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The Coronation in Medieval England: The Evolution of the Office and the Oath

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

H. G. Richardson*
Affiliation:
Goudhurst, Kent

Extract

An explanatory foreword seems to be demanded by the studies in the English coronation ceremony here presented. I am conscious that on a number of points, views are now put forward incompatible with those I have expressed on other occasions since first I began to write on the subject. Further scrutiny of the evidence and the redating of some of the more important documents have, however, led me inevitably to conclusions at variance not only with those of other scholars, but with some that seemed plausible to me at the time of writing. What is principally in question is the history of the English coronation before 1308; but I have revised and elaborated the story of the evolution of the Fourth Recension of the English coronation office as it was presented by Professor Sayles and myself a good many years ago. It would be presumptuous on my part to pretend that I have given final answers to the many questions the tangled history of the English coronation provokes. I have changed my own mind too often to permit me to imagine that there may not be answers to those questions more satisfying than mine. But what I have written will, I trust, advance the study of obscure and complicated problems which have an important bearing upon the history of kingship in the Middle Ages and therefore upon medieval polity.

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 There is no reason to suppose that Anselm had any knowledge of this text or was in any way associated with it.Google Scholar

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3 This is notably true of the text edited from Cambridge University Library MS Mm. iii 21 by Maskell, W., Monumenta ritualia ecclesiae anglicanae (Oxford 1882) II 1-52. There seems no doubt that it represents a preliminary draft used for the fourth form: see below pp. 143-146.Google Scholar

4 E. Schramm, P. has edited two recensions in Z[eitschrift der] S[avigny-]S[tiftung] 55 (1935) Kan[onistische] Abt[eilung] 24.309-324, 325-332. Another recension (a variant of the second edited by Schramm) was printed by Hittorp, M., De divinis catholicae ecclesiae officiis (Paris 1610) 147-152 and has been often reprinted. The recension known in England, from the eleventh century onwards in some ways resembled this last (below Appendix I).Google Scholar

5 The earlier form of this is edited by Schramm in ZSS 54 (1934) Kan. Abt. 23.221-230; the later form is edited by Wickham Legg, J., Three Coronation Orders (HBS 19; 1900) 53-64, 162-173.Google Scholar

6 Edited by Schramm, loc. cit. 235-242.Google Scholar

7 Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works (Rolls Series 1879) I 524-525.Google Scholar

8 Chevalier, Ulysse, Sacramentaire … de l'abbaye de Saint-Remy (Paris 1900) 222226.Google Scholar

9 Th. Godefroy, Le cérémonial français (Paris 1649) I 26-30; Archives administratives de la ville de Reims ed. Varin, P. (Paris 1839) 527-530; Coronation Book of Charles V (HBS 16; 1899) 6-11.Google Scholar

10 E. Schramm, P., Der König von Frankreich (Weimar 1939) II 4, where an earlier date than seems probable to me has been suggested for the French translation: moreover, the sequence of texts proposed appears to be very questionable.Google Scholar

11 Below, p. 192.Google Scholar

12 Sacramentaire de Saint-Remy 223: there is also a reference to ‘orationes que suis in locis in Ordinario continentur’ at p. 225.Google Scholar

13 BIHR 16 (1939) 10.Google Scholar

14 As in the title Directorium sacerdotum of the Salisbury diocese; this is an alternative to Ordinale. Google Scholar

15 The book that survives is an illuminated copy specially prepared for the royal library in 1365: the coronation took place on 19 May 1364, and one or more service books must have been in existence on that occasion (Coronation Book of Charles V Introduction ix).Google Scholar

16 The introductions of the delivery of the ring involved a clumsy interpolation (ibid. 34).Google Scholar

17 Godefroy, , Le cérémonial français I 13-25. For the date see Schramm, Der König von Frankreich II 4.Google Scholar

18 Below, Appendix III.Google Scholar

19 The passage cited above (p. 114) continues: ‘preter iuramentum Lateranensis concilii, videlicet de hereticis de regno extirpandis.’ The French translation reads significantly: ‘et le serment de la nouvelle constitution du Concile de Latran.’ Evidently this oath was not in the Ordinarius in its original form.Google Scholar

20 Below, p. 135.Google Scholar

21 Below, Appendix II.Google Scholar

22 Cf. Schramm, History of the English Coronation (Oxford 1937) 74: ‘For two hundred years people had been satisfied with the ‘Anselm’ ordo.’ Google Scholar

23 The First and Second Recensions mention only oil and only on the head. The prayer in the Second Recension and the related Frankish office do not suggest anything else, especially the words ‘unctio super caput eius defluat ad interiora descendat’ (L. Legg, G. W., English Coronation Records [London 1901] 5,19; Schramm, ZSS 54 Kan. Abt. 23.203, 214, 225, 239).Google Scholar

