A Royal Funeral
23/03/15 04:40
I’m sure that regular readers of this blog are already up to speed on all of the events happening in Leicester this weekend and into next week, but if you are not a dedicated royal-watcher, and if you don’t make it a practice of keeping up with the ever-busy schedule of the Right Reverend Tim Stevens, Bishop of Leicester, you might have missed the story. It hasn’t garnered much press in the United States. I don’t watch television, so don’ know of CNN or Fox is devoting full-time to coverage of the events this week, but something in me says they probably don’t have it in their schedule of programs.
To fill you in, you need to imagine that you are in Bosworth, a bit to the northwest of London. That’s were yesterday’s ceremonies took place. It is, in case you don’t know, a funeral procession for an English royal. The coffin was made from English oak from a Duchy of Cornwall plantation by Canadian carpenter Michael Ibsen. The coffin has been sealed. The funeral procession began at Fenn Land Farm, near the spot where the death occurred. Ceremonies were held as the cortege travelled through the county at Bosworth Battlefield Heritage Center. The funeral cortege entered the city of Leicester by the historic Bow Bridge after touring landmarks in the country in a funeral coach. At the bridge, after additional ceremonies, the coffin was transferred to a horse-drawn hearse to proceed through the crowds who threw white roses atop the coffin as it passed. Knights in full armor led the procession through Leicester.
Historians in Tudor costumes processed through the field ahead of the coffin’s arrival at the University of Leicester where the university’s chancellor led a short ceremony before the cortege departed for Leicester Cathedral, where it will be on display for the public to view the coffin Monday through Wednesday before the final burial ceremony on Thursday, which will be presided over by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby.
It isn’t the first time King Richard III has been buried. Richard III, the last of the British Royals to physically lead troops into battle died and the battle was lost in 1485. Richard was only 33 at the time of his death. His first burial was likely accompanied by much less pomp and ceremony. In fact, subsequent generations of British royals sought actively to discredit the king. Shakespeare depicted him as evil, cruel, bent and frightening. For centuries, no one even knew the exact place of his burial. He was forgotten to history until his remains were discovered, buried under a parking lot.
It took no small amount of modern day sleuthing, including DNA tests of his descendants, one of whom is the carpenter who made his coffin. The original lead-lined coffin preserved his bones well enough that there is a skeleton available for his final reburial, which will take place with most of the elements of a British state funeral on Thursday.
You’d think that after 530 years a person’s place in history might be pretty well set, but historians are discovering much about the King that leads us to believe that prior histories contained mistakes and inaccuracies.
This week’s ceremonies won’t change history, but they might change how we interpret history. Richard III may well have been one of the victims of the well-oiled propaganda machinery of Henry Tudor, who became known as Henry VII. Stories circulated by the Tudors included a report that Richard was a freakish individual who was born with teeth and shoulder-length hair after having been in his mother's womb for two years. They claimed his body was stunted and distorted, with one shoulder higher than the other, and he was "slight in body and weak in strength”. Richard was also blamed for the murder of Henry VI. There were also claims that he poisoned his own wife.
It has been too many years to accurately prove or disprove the stories that have been circulated, though the physical evidence of his skeleton seem to at least discredit the reports of freakish physical appearance, a hunchback or one shoulder being radically higher than the other. There was some curvature of his spine, but to what extent that came from five centuries of being a a coffin that was too short for his frame is uncertain.
As for me, I won’t be attending the funeral. I don’t plan to watch the live coverage on BBC. I don’t even plan to check out CNN or Fox to see if they cover the events. What is most interesting to me about the week of ceremonies is that people are able to change their opinions - and gain a fresh look at events that occurred over five centuries ago.
We tell many stories of the 15th and 16th centuries in the church. The Protestant Reformation was a major event in the way that we interpret the story of the church and how we align our loyalties in this day and age. Depending on which part of the modern church you find yourself, the ways that you interpret the stories - and the stories that you tell - might be very different. We like to think of the past as fixed and set and unchangeable, but the reality is that we know so little of the past that a seemingly insignificant bit of new information can make a big change in how we interpret the events of our past. The way we always thought things were might not be the complete story. The way it was taught in our history classes, may not be the only perspective on the events.
The events in England are a bit over the top for my sensibilities. I doubt if I’d attend even if I were in the area. I think the poor king deserves a quiet burial with dignity after having been dug up, examined and photographed over and over again.
