I said I would continue about Sir Henry and his tents and so here it is. Yes, he was the Master of the Tents, and when there was a problem with rain/snow coming into the Revels Office (based in Clerkenwell, near the Red Bull) a record of his using one of his tents to remedy the difficulty was generated.

As I wrote in a previous post, I thought he physically used the canvas of the tent to gum up or delay a water ingress problem like a leak, but then it occurred to me that what he could have done was prevent rain from making its way into the building by introducing a tent as a porch-type structure by the door, thereby preventing those entering from treading water immediately into the building.

Sir Henry was an early member of ´The Spanish Company´, which suffered a chequered existence with the onset of the famous war with Spain (including the Armada). He was like Antonio – the ´Merchant´ in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice – in that he did not, as a rule, travel with his ships but benefited from the profits on the goods that came back from their journeys. He built and owned some of these ships. In Antonio´s case, bad luck came in the shape of wreckage at sea; and Sir Henry was to be involved in similar difficulties with this aspect of his life. He is down in history as somewhat of a privateer (a state-sanctioned pirate). He also held, however, the post of the Master of the Tents, Toils, Halls and Pavilions, which meant he had a good post in the Elizabethan era keeping and supplying shelters and the trappings of catering for court activities like Hunting, Banquets and such. Where would the horses be sheltered when on Progress? Where would the Queen get changed/go to the toilet in the middle of the countryside etc.? Tents and marquees and the things for the hunt were Sir Henry´s way of work and he was knighted at the beginning of King James´ reign for this and for his privateering and other useful talents, no doubt.

At one stage he married Alice Bedingfeld, the recusant Sir Henry Bedingfeld´s daughter. But this association with both Spain and forbidden Catholicism was not to hurt him… for some reason. Sir Henry Bedingfeld was to be depicted in a Red Bull play not very flatteringly (If You Know Not Me You Know Nobody Part I), but there is no record of disapproval concerning his public drubbing and I doubt Henry Seckford was ever made the victim of drama.

The Tents position was very much associated with the building work involved at the Revels Office which, until c. 1607, was housed next door to the field-site where the Red Bull Playhouse was. That field next door was owned by Thomas Seckford, a Master of the Court of Requests, who was Sir Henry´s brother.

The Burbages would have known the Seckfords – of that we can be certain – in this extraordinarily trade-bound age. How they viewed one another I’ve no idea.

Scaffolds were important for many reasons. For building something, for putting something right, for staging something – plays and entertainments, yes, but also – executions.

King James´ son Charles I saw to it that there was a remarkable Rubens painting applied to the ceiling of the Banqueting House in Whitehall (still there), showing the glories of the Divinely-sanctioned Stuart court (´Divinely´ in that the Stuart family in England believed in the ´Divine Right of Kings´). Scaffolding was no-doubt used to access that ceiling. They were used at the Masques performed there too. And yet… finally… a scaffolding was built outside a Banqueting House window for King Charles access in order to meet his end in a beheading. The first and last public execution in England of a crowned monarch in Britain. Did the same Revels scaffolders make that stage, we wonder?

Such are the building blocks of Britain´s entertainment story. Peter Paul Rubens was Flemish; Henry Seckford’s interests were in Spain; King Charles troubled end had much to do with Catholic France. For his wife, Henrietta Maria, was a French princess who loved performance art. This British entertainment story is as much a European one, as one belonging to the U.K., as I hope this current and future research will show.

Water, Water, Everywhere and all of it caused by Witches!

Queen Anna of Denmark was born on the 12th of December 1574, which makes today the 450th anniversary of her birth.

Eva Griffith and a group of actors have been working towards a three-part series of her life as a teenager, marrying King James VI of Scotland by proxy at the age of 14, and the adventurous time she had of it becoming Queen Consort of Scotland. One day, all being well, we’ll get her to England where she became Queen Consort of England too.

Queen Anna became the patron of the actors at the Red Bull playhouse, Clerkenwell. And her time in Denmark and Scotland explains much about her time in England.

