did not come from him.
The Eye Before America
The eye itself was already an established symbol long before the United States existed.
Known as the Eye of Providence, an eye surrounded by rays of light—or sometimes enclosed within a triangle—appeared in European Christian art as a representation of divine providence: God watching over humanity and human affairs.
It therefore did not originate with either American Freemasonry or the Great Seal.
The official 1782 description makes its meaning unusually explicit. Above the pyramid appears an eye surrounded by rays, accompanied by the Latin motto:
ANNUIT COEPTIS.
The phrase is generally translated as “He has favored our undertakings” or “He favors our undertakings.”
The unidentified “He” refers to Providence.
The implication was straightforward: the new nation's undertaking had received divine favor.
Why an Unfinished Pyramid?
Beneath the eye stands one of the most distinctive elements of the entire design: a pyramid composed of thirteen courses.
The number thirteen appears repeatedly throughout the Great Seal, representing the thirteen original states.
But the pyramid is deliberately unfinished.
Charles Thomson explained that the pyramid represented “strength and duration.” Its unfinished condition indicated that the new American nation was still being built.
At its base appears another important number:
MDCCLXXVI — 1776.
The year of American independence is literally placed into the foundation of the structure.
The symbolism creates a remarkably economical visual statement.
The foundation has been established.
The structure is strong.
But the work is incomplete.
Above it, Providence watches.
“A New Order of the Ages”
Below the pyramid appears perhaps the most misunderstood phrase on the Great Seal:
NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM.
It is commonly rendered “A new order of the ages.”
The phrase was proposed by Thomson and derives from the classical Roman poet Virgil. It did not mean a secret “New World Order” in the modern conspiratorial sense.
It referred instead to the beginning of a new historical era.
Thomson's own explanation makes that intention clear: the words referred to the new American era beginning with the Declaration of Independence in 1776.
This was characteristic of the intellectual culture of America's founding generation. Classical Roman history, republicanism, Latin mottos, heraldry, biblical imagery, and Enlightenment political thought were frequently combined into the visual language of the new republic.
The Great Seal belongs squarely within that world.
From Government Seal to Dollar Bill
Interestingly, most Americans would not regularly encounter the reverse of the Great Seal for more than a century.
The familiar combination of eagle on one side and pyramid on the other became part of everyday American visual culture only when both sides of the Great Seal were placed on the one-dollar bill in 1935, during Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration.
That exposure helped transform the Eye of Providence and unfinished pyramid into two of America's most recognizable symbols—and eventually into fertile ground for conspiracy theories.
But the surviving records give us something better than speculation.
They give us the designers' own explanations.
The eye represents Providence.
The thirteen-level pyramid represents strength and duration.
The Roman numerals establish 1776 as the foundation.
The unfinished summit represents a nation whose construction was not complete.
And Novus Ordo Seclorum announces the beginning of a new American age.
Taken together, the design contains an idea that remains surprisingly powerful more than two centuries later.
The foundation has been laid. The structure is unfinished. The work continues.
Eye on Pyramid — Great Seal -- Catalog No. 6203
Hermetic Collection - Within Symbolism
Symbols Worth Wearing.