24 Below, p. 181.Google Scholar

25 Below, pp. 181-182.Google Scholar

26 Legg, English Coronation Records 32-33.Google Scholar

27 The anointing of the hands is an additional ceremony not included in the primitive text (Schramm, ZSS 55 Kan. Abt. 24.315, 327-28; Hittorp, op. cit. 149).Google Scholar

27a PL 213.284; X. 1.15.1 § 5.Google Scholar

28 Below, p. 175; Pontifical of Magdalen College ed. Wilson, A.H. (HBS 39; 1910) 92, 273.Google Scholar

29 Below, p. 195.Google Scholar

30 The relevant paragraph is not included in the portions of the text of the twelfth-century directory given in Appendix II below: it will be found in ‘Benedict of Peterborough,’ Gesta regis Henrici secundi (Rolls Series 1867) II 82.Google Scholar

31 See note 50 below. The earliest direct statement that chrism was used seems to be that of Ralf de Diceto, who officiated at the coronation of Richard I in place of the bishop of London and who, as he said, ‘in oleo sancto quam in crismate administrauit archiepiscopo’ (R. de Diceto, Historical Works [Rolls Series 1876] II 69).Google Scholar

32 Legg, English Coronation Records 32-33.Google Scholar

33 Ibid. 34.Google Scholar

34 For a discussion of the meaning of armillae see Maskell, , Monumenta ritualia II 29-30: see also the references collected in the index to Legg, op. cit. 392. The translator of the second form of the Fourth Recension understood armillae to be bracelets: ‘il recevera les bracers d'or sur les deus bras’ (Three Coronation Orders 45 corrected). The translator of the third form, however, understood the armilla (sic) to be a cowl (Ibid. 123).Google Scholar

34a The pre-Conquest ‘Historia de Sancto Cuthberto’ mentions armillae aureae as royal ornaments in the tenth century and gives an apocryphal account of the investiture of Guthred as king of Northumbria (883) by placing armillam auream on his right arm (Simonis Monachi Opera omnia [Rolls Series 1882] I 203, 207, 211).Google Scholar

35 In the Ordo Romanus the order is sword, armillae, mantle, ring, sceptre, virge, crown (below pp. 179-180).Google Scholar

36 The relative paragraphs are not given in Appendix II: see ‘Benedict of Peterborough,’ Gesta II 82.Google Scholar

37 Sacramentaire de Saint-Remy 224. The tunica iacincta was a surcoat of violet silk and in it the king was buried (Coronation Book of Charles V 8, 88). So Edward I was buried in a mantle of crimson satin which had been, or represented, his coronation mantle (Archaeologia 3 [London 1775] 383). See below, note 43.Google Scholar

38 de Hovedene, R., Chronica ed. Stubbs, (Rolls Series 1870) III 11. The alteration appears also in the abstract included by Roger of Wendover in his chronicle and presumably had been made in the copy of ‘Benedict of Peterborough’ before him (Flores Historiarum ed. Coxe, [English Historical Society 1841] III 6).Google Scholar

39 The king might very well return the virge and sceptre to the altar, as in later ceremonial the sword and the orb were returned (Legg, English Coronation Records xli, li, 97).Google Scholar

40 Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works I 526.Google Scholar

41 Rotuli litterarum patentium (London 1835) 77. The regalia were at Kenilworth and were sent to Clarendon, apparently on their way to Windsor for the Christmas crown-wearing.Google Scholar

42 Legg, English Coronation Records 54-55.Google Scholar

43 Archaeologia 3.382-383. This article by Sir Joseph Ayloffe, ‘An account of the body of King Edward the First, as it appeared on opening his tomb in the year 1774,’ is a well documented account not only of Edward I's burial but of the general practice followed in royal burials. This article may be compared with the ‘Notes historiques sur les exhumations faites en 1793 dans l'abbaye de Saint-Denis’ by Alexandre Lenoir, published in his Musée des monuments français (Paris 1801) II xcix-cxxiv, and Description … des monumens de sculpture … (Paris 1801) 338-356.Google Scholar

44 This is evident from the explanatory rubric which the compilers thought it necessary to introduce into the Westminster Liber Regalis (Legg, English Coronation Records 95).Google Scholar

45 Gregorian Sacramentary under Charles the Great ed. A. Wilson, H. (HBS 49 1915) 187.Google Scholar

46 ZSS 54 Kan. Abt. 23.239-240.Google Scholar

47 Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works I 525.Google Scholar