In the spirit of the main theme of the website, the series is entitled:

‘Water: The Story of Queen Anna of Denmark‘

Here she is where you can visit her for free in Room 4 on Floor 3 of the National Portrait Gallery, London. It is by John De Critz the Elder, it is oil on canvas, and was painted circa 1606-1608 (a few years after she arrived in England, becoming Queen Consort there).
NPG 6918 – that’s important. For we all have a number. And this is that of this portrait.

Here are some photographs of our last day recording the 3 pod-cast-y audio-files which will be available soon. Starring Guy Henry as James VI and John Sackville as Francis Stewart, Earl of Bothwell (not that one), this photograph was taken by Géraldine Chevalley, one of our Annas…

From Left to Right: David Hall (various inc. Will Kemp), Murray Simon (various inc. George Keith), Dr. Eva Griffith (a host of maids), Guy Henry (James VI). Taken by Géraldine Chevalley.

David, Murray, Géraldine and Guy.

Trala!

My home has had problems with water just recently. There has been a huge leak in the second bedroom that has gone on since before Lock-down. The landlords have put scaffolding up and done works to address a range of issues meeting the demands of current housing acts. At the moment it is a store room and it is hoped that once everything is sorted, we’ll be able to make the place all right again. Perhaps it won’t be a decade before the hole in the ceiling is sorted.

Dr. Griffith’s Red Bull book: A Jacobean Company and its Playhouse is over a decade old.

I remember 2013 being important to this book. I remember the book launches. I should – they cost me a lot of money. But I liked putting on these events.

It turns out scaffolding is very important to theatre history. Thinking about it, actors, or the groups of people around them, were compelled to build those things quite a lot.

James Burbage, who built the first purpose-built playhouse in the London area, was an actor, yes, but he was a builder first. A carpenter of sorts. His son, Richard, also became an actor, and went on to create the roles of characters like Richard III and Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. This, one assumes, was very much on the back of his father’s ability to build an entertainment venue. Topics such as this figure in my screenplay about the actors at the Red Bull playhouse, with the working title it has of In A Garden.

Re. scaffolding and leaks: for years I thought that when Henry Seckford, the Tudor Master of the Tents, Toils, Hales and Pavilions (don’t ask) had to use some of his tents in his Hall in relation to some leak problems of his own, he was gumming up the holes with canvas.

Now I realise something different is more likely to have happened.

More another day, maybe tomorrow! For now, adios amigos! I am now a member of BECTU, and will be registering my scripts with their Script Registry. So hands off!

Thank you.

(Red Bull book link)

https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/jacobean-company-and-its-playhouse/220C3755AA45BAAAAE165DD10EFD3325

Copyright Alon Alush, from Wikipedia CC BY-SA 4.0

3/10/2024

I said to somebody today: “You wouldn’t think I like writing comedy, would you?” But sometimes something is so serious, it’s hard to put a comic spin on it.

First of all, I would like to wish a Happy New Year to all my Jewish friends and acquaintances. I’ll be pleased when things are better for the Middle East and I can take down this post. Then I’ll dance with you if you’ll let me, for there could be much to celebrate in years to come.

There is a chapel built in the shape of a tear which, according to Wiki, is on the Mount of Olives, “opposite the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem”. It wasn’t built to remember St. Veronica, the woman who wiped Jesus’s face as he went down the Via Dolorosa, carrying his cross on his back, or the women who are recorded crying as they watched him go by.

No.

It commemorates Jesus’s own tears from before that time, recorded in the book of Luke (19, verses 41-44):

Jesus Weeps over Jerusalem (NLT version):

But as he came closer to Jerusalem and saw the city ahead, he began to weep. “How I wish today that you of all people would understand the way to peace. But now it is too late, and peace is hidden from your eyes. Before long your enemies will build ramparts against your walls and encircle you and close in on you from every side. They will crush you into the ground, and your children with you. Your enemies will not leave a single stone in place, because you did not recognise it when God visited you.”

