Having been out for my hour’s walk yesterday with History Jar challenges on my mind – and no I do not feel the urge to take up jogging, thank you all the same -I now have a long list of challenges for the blog.
This week’s challenge is a two part challenge. Firstly, where have English monarchs and their consorts been buried since 1066? And secondly, the obvious answer is Westminster Abbey. There have been thirty kings and queens buried there according to the Westminster Abbey website. Without looking them up, how many of the 30 can you name?
Edward the Confessor was buried in the newly completed Westminster Abbey on 6th January 1066. He was placed before the high altar but on 13th October 1163 he was moved to a shrine which Henry III improved upon with the addition of mosaics but of course in 1540 the shrine was destroyed by Henry VIII’s vandals.
Perhaps its best to answer this by those who weren’t given the honour of burial in Westminster Abbey notably those who were murdered – Richard II, Edward II, Henry VI and, of course, Richard III whose body was just thrown away. John was also not given this ‘honour’ being, of course, bad.
It seems to have been an intermittent thing until the Tudors at which point it became all the rage to be buried in Westminster until the Hanoverians turned up at which point Windsor became the resting place of choice. Good point about the murder victims – no one wants a saintly cult on their hands least of all an usurper!