48 Legg, , English Coronation Records 102-106.Google Scholar

49 Gervase of Canterbury, loc. cit. Google Scholar

50 These forms are not those of the First Recension. The Fourth Recension gives alternative forms for use when the queen is crowned with the king, borrowed from the Sarum Missal (Legg, English Coronation Records 102-106; Sarum Missal ed. W. Legg, J. [Oxford 1916] 398). The statement of Guy of Amiens that Archbishop Aeldred anointed William the Conqueror on the head with chrism indicates that this had previously been the practice (De bello Hastingensi carmen, lines 833-4 in Monumenta Historica Britannica ed. and Sharpe, Petrie [London 1848] 872). The mention of chrism in the revised Third Recension only in relation to the head points in the same direction (below p. 175). Whether any distinction was made between the anointing of different parts of the body is uncertain. In the official account of the coronation of Richard II we are told that ‘oleo sancto atque crismate in diuersis partibus corporis sue, ut moris est … inunctus extitit’ (Munimenta Gildhallae Londoniensis [Rolls Series 1860] II 479; Legg, English Coronation Records 147). At the coronation of Edward VI chrism was applied only to the head (Acts of the Privy Council 1547-1550 [London 1890] 32).Google Scholar

51 Below, Appendix I.Google Scholar

52 The post-Conquest practice is uncertain. Though the revised Second Recension gives an alternative anthem, there is no evidence that it was ever used (below, pp. 176-177).Google Scholar

53 Unguatur oleo letitiae: see below, Appendix I note 17.Google Scholar

54 For the original text see ZSS 54 Kan. Abt. 23.228-229; for the revised text see Three Coronation Orders 61-63. For the variant text of this revision see ibid. xl, 171-172.Google Scholar

55 Maskell, Monumenta ritualia II 85-88.Google Scholar

56 Memoranda Roll 1 John (Pipe Roll Society 1943) Introduction lxvii-lxviii, lxxxi; E[nglish] H[istorical] R[eview] 74 (1959) 200-208.Google Scholar

57 For Isabelle see EHR 61 (1946) 307310. In the case of Adeliza, Henry I's second wife, we have the statement: ‘Puella predicta in regni dominam electa … crastino die … regina consecratur et coronatur’ (John of Worcester, Chronicle ed. Weaver, J. R. H. [Oxford 1908] 16). This can only mean that just as the king was dominus Angliae before he was crowned, so Adeliza was domina by some formality of election before she was crowned.Google Scholar

58 For the relation between the Third Recension, the Ordo Romanus and the Second Recension see below, Appendix It, I. may be noted that the prayer Omnipotens sempiterne Deus in the unrevised Third Recension, preserved also in the Fourth Recension, contains the words ‘hanc famulam tuam N. quam supplici deuotione in reginam elegimus’ (Legg, op. cit. 37, 109). Since this prayer is taken, with the rest of the office for the queen, from the Ordo Romanus, little significance can be attached to these words.Google Scholar

59 Pontifical of Magdalen College 95.Google Scholar

60 Below, Appendix II.Google Scholar

61 De bello Hastingensi carmen, lines 787-835, in Monumenta Historica Britannica 871-2. The form of office might be the revised Third Recension, so far as the identifiable details go; but if this were so, we should have to date this text well before the death of Guy in 1075-6. Since it is stated that the king's head was anointed with chrism, Guy's text could not have been the unrevised (A) text.Google Scholar

62 Below, p. 186.Google Scholar

63 Coronation Book of Charles V xi, xii, 17, 19, 30, 33, 35, 39. The interpolation at col. 34 may originally have been marginal.Google Scholar

64 BIHR 16 (1939) 11.Google Scholar

65 I take these words from the first paragraph of Clement Maydeston's Defensorium Directorii (HBS 7; 1894) 5.Google Scholar

66 The only real exception, that of Henry III at Gloucester, was remedied by a subsequent coronation at Westminster. No such rule governed the coronation of the queen apart from the king, although the archbishop of Canterbury claimed the right to officiate, incidentally because the king wore his crown at the ceremony (Eadmer, Historia Novorum [Rolls Series 1884] 292-293).Google Scholar

67 For France see Sacramentaire de Saint- Remy 224; Coronation Book of Charles V 21. For England see the directories, in ‘Benedict of Peterborough,’ Gesta II 82 and Appendix III below, p. 200, and the Fourth Recension in Legg, English Coronation Records 94.Google Scholar

68 The ceremony of laying the text of the oath upon the altar is mentioned, so far as I know, only twice in English documents, referring to the years 975 or 978 and 1154 (F. Liebermann, Gesetze der Angelsachsen [Halle 1903] I 214-217; Materials for the History of Thomas Becket [Rolls Series 1881] V 282). But there are a number of continental parallels (cited by Schramm in ZSS 54 Kan. Abt.23.127-128, and Marcel David in Revue du moyen âge latin 6 [1950] 111-115). I need not repeat the argument for believing that the oath was sworn in the vernacular (Speculum 24 [1949] 46).Google Scholar