I am going to publish this post just as it is, today. Tonight, tomorrow, or in a few days time, I may edit it. At the moment it stands as a warning from over 2000 years ago. Please listen to it. And remember the loveliness and global desirability of peace.

9/10/2024

“The World needs you alive”

Rosh Hashanah has come and gone and so have commemorations of a very sad day.

Watching the television I saw two beautiful women talking, one was Elizabeth Taylor, the movie star, recorded when she was giving a speech to a hall filled with AIDS charity supporters. She spoke directly to those affected by HIV/AIDS, a community she loved. I saw this footage in the third part of Kim Kardashian’s fine series on the life of the actress. I knew Taylor briefly, when I was a little girl.

“The World needs you alive!” is what I heard her saying. She worked tirelessly at the end of her life for money towards AIDS research. Kardashian called her the “blueprint”.

The second beautiful woman I saw on the television was a woman interviewed outside the kibbutz where she had lost her whole family last year. The community was not sure what to do. Whether to stay and rebuild or – what? What I say to her and to you, Israel, is the same as Elizabeth Taylor said: “The World needs you alive!”

Israel and the Global Environment (as I understand and remember it).

When I was in Israel, so many years ago, I remember swimming down a clear-water tributary of the Jordan River alongside many other people and some very happy fish. I remember the thrill of that and being surrounded by happy young people. It’s taken this recent war to realise what a country full of youth you are.

Israel, as I remember it, was awash with clean water and it sets examples. The sea, as an instance, has been successfully desalinated where necessary. As for the kibbutzim, my father, who took me to that beautiful country said: “They made the desert bloom.” And it was true. Working the land and understanding community, it seems to me, is something which, in the current worldwide economic and environmental crisis, we are only beginning to appreciate here, with our food banks and our community cafes.

So here is the confession, but one made on your behalf, and particularly directed at the second beautiful woman I saw who worked the land but has lost her family: there is a part of me that wishes your country did not exist. That you knew, as many Jewish sects living here in London believe, that “Zion is a state of mind”. A state of mind that rejects notions of war and favours peace.

My favoured Jewish rabbi said: “The Kingdom of Heaven is Within You”. You take it wherever you go.

My son cries when I run this one by him. How could you think about a Jewish existence without its state? And he refers to my father’s film The Light: the Life of David Ben Gurion, which I have not seen for a long time. I think again. There is one reason why Israel should exist, and it’s all wrapped around the past. From the moment they left they were persecuted. And then there was the Holocaust. And for those who chose to come to Britain, or the United States, or elsewhere, I guess, they could always say to themselves: “Well, if things get bad again in any way, shape, or form, we can always go to Israel”

It’s been perceived as a safety net, then. But isn’t it time to come out of there, now it’s not so safe – for you – or anyone, it seems?

I wish you knew to what extent you, with your knowledge, could go to anywhere in our struggling world and bring great benefit, leaving a place fitted up to bring you sadness, to come over here and teach us your skills.

“We are sure we are seeing the effects of climate change,” says another woman on the television set, as England sees, not for the first time, swelling rivers along with flooding sewage systems and water companies that cannot cope.

Come here and bring your community-orientated, peace-loving Zion with you. It’s up to you as far as it goes, but I’m sure we’ll welcome what you know.

Leave foolish people to dissension and the storms of war.

20/11/2024

It’s now the second half of November and I’ve just done a Psalm-a-thon. A day saying the 150 psalms of King David. Forty-three people said them all between them – young people, old people, some said them in their own language, a couple cried. I asked to recite any of them that were about water. And there were quite a few. The whole experience was like a rolling sea in itself. Some represented the depths of despair; some were happy and joyful. They seemed to round and round up and down. Many of the ones I recited were about the parting of the Red Sea – how God has forgiven humanity again and again and again – why? I thought. Some, surprisingly for me, were about God pouring hot coals on one’s enemies. Revenge, indeed. I texted a friend who had organised it afterwards about how I was glad Jesus came along when he did – with his ‘turning the other cheek’ and ‘love your enemies’ ideas. They must have been such radical ideas in the context of his time and place.