Though I’ll never gain the world’s attention as did Richard III, I think I’d rather not have my descendants making me a new coffin every 500 years or so. Return the elements of my body to God’s creation. Once will be enough. I trust God to take care of whatever physical remains there are.
To fill you in, you need to imagine that you are in Bosworth, a bit to the northwest of London. That’s were yesterday’s ceremonies took place. It is, in case you don’t know, a funeral procession for an English royal. The coffin was made from English oak from a Duchy of Cornwall plantation by Canadian carpenter Michael Ibsen. The coffin has been sealed. The funeral procession began at Fenn Land Farm, near the spot where the death occurred. Ceremonies were held as the cortege travelled through the county at Bosworth Battlefield Heritage Center. The funeral cortege entered the city of Leicester by the historic Bow Bridge after touring landmarks in the country in a funeral coach. At the bridge, after additional ceremonies, the coffin was transferred to a horse-drawn hearse to proceed through the crowds who threw white roses atop the coffin as it passed. Knights in full armor led the procession through Leicester.
Historians in Tudor costumes processed through the field ahead of the coffin’s arrival at the University of Leicester where the university’s chancellor led a short ceremony before the cortege departed for Leicester Cathedral, where it will be on display for the public to view the coffin Monday through Wednesday before the final burial ceremony on Thursday, which will be presided over by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby.
It isn’t the first time King Richard III has been buried. Richard III, the last of the British Royals to physically lead troops into battle died and the battle was lost in 1485. Richard was only 33 at the time of his death. His first burial was likely accompanied by much less pomp and ceremony. In fact, subsequent generations of British royals sought actively to discredit the king. Shakespeare depicted him as evil, cruel, bent and frightening. For centuries, no one even knew the exact place of his burial. He was forgotten to history until his remains were discovered, buried under a parking lot.
It took no small amount of modern day sleuthing, including DNA tests of his descendants, one of whom is the carpenter who made his coffin. The original lead-lined coffin preserved his bones well enough that there is a skeleton available for his final reburial, which will take place with most of the elements of a British state funeral on Thursday.
You’d think that after 530 years a person’s place in history might be pretty well set, but historians are discovering much about the King that leads us to believe that prior histories contained mistakes and inaccuracies.
This week’s ceremonies won’t change history, but they might change how we interpret history. Richard III may well have been one of the victims of the well-oiled propaganda machinery of Henry Tudor, who became known as Henry VII. Stories circulated by the Tudors included a report that Richard was a freakish individual who was born with teeth and shoulder-length hair after having been in his mother's womb for two years. They claimed his body was stunted and distorted, with one shoulder higher than the other, and he was "slight in body and weak in strength”. Richard was also blamed for the murder of Henry VI. There were also claims that he poisoned his own wife.
It has been too many years to accurately prove or disprove the stories that have been circulated, though the physical evidence of his skeleton seem to at least discredit the reports of freakish physical appearance, a hunchback or one shoulder being radically higher than the other. There was some curvature of his spine, but to what extent that came from five centuries of being a a coffin that was too short for his frame is uncertain.
As for me, I won’t be attending the funeral. I don’t plan to watch the live coverage on BBC. I don’t even plan to check out CNN or Fox to see if they cover the events. What is most interesting to me about the week of ceremonies is that people are able to change their opinions - and gain a fresh look at events that occurred over five centuries ago.
We tell many stories of the 15th and 16th centuries in the church. The Protestant Reformation was a major event in the way that we interpret the story of the church and how we align our loyalties in this day and age. Depending on which part of the modern church you find yourself, the ways that you interpret the stories - and the stories that you tell - might be very different. We like to think of the past as fixed and set and unchangeable, but the reality is that we know so little of the past that a seemingly insignificant bit of new information can make a big change in how we interpret the events of our past. The way we always thought things were might not be the complete story. The way it was taught in our history classes, may not be the only perspective on the events.
The events in England are a bit over the top for my sensibilities. I doubt if I’d attend even if I were in the area. I think the poor king deserves a quiet burial with dignity after having been dug up, examined and photographed over and over again.
Though I’ll never gain the world’s attention as did Richard III, I think I’d rather not have my descendants making me a new coffin every 500 years or so. Return the elements of my body to God’s creation. Once will be enough. I trust God to take care of whatever physical remains there are.