1 De statu ecclesiae (PL 159.1003). The date is c. 1110. Gilbert's words are: ‘Eo tantum ergo praeest primas archiepiscopo quod cum multi sint in eadem regione archiepiscopi, solus ex eis qui regem ordinat et in tribus solemnitatibus coronat.’Google Scholar

2 He had known Anselm in Normandy and he corresponded with him after becoming bishop of Limerick.Google Scholar

3 Larson, L. M., The King's Household in England before the Norman Conquest (Bulletin of the University of Wisconsin no. 100; Madison 1904) 200202. The evidence is best for the Easter festival at Winchester and the Christmas festival at Gloucester.Google Scholar

4 It has been questioned whether Eleanor was anointed, since she had already been anointed as queen of France (Schramm, History of the English Coronation 57). Though there is no direct evidence, it is inconceivable that she should not at least have worn her crown at Henry II's coronation.Google Scholar

5 Howden, Chronica I 302 (s. a. 1159, recte 1158); Diceto, Historical Works I 302. Both writers were, however borrowing from some unknown source. Howden, in fact, here contradicted what he had previously written of the services rendered ‘in coronationibus in solemnibus festis regum Angliae’ when noticing the Christmas feast in 1186 (Gesta II 3): to avoid the contradiction he suppressed this passage in his revision (Chronica II 317). That the laudes were sung at these feasts we know from an entry in the pipe roll of 1188 (Pipe Roll 34 Henry II [Pipe Roll Society 1925] 19).Google Scholar

6 We have not only the evidence of the Peterborough Chronicle s.a. 1087 (Anglo-Saxon Chronicle [Rolls Series 1861] I 355), but also a writ of Henry I in favor of the three abbeys, testifying to the custom in the time of the king's predecessors (J. Robinson, A., Gilbert Crispin [Cambridge 1911] 141).Google Scholar

7 Curia Regis Rolls (London 1935) VII 349-350. Many of the charters issued at Brampton were presumably granted on these occasions.Google Scholar

8 William of Newburgh in Chronicles … of Stephen, Henry II and Richard I (Rolls Series 1884) I 57.Google Scholar

9 Ibid. 117-118; Howden, Chronica I 216. The bishop of Lincoln officiated: a rumor that the archbishop of York would do so caused great perturbation at Canterbury (EHR 54 [1939] 471).Google Scholar

10 Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum (Rolls Series 1870) 243.Google Scholar

11 Howden, Chronica III 11: ‘et ipse obtulit unam marcam auri purissimi; talis enim oblatio decet regem in singulis coronationibus suis.’ These words are an addition on revision and form no part of the text of the ordo: it is clear that ‘coronations’ must be understood as covering crown-wearings as well as the king's consecration.Google Scholar

12 Kantorowicz, E. H., Laudes Regiae (Berkeley 1946) 173174. Originally the payment was to the cantores at the abbeys.Google Scholar

13 There appears to be little direct evidence of this in relation to crown-wearings. In 1189 the barons of the Cinque Ports claimed the canopy which they held over the king (Epistolae Cantuarienses [Rolls Series 1865] 308) and successfully reasserted their claim in 1236 (Red Book of the Exchequer [Rolls Series 1896] II 756). In the same year the cloth on which the king walked ‘in quacumque fuerit ecclesia coronatus rex’ was divided, part going to the sacrist and part to the poor (ibid. 757). The passage indicates that the custom obtained at crown-wearings as well as coronations. The monks of Westminster claimed not only this cloth but all of the furnishings remaining in the church after the coronation (Legg, English Coronation Records 85). This latter claim seems to have had its origin at the coronation of Edward III, after which the monks retained a large quantity of hangings (tapitz), cloth (draps), and cushions: being challenged at the audit of the account of the clerk of the great wardrobe, they appealed to the king who, of his special grace, decided that the claim against them should be dropped (P.R.O., Memoranda, K.R. Roll 6 Edward III [E. 159/108] mem. 83v). The monks also claimed the silvered spears which upheld the canopy and the attached silver-gilt bells, a claim subsequent to 1236 and first asserted apparently in 1308, as will be seen by comparing the prefatory rubric of the second form of the Fourth Recension with the abstract of the decisions of the court of claims in 1236 on which it is based (Foedera [London 1818] II 33; Church Quarterly Review 95 [1923] 338-339).Google Scholar

14 The first specific reference appears to be in ‘Benedict of Peterborough,’ Gesta II 3 on the occasion of the Christmas crown-wearing in 1186, the next on the occasion of Queen Eleanor's coronation in 1236 (Red Book of the Exchequer II 757-758).Google Scholar