It’s no surprise Humanity executed him is it?

Here is a psalm for you Israel, and anyone who feels troubled in the Middle East or – indeed – anywhere. I’ve had a hard time, and it means something to me (King James’ version):

142 

I cried unto the Lord with my voice; with my voice unto the Lord did I make my supplication.

² I poured out my complaint before him; I shewed before him my trouble.

³ When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, then thou knewest my path. In the way wherein I walked have they privily laid a snare for me.

⁴ I looked on my right hand, and beheld, but there was no man that would know me: refuge failed me; no man cared for my soul.

⁵ I cried unto thee, O Lord: I said, Thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the living.

⁶ Attend unto my cry; for I am brought very low: deliver me from my persecutors; for they are stronger than I.

⁷ Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name: the righteous shall compass me about; for thou shalt deal bountifully with me.

And now I have to get back to at least occasional comedy...

30/9/2025

If I write now about Mr. Trump’s hopes with Mr. Netanyahu, I realise there is nothing to laugh at there – only something to hope. Really – Hope!

4/9/2024

The disease of Polio has been much in the news recently because of a ceasefire in the current Gaza/Israel conflict. The no-doubt welcome lull in this horrible war has resulted from the discovery of Polio among Palestinian children. The children of this community are currently undergoing a course of anti-Polio treatments.

Poliomyelitis is an old but acutely infectious viral disease which, in certain forms, paralyses the brain and spinal cord, wasting muscle, particularly in the legs.

When I was a child film actor I played the part of a Polio sufferer called ‘Josie’ who had contracted Polio before the story of the film began. The film was an adaptation of an Australian book called A Sporting Proposition which was written by the significant Australian-British writer, James Aldridge. It was presented by Walt Disney in 1975, the company changing the title of the book for the film to Ride A Wild Pony. Josie was a rich girl in 1920s Australia who, before she contracted Polio, loved riding – a pastime no longer available to her now she could not walk. That was Josie. But the film also told the story of Scott Pirie, a poor boy from the same area as Josie, who captured and trained a wild Welsh mountain pony so that he could get to school. Unhappily, ‘Taff’, as Scotty called him, was a match for the training he received, and he managed to break loose, ending up with Josie, who also fell for the pony’s charms, keeping him and calling him ‘Bo’.

I quote from the blurb on the back of the 1976 Peacock paperback:

“To Josie, the daughter of the wealthiest landowner in town, Bo is an important compensation for her useless legs. To Scotty, the pony is Taff, as wild and independent as himself. But who really owns him? The conflicting claims of the two children build up until the whole town is divided in the tense struggle for the ownership of the pony.”

Yes. There is conflict in Australia over the ownership of a pony. One side is represented by a rich, strong-willed girl who cannot walk after contracting an illness – an illness which, when the film was made in the 1970s, was thought to be largely stamped out; and the other represented by a poor boy, unafraid to stand up for himself when recognising his own in the hands of someone else.

Well I remember the old-fashioned wheelchair, the orthotic calipers fitted, the discussions about what it was truly like not to be able to move my legs. Getting to know the ponies – of Welsh extraction like me. I remember the friendships made – Robert Bettles, John Meillon Jnr, Laurence Goodheart (our stunt double) – the crew, the production team – the beautiful locations in the Australian countryside, and how my mother and I wanted to go back, but never did because we never could.

I could write more of my memories here, but perhaps that could wait for a larger and more happy piece of writing, recording what it was like to be a child in the film industry at that time in those days.

Right now, at this moment in time, I want to communicate to what extent Humanity should take seriously the new impetus towards worldwide Polio vaccinations.

The Polio virus is not communicated through water, but it has been detected through sewage testing in our currently ailing water supplies. It is a virus of a few forms passed on to others through faeces to food and can also be airborne. It is quickly caught where standards of hygiene and sanitation are low. Most children in this situation develop immunity on contracting it. For richer areas where sanitary conditions are better, the virus surprises the better-off child (like Josie) and the effects can be devastating. Vaccinations administered to as many children as possible from all walks of life are therefore essential for the whole global community.

According to my copy of the British Medical Association’s Family Health Encyclopedia, published by Dorling Kindersley in 1990, vaccinations, at that time, were given at 3, 5 and 9 months with booster doses given to 5-year-olds. Today, according to nhs.co.uk, it is given at 8, 12 and 16 weeks old as part of the 6-in-1 covering a range of illnesses, then at 3 years and 4 months before attending school, and lastly, again, at 14 as part of a teenage booster shot: Polio – NHS (www.nhs.uk)

I am writing in a café in Islington and I see many men in shorts. “Why are they in shorts in wintertime?” I think. I mean… so many of them. They are allowing quite a large proportion of their body to meet the cold! What’s worse – they are probably runners. Running plus the wind-chill factor means very cold knees. They are probably single and on the run, just in order to keep fit. So that they are well enough to face that time when keeping fit is hard: when they are old. They keep themselves fit and locked into music playing in their ears. I reflect on men and how I wish my husband would keep fit. So that we might have a long life together, with the normal ratio of humour and hurt as befits marriage, but be fit enough to meet the challenges with aplomb. And then I think: “there’s more than one way of ‘keeping fit’ ”. You have to drink plenty of water if you run. Indeed, it’s wise to lock into the H20 whatever your level of fitness. My husband builds things from time-to-time. He’s a gardener. He can build you a place in your garden to recycle things if you like. He’s done that. We have a place like that in our garden. There’s drinking water, there’s enjoying the great outdoors, there’s building something. Slowly drawing on the examples of time.

I’m in Suffolk and I’ve jumped off a bus right by a church I know.

I need to think.

Churches carry about them stoups of water, blessed so you can bless yourself with water from them. Holy Water. It’s reassuring.

For some reason, once in there, I go straight to the statue of St. Joseph. It’s a nice statue but there’s something missing from one of his hands. Probably the tools of his trade. He was a carpenter, and probably the most famous step-father we know. Looking around I see I’m not alone in the church. A really cool and stylish leather-jacket-wearing woman is just sitting, legs towards the congregation part of the church, on the altar steps and she is writing in a notebook, quietly. She looks up at me.

“It’s nice in here at this time of day,” she says. “It’s so quiet.”

I want to light a candle by the statue of the Virgin Mary at her altar in a corner of this church, but again I see that I am not alone. Again the person is low to the floor, as if hiding. But he’s not hiding. He is a slight but muscular man. He has adopted the lotus position of the eastern religions on the floor. He is absolutely concentrated on his prayer.

I assume, since he is in front of the Virgin, that he is what my sister calls “channelling the Divine Feminine.” The power of his meditation is so strong that I don’t not want to risk disturbing him. The World needs prayer right now. I end up at an icon that’s been put up by the Polish community in this Suffolk town. It’s of Our Lady and her child.

I’ve been reading about Polish people in Suffolk. The icon’s near a picture of the Sacred Heart, special to the Polish. It feels right that I should light a candle there. Outside, everything is unstable, easily misinterpreted. My work feels unsafe, I feel unsafe. I wobble like a jelly at a small child’s party, outside. I’m not sure I don’t belong at a small child’s party, to tell you the truth. Maybe it’s a lemon jelly. And I wear a red nose. But in a place of worship or a place I can draw closer to the best we can manage, I feel okay. Myself. Grown up.