15 Curia Regis Rolls VII 350.Google Scholar

16 Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works I 527.Google Scholar

17 Howden, Chronica III 248.Google Scholar

18 Gervase, ut supra 524-525; Eadmer, Historia novorum 212.Google Scholar

19 The responses were presumably: (i) ‘Et exaudi nos in die qua inuocauerimus te’; (ii) ‘Et de Sion tuere eum’; (iii) ‘A facie inimici.’ Cf. Marbach, C., Carmina Scripturarum (Strasbourg 1907) 83 (Ps. 19), 143 (Ps. 60); Sarum Missal (ed. W. Legg, J.; Oxford 1916) 415, 419, 451.Google Scholar

20 Gervase, ut supra 525.Google Scholar

21 Thronus presumably means merely the chair in which the king sat in the choir. Gervase states specifically that in 1142 he sat ‘in sede archiepiscopi’ (ibid. 525, 527).Google Scholar

22 Ibid. 526, 527.Google Scholar

23 Ibid. 526; Howden, Chronica III 248.Google Scholar

24 The proceedings of 1236 appear to have been a novelty: the record itself shows that there had been disputes earlier, but does not suggest that they had been resolved judicially (Red Book of the Exchequer II 757).Google Scholar

25 We lack information about 1274 and 1308. The proceedings in 1327 were in the chancery (BIHR 14 [1937] 1-8): they assumed their modern form in 1377.Google Scholar

26 The citizens of London and Winchester were already disputing in 1194 (Howden, Chronica III 248); they were still disputing in 1269 (Annales Monastici [Rolls Series 1865] II 108).Google Scholar

27 Below, Appendix II.Google Scholar

28 The steward, butler, chamberlain, marshal, as well as subordinates, officiated at the coronation as officers of the royal household. These offices are discussed by Round, J. H. in The King's Serjeants and Officers of State (London 1911).Google Scholar

29 This is true in particular of the office of steward (Red Book of the Exchequer II 757), although the ancestors of the contestants of 1236 were serving side by side in 1186 (‘Benedict,’ Gesta II 3).Google Scholar

30 The point of dispute is obscure: apparently the Londoners conceded the right of the citizens of Winchester to serve in the kitchen (Howden, Chronica III 12, 248; Red Book of the Exchequer II 758; Annales Monastici II 108).Google Scholar

31 See note 13 above.Google Scholar

32 Not apparently at the coronation of Richard II. For references see the index to Legg, English Coronation Records 392, 397.Google Scholar

33 Gervase, ut supra 526, says that the canopy was borne by four barons, Howden (Chronica III 247 f.) that it was borne by four earls, whom he names.Google Scholar

34 It may be relevant to note that Henry II granted to the barons of Hastings ‘honores suos in curia mea’ (Calendar of Charter Rolls [London 1908] III 221): but there seems no ground for identifying these ‘honors’ with a right to perform a particular service at coronations, though this has been assumed (K. Murray, M. E., Constitutional History of the Cinque Ports [Manchester 1935] 19-20).Google Scholar

35 Round, J. H., The Commune of London (London 1899) 8183; The Ancestor 5 (1903) 207-209.Google Scholar

36 Book of Fees (London 1920) 74; Red Book of the Exchequer II 486. The charter upon which Round relied granted to William Manduit (a) a chamberlainship he had held under Henry I with the appurtenant lands in Normandy and England, and (b) the chamberlainship of the treasury (Brit. Mus. Additional MS 28024 fol. 21v). Round confused the two.Google Scholar

37 BIHR 14 (1937) 23, where some claims in 1327 are examined.Google Scholar

38 Red Book of the Exchequer II 755-759.Google Scholar

39 When London and Winchester advanced conflicting claims in 1194, the Londoners were successful because they paid for the privilege of serving as butlers (Howden, Chronica III 248).Google Scholar

40 ‘Benedict,’ Gesta II 80-81.Google Scholar

41 Howden, Chronica III 214.Google Scholar

42 Ibid. IV 90.Google Scholar

43 Foedera (London 1816) I 160.Google Scholar

44 Red Book of the Exchequer II 756.Google Scholar

45 Kantorowicz, Laudes Regiae 175-176. At present the evidence does not go beyond 1241, but this seems to be no more than a consequence of a change in the manner of paying the customary fees.Google Scholar

46 Annales Monastici IV (1869) 226229.Google Scholar

47 In 1269 the citizens of both London and Winchester proffered their services, which were declined (ibid. II 108).Google Scholar

48 There is a side note in Matthew Paris, Chronica maiora (Rolls Series 1876) III 338, referring to the consuetudinarium scaccarii for fuller and better particulars. This clearly refers to the year 1236, but in the Historia minor (Rolls Series 1866) II 8 the note was transferred to 1189 with this difference that the authority is said to be the rotuli scaccarii. In the Abbreviatio Chronicorum again s.a. 1189 there is a similar reference, but the source is now said to be the consuetudines scaccarii (ibid. [Rolls Series 1869] III 209). The references are to the same source, the Red Book or the document underlying the entry there, but they have led to the belief that an account of Richard I's coronation was to be found in the records of the exchequer; see Luard's note to the Chronica maiora II 348 and Stubbs's note to Howden Chronica III 9. An abstract of so much of the decisions as interested the monks of Westminster was in their possession by the middle of the century (Church Quarterly Review 95.338-339; BIHR 13 [1936] 135).Google Scholar

49 Below p. 191.Google Scholar

50 Cf. Round's remarks in King's Serjeants 125, 130, and Mr. Geoffrey White's paper ‘Coronation Claims’ in The GenealogistsMagazine 7 (1935-37) 505-516, particularly pp. 512-513 on the claim to serve as champion.Google Scholar

1 Westlake, H. F. argues for Master Hugh's previous employment at Reims (Westminster Abbey [London 1923] 69-73); W, Lethaby, R. dissents (Westminster Abbey Re-examined [London 1925] 81-84).Google Scholar

2 BIHR 16 (1939) 7, 10. This practice ceased under Edward III at latest. Richard II made his offertory in coin: the official account of his coronation (see below, note 50) says that he offered ‘unam marcam auri,’ while Thomas Walsingham speaks of ‘oblationem pecunie’ (Historia Anglicana [Rolls Series] I 337). Henry IV made his offertory in gold nobles (Adam of Usk, Chronicon [London 1904] 119).Google Scholar

3 Below, Appendix III. The evidence for the actual practice is examined by Maskell, Monumenta ritualia II lxi-lxiii. The evidence of Thomas of Walsingham (Historia Anglicana loc. cit.) is difficult to set aside in the case of Richard II, though he was capable of making grotesque mistakes. The rubrics of the Liber Regalis are self-contradictory, if strictly interpreted (Legg, English Coronation Records 105-106). It may be that the practice varied.Google Scholar

4 Below pp. 176, 199. But it is not possible to argue confidently from the silence of the texts.Google Scholar

5 ZSS 54 Kan. Abt. 23.214, 225; Coronation Book of Charles V 22; Godefroy, Cérémonial françois I 35, 61.Google Scholar

6 Marbach, Carmina scripturarum 90; Sarum Missal, ed. W. Legg, J. (Oxford 1916) 85; Missale ad usum ecclesie Westmonasteriensis (HBS 1; 1891-96) I 205, II 1188, III 1315.Google Scholar

7 With Foedera II 34 and Legg, English Coronation Records 94-97 compare Coronation Book of Charles V 21, 33; Godefroy, Cérémonial 60. The differences are trifling.Google Scholar

8 ZSS 54 Kan. Abt. 23.230. The inclusion of the prayer Deus cuius est omnis potestas may also have been suggested by a comparison with the Second Recension (ibid. 225), but it occurs in the office for the queen in the Third Recension.Google Scholar

9 The two forms will be found in Foedera II 33, 36. A better text of the French form is in Parliamentary Writs (London 1830) II div. ii, appendix 10-11.Google Scholar

10 Whatever recension of the Ordo Romanus was accessible at Westminster, we may be sure that the interrogation would follow the traditional form. Cf. Godefroy, Cérémonial I 16.Google Scholar

11 Below p. 191.Google Scholar

12 Legg, English Coronation Records 85-86 note (reading of O). In the second form the reading is unchanged (Foedera II 33).Google Scholar

13 Speculum 24 (1949) 59 note 75.Google Scholar

14 The rubrics from the Third Recension begin with the anointing of the hands: the comparison is easily made between the text in Foedera II 33-35 and that in the Pontifical of Magdalen College 86-95.Google Scholar

15 The Latin reads: ‘Qui vero cum accesserit metropolitanus vel episcopus vestem qua indutus fuerit princeps, pallio super eum extenso, scindat propriis usque ad cingulum manibus’ (Legg, English Coronation Records 91; Foedera II 33). The French translation of the second form renders this: ‘li roy severa ses draps de ses mains demeyne del coler jesqes à la seinture,’ where ‘li roy’ is due to the ambiguity of the Latin (Three Coronation Orders 43). The French of the third form reads: ‘le quel ercheveke … fendra par ses propres mayns les draps du roi tanqu'al pitz’ (ibid. 132). It seems clear that the verb scindo was understood to mean ‘to rend’ and not ‘to cut.’Google Scholar

16 Below, p. 198.Google Scholar

17 Below, p. 182.Google Scholar

18 With Foedera II 35-36 compare Legg, English Coronation Records 37-39. The rubric ‘Hic effunditur oleum sanctum super verticem eius in modum crucis dicente episcopo’ is not, however, in Tiberius B viii. The prayer Spiritus sancti gratia, found in Tiberius, was omitted.Google Scholar

19 The Gregorian Sacramentary under Charles the Great 187. Cf. Missale ad usum ecclesie Westmonasteriensis II 1145; Sarum Missal 397.Google Scholar

20 Speculum ut supra, note 13.Google Scholar

21 Parliamentary Writs II div. ii 1. If the abbot had not attended, he would have sent fellow monks as proctors.Google Scholar

22 H. Pearce, E., Walter de Wenlok (London 1920) 205225; Monks of Westminster (Cambridge 1916) 61, 73-74.Google Scholar

23 Speculum 24 (1949) 57. For the original memorandum see Church Quarterly Review 95 (1923) 338-339.Google Scholar

24 With slight variations, the rubric reads in all forms of the Fourth Recension: ‘Post hec vero induatur sindonis collobio capite amictu operto propter unccionem.’ This corresponds to paragraphs 18 and 19 of the directory (below p. 200).Google Scholar

25 Above, p. 140.Google Scholar

26 Three Coronation Orders 39-49; BIHR 13 (1936) 134137.Google Scholar

27 Three Coronation Orders 121-124; BIHR 13. 137-138: see below, pp. 192-194.Google Scholar

28 I can give no other meaning to the text: ‘et si serra mys au doit nue, et puis les gauntz li serront mys et pardessus l'anel de saint Edward’ (Three Coronation Orders 123).Google Scholar

29 Ibid.: ‘et soit sa chemys et ses autres draps recusutz sur li.’Google Scholar

30 This is the text printed by Maskell, Monumenta ritualia II 1-62.Google Scholar

31 With Coronation Book of Charles V 5-11 compare Sacramentaire de Saint-Remy 222-226.Google Scholar

32 Coronation Book of Charles V 12; Maskell, Monumenta ritualia II 9-11.Google Scholar

33 Although not in the rubrics, it would seem that there was a ceremonial act of this kind in the twelfth century. Thus Howden, when revising his chronicle, added to the statement that the archbishop placed the crown on the king's head ‘quam [coronam] duo comites sustinebant propter ponderositatem ipsius’ (Chronica III 11).Google Scholar

34 Maskell, , op. cit. 23; Legg, English Coronation Records 33. Cf. Pontifical of Magdalen College 92 for revised B text.Google Scholar

35 Maskell, , op. cit. 42; Missale ad usum ecclesie Westmonasteriensis II 1144. Cf. ibid. III 1310.Google Scholar

36 Maskell, , op. cit. 4-5.Google Scholar

37 Ibid. 19-20.Google Scholar

38 The manuscript is described in Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of the University of Cambridge (Cambridge 1861) IV 200-203. The additional rubrics are noted by Maskell in his apparatus. Blunders in the text suggest that the draft had been imperfectly revised; two prayers, for example, are misplaced (Maskell, op. cit. 39, 44).Google Scholar

39 For the manuscripts see Missale ad usum ecclesie Westmonasteriensis III 1436: the text in the missal is printed ibid. II 673-733.Google Scholar

40 Below, p. 189.Google Scholar

41 Legg, With, English Coronation Records 82-85, beginning ‘Rex autem precedenti die coronacionis sue,’ compare paragraphs 1-11 of the directory, below pp. 197-199.Google Scholar

42 Legg, op. cit. 83-85, 108. Legg has printed the text of 1236 at pp. 58-61.Google Scholar

43 Ibid. 81-82.Google Scholar

44 Alternatively ‘ex iure antiquo et consuetudine’ (ibid. 85, 107).Google Scholar

45 Ibid. 107.Google Scholar

46 Richard of Cirencester, Speculum historiale (Rolls Series 1869) II 26-39. Robinson, J. A. believed this tract to have been written after 1387 (Proc. Brit. Acad. 3 [1907] 74).Google Scholar

47 The original of Guala's letter has survived (ibid. 74 note 2). It does not follow that Sudbury was conscious of the spurious nature of his authorities, some of which are forgeries of the early twelfth century.Google Scholar

48 Legg, op. cit. 82-83.Google Scholar

49 Henry VIII's manipulation of the oath is a well-known and rather ludicrous incident (BIHR 13 [1936] 144-145). The whole office, including the oath, was drastically revised for the coronation of Edward VI (Acts of the Privy Council 1547-1550 29-33). The preparation of the office used at Charles I's coronation and the resulting charges against Archbishop Laud are described in detail by Christopher Wordsworth in his introduction to The Manner of the Coronation of Charles I (HBS 2; 1892) iii-lxv.Google Scholar

50 The decisions of the court of claims are embodied in the official record of the coronation, which has been printed several times: for a list of manuscripts and editions see BIHR 13 [1936] 133. I cite the text printed in Munimenta Gildhallae Londoniensis II 456-482. The first decision of the court was that John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, was entitled to the office of steward; but the Liber Regalis has an inept reference to the controversy between the earls of Leicester and Norfolk in 1236 (Legg, op. cit. 108, 132). It seems inconceivable that this and other decisions would not have been reflected in the rubrics if the monks had known of them, and since the decisions of 1377 were evidently public property, we must assume that they became aware of them subsequent to the preparation of the Liber Regalis. Google Scholar

51 Legg, op. cit. 84: ‘duo duces siue comites regni excellenciores et maxime qui iure propinquitatis stirpi regie proximius videntur pertinere …’Google Scholar

52 Legg, op. cit. 81. The official account of the coronation gives no indication whether or not the form of the Fourth Recension used was this or an earlier one. The account of the coronation in Walsingham's Historia Anglicana I 330-338 is little better than a travesty: the order in which the different parts of the office are introduced is absurd. The account in the Anonimalle Chronicle, ed. H. Galbraith, V. (Manchester 1927) 108115, is not much better. In either case it is difficult to separate the few facts otherwise unrecorded from the fiction. It is, however, clear from all the accounts that the order of the service was varied in that the archbishop's address to the congregation followed, instead of preceding, the oath.Google Scholar

1 Speculum 29 (1954) 488502. N. Riesenberg, P., Inalienability of Sovereignty in Medieval Political Thought (New York 1956) does not add anything to the discussion on this particular point.Google Scholar

2 This is true for the period with which I am concerned. Cf. Victoria County History: Cambridgeshire (London 1948) II 204.Google Scholar

3 For the canons whose authority is vouched see the Decretum of Yves of Chartres 3.152 and 5.375 (PL 161.233, 435). The latter seems certain, the former probable. These texts were borrowed by Gratian C. 12 q. 2 cc. 19, 22.Google Scholar

4 British Museum Cotton MS Tiberius A. vi fol. 117v; JL 9376.Google Scholar

5 Brit. Mus. Cotton MS Titus A. i fol. 48r (olim 46); JL 10149.Google Scholar

6 Stubbs, W., Select Charters (9th ed. Oxford 1942) 143144.Google Scholar

6a Note that in 1130 the abbot of Westminster agreed to pay the king 1000 marks (reduced to 200), ‘ut bona ecclesie sue que iniuste dispersa erant congregaret et congregata custodiret’ (Magnum rotulum scaccarii ed. Hunter, J. [London 1833] 150).Google Scholar

7 Below, p. 173.Google Scholar

8 Walsingham, Thomas, Gesta abbatum monasterii sancti Albani (Rolls Series 1867) I 123. This is the latest and most accessible (though unscholarly) edition of the early gesta abbatum, which were continued by Matthew Paris and later incorporated in Walsingham's compilation. The life of Abbot Gorham appears to have been composed about the end of Henry II's reign, partly from documents and partly from personal knowledge: cf. Vaughan, R., Matthew Paris (Cambridge 1958) 182-189.Google Scholar

9 Curia Regis Rolls 11-14 John (London 1932) 272273.Google Scholar

10 The pipe roll of Michaelmas 1156 shows Anfrid Butteturte accounting for the farm of Wen dover both for the current year and for a small balance from the previous year ended Michaelmas 1155 (Great Rolls of the Pipe [London 1844] 24).Google Scholar

11 Foedera I 18.Google Scholar

12 Round, J. H., Studies in Peerage and Family History (London 1901) 170.Google Scholar

13 ‘Chronicle of Robert of Torigny,’ Chronicles of the Reigns of Stephen, Henry II and Richard I (Rolls Series 1889) IV 192-193.Google Scholar

14 Letters of John of Salisbury (London 1955) I 82 no. 46. The treaty had provided for the correction of infractions by ‘Ecclesiastical justice’ and, by implication, an appeal to the pope.Google Scholar

15 Henry knighted him in June 1158, and he died in the king's service in October 1159 (Chron. R. de Torigny 196, 206). The pipe rolls contain many references to remissions of taxation and penalties in his favor.Google Scholar

16 Below, p. 168. William of Newburgh s.a. 1155 uses similar words: ‘rex … regia dominica … praecepit … cum omni integritate a quibuscumque detentoribus resignari et in ius statumque pristinum reuocari’ (Chronicles of the Reigns of Stephen etc. I 103).Google Scholar

17 Ibid. IV 192.Google Scholar