Stepfathers. Yes

I’m visiting another church in Islington. It’s unusual as it doesn’t have leaks. A grander church, up in the north of Islington, is always suffering from bad leaks. It’s too big. This one I’m in now was a church that my son’s father’s family used to go to. My son’s father is London-Irish. His stepfather, also Irish, was like St. Joseph in that not only was he a stepfather, but he was a carpenter in the building trade. As far as I understand it, what he would do was frame out a building ready for concrete to be poured where it was wanted. A “shutter carpenter” my son’s father tells me. He looked after Angela, and a good few children of Angela’s did Ken. A strong man, not an easy man, but a strong one. He was a quiet person. He drank, somewhat, of course, as many Irish men making our city better did. I look at the ceiling of this church and think: it hasn’t got leaks because builders loved it. They thought it was ‘worth the candle’. Ken had one child with Angela. A daughter. She was their Pearl. And they had many grandchildren and step-grandchildren.

I remember the last time I saw him. I was in Eddie’s van. The family had just lost Angela, and everyone knew Ken wouldn’t last long. I can still see him. Waving at me and my son and Eddie in the front of the van. His cheeks red, flushed, the rest of his face pale, pale, pale. A skilled person. A quiet man who – if he went into church – would probably go in alone when no one else was around. I’ve observed men doing this.

And now my son has moved near us with his wife. His one and only. And for all their differences in personality, he gets on with my husband very well. My husband makes him laugh. My husband makes ME laugh. And, of course, he’s strong. He gets boxes down from high up places; he moves furniture around town for my son. Maybe one day, my son and his wife will have children, and we’ll be nearby. His own gem of a father is not far away. Whatever happens, we’ll all be nearby, I hope.

We are building something.

And it will be healthy, and safe.

Overdone it a bit? Feeling the pinch around the midriff?

Not to mention the bank balance.

Recently my husband and I visited Turkey to attend a marriage ceremony.

We had a great time. Too great a time, as a terrible bout of indigestion kicked in, at one point, for my other half.

Could he get the usual over-the-counter relief? No. So local advice was sought.

“Ah!” A non-English-speaker responded, getting the hang of my husband’s gesticulations. And he pointed to two products on the shop’s shelves.

One purchase was the sainted Lemon, and the other, a bottle of SODA water. Soda water, mind, not tonic or mineral water. According to the bottle pictured above, sodium bicarbonate is the crucial ingredient of soda water, which, the internet tells me, is the same as bicarbonate of soda. Apparently (and this is confusing), baking SODA is just the American term for bicarbonate of soda/sodium bicarbonate; while according to some, baking POWDER is also the same – to others, it has cream of tartar added. Bicarbonate of soda is more powerful, which explains why (perhaps), between two banana cakes tried recently, the one with bicarb in it was softer than the one with baking powder.

So much for cake. Back to indigestion.

To my husband’s surprise, the cure worked. The water is alkalising and hydrating, of course. Lemon is good for the digestion, reduces gas, and can even aid sensible weight loss.

Carbonation is what happens to all three types of fizzy water, with naturally bubbly mineral water having valuable minerals included, such as calcium, magnesium and sodium. Soda water has salts added to it by dissolving carbon dioxide in the water forcefully. Tonic water is also carbonated, but with sugar and quinine added, now available with extra flavours bringing about choice that can become elaborate but no doubt enhances whatever you are having with it.

When it comes to the early modern world, all I can say is “heartburn” was a discomfort understood by the antiquarian and lexicographer Thomas Blount (1618-1679) who coined the term “dyspepsy” for his Glossographia (1656), when we believed the condition was associated with the heart, not the esophagus (reflux, etc.).

Look, if this all seems a bit late in the day, we’ve got Burns Night coming up.

Keep up the water intake!

The air is very soft here, where I am. We’ve just had a Coronation, and I’ve come away from London so I can appreciate it, as one would a work of art. And a work of art it was. Spiritual, musical, historical art.
In the nights before the ceremony, I caught glimpses – on the television – of disrespectful things. Even my own ‘skit’ on Lansdowne MS 285 might be interpreted as disrespectful, by some. If so, I am sorry.

But excuse me while I gasp! Did I know, as I studied that British Library manuscript, that Lady Fiona Lansdowne would be there, accompanying the new Queen? Did I know that Pretty Yende, who I last saw singing in beautiful Napoli, decked out in Lemon yellow, would be there too?

I understand the King has a great sense of humour, and one of the wonders of British satire is that we are allowed to have it.

A gentleman called Michael, who was from Ireland, but had lived here in England a long time, was reading the newspapers while we watched the ancient ceremony here where I am. It turned out he had lost his son in a joy-riding car accident. Michael also suffers from epilepsy and shouldn’t drink alcohol. He was on the lemonade; I was on the really hard stuff: water. Michael was particularly interested in the satirical cartoons in the papers he was reading, I could see from the way he showed these to a friend. After a while he stood up, in the place where I am (where it was sunny on Coronation day). He was troubled, and left the room, unable to be near the rites any more. Later he spoke to me a little and I listened. He was full of full of jokes and laughter and aphorisms denoting Irish Wisdom about Life and his life, some of it cruel.

Am I destined always to feel conflicted? To feel that my father was right to be someone who knew that much of what has happened in the past still needs to be addressed, whilst at the same time, myself seeing that many are doing their best in a complex world.

To those of you who might say that we should do away with the monarchy I would say – look to those sections of the Coronation ceremony where diversity took over. A Hindu gives a special ring; a Seikh gives a special glove; and I would urge you to think about what these cultures mean in terms of King Charles’ knowledge about this land and the world. We are looking at a farmer king, and a Green one. India and the Punjab are ex-imperial emblems, yes, but Asia is a place where climate change marches on, largely unchecked.

Michael’s land, Ireland, is a place where the English language bends and folds around soft-spoken thoughts, hidden knowledge translated into poetry. As soon as I saw lines 31-32 of Lansdowne 285 I thought of W.B. Yeats ‘He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven’. The line is about new ‘Ray cloth’ being laid down in the cathedral for the King’s feet, and I wondered if the poet had seen a ‘Form’ of Coronation in the way I had. And I wondered, in all that spiritual commitment expressed, whether King Charles was wishing for the cloths of heaven too. I think he probably was. He seems a man who wants to bring things together, not to divide. I felt, amidst a lot of debate about what made him the happiest, that the moment when he smiled at the group of faith leaders on his way out, that this was the best. The Welsh Cross of the procession, carrying splinters of the True Cross, was beautiful. And that’s where this king is. Not at the bottom of signed undertakings declaring things firmly this way or that. There were sticks of Equity and Mercy… And the new Queen is a charity worker too. And we should go with that. Indeed, I’ve just seen Prince William confirm this idea about his father: service crossing all faith and culture boundaries is the name of the game.

If this seems like a series of disjointed thoughts and feelings, then that’s how these special days felt for me.

I’m sorry about the rain, especially on the marching soldiers, but then, as I said for somebody else’s podcast recently (and the king echoed this, I believe), our rain is – for the most part – a blessing. It’s rhythms don’t swing in the way it does in other places. It has a poetic beat all of its own.

Lansdowne 285 lines 31-32:
“and he shall go upon new Ray cloth laid under his feet on the ground”

W.B. Yeats, ‘He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven’

Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Maggie Steed and Peter Quince star in a completely barmy one-off script I have written, based on the Coronation Form transcribed in my last post (before I consulted the Oxford English Dictionary). Performed practically sight-unseen by two brave friends. Hurrah!

No Frenchman was harmed during the making of this audiofile. Vive La France!

Long Live the King!

Taken from British Library Lansdowne MS 285.

https://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/ILLUMIN.ASP?Size=mid&IllID=3997

Here is a modernised transcription of a form of a coronation. It is published here to mark the crowning of King Charles III.

Extracts from Folio 2 onwards:

First the Prince that is now to be crowned the day before his Coronation shall be 1 | apparelled and clothed with most noble and fairest clothing. And so he shall ride from the 2 | Tower of London to his Palace at Westminster through the City of London bareheaded 3 | Riding with him temporal lords and the Commonality of the same City with 4 | other much and noble people /// 5 |

The King’s seat: Also, it must be ordained that in the day of the King’s Coronation, 6 | in the Great Hall of Westminster, the King’s seat be Royally ordained and dressed with 7 | cloths of silk and gold and Royal cushions and carpets.

The Pulpit: Also, in 8 | Westminster Church must be ordained a Pulpit with “grees” [steps] on every side. And that 9 | must be fair arrayed with cloths of Silk & of gold and about on the ground, both. 10 |

The King’s Throne: Also, in that Pulpit, shall be a Royal Throne and a Royal seat in 11 | the which the King shall sit. And it shall also be Royally arrayed with cushions 12 | and cloths of gold and silk.

The Abbot of Westminster shall inform the King: 13 | Also, it is, to wit, that the Abbot of Westminster, which is, for the time, two days 14 | other before the King’s Coronation, or the Queen’s, and shall inform them of divers 15 | observances that they shall do & keep in their Coronation, and warn them to 16 | strive and to cleanse their Conscience before the holy anointing. And if the 17 | Abbot be dead sick or in foreign countries, or “leefully lett'”[lawfully stopped] Then shall one of the monks 18 | of the Church be chosen by the Convent that shall fulfil and do in the Abbot’s 19 | stead at the said time of Coronation.

The Shirt and the Coat: Also, the 20 | same day of the Coronation, the same Prince that shall be crowned shall 21 | be lifted up in the foresaid Royal seat in the Hall, but first he shall be bathed 22 | And after the bath, there shall be ordained to him a new shirt and a Coat of 23 | Silk opened to the breast, open between the shoulders & the middle of the 24 | arms. And above the Coat he shall be clothed with other noble vestments 25 | And he shall wear one [pair of] hose without shoes.

The solemn procession: Also, 26 | there shall be a solemn procession ordained by the Abbot and Convent of Westminster 27 | unto the King’s seat in the Great Hall, in the which the Prince shall sit abiding the procession 28 | and in this procession shall be Archbishops and other prelates, and then 29 | shall the Prince descend and follow the procession into the Church, and he 30 | shall go upon new Ray [striped] cloth laid under his feet on the ground from the said 31 | Church, and there shall be singing in the “Resteyning” of [receiving?] Kings and Queens 32 |

… The Archbishop, with a high voice, shall enquire the will of the people as touching the King’s Coronation. And that while shall the prince stand in his Throne or Chair and turn him also to the parties of the people. And after that question shall an anthem be song…

The Offering of the King. Also when the anthem is song and ended, the King shall come down off his pulpit unto the High Altar between bishops that shall lead him on which altar he must offer a cloth of gold…

The Lying of the King before the Altar. Also, when the King hath offered, he shall lie down flat on the pavement before the altar upon cushions and cloths of silk, Royally arrayed, till that the Archbishop or some other that shall Crown him hath said Deus Fidelum. And then there shall be made a Sermon to the people. Another that the King shall make. And when the Sermon is done, the King shall come to the Altar to make his oath, which he shall confirm with the Sacrament of the Altar.

The lying down again of the King before the Altar. Then shall a hymn begin: Veni Creator Spritus…

The Anointing of the King in 6 places. Afterwards, the King shall arise out of his Chair to go to the altar and “do of” [take off] his clothes save his Coat and his Shirt that he may receive the anointing… and shall be anointed in 6 places, that is to say: in the hands, within the breast, between the shoulders and in the great of the arm, and in the head in the manner of a Cross with the Holy Oil.

The Abbot of Westminster. And then after the aforesaid anointing and wiping with linen cloth (which shall be burned), the openings of the place of the anointing in his Coat and Shirt shall then be closed after the anointing of the Abbot of Westminster or one in his stead.

The Abbot of Westminster shall take off the King’s Pelion: Also, when the King is anointed on his head, the King’s head shall be held with a linen cloth for the Holy anointing. And so it shall be still till the viij [8] days after he is anointed, at which day the Abbot of Westminster or a Monk in his stead, shall come to the King and take off that Pelion (turban) and wash the King’s head and make it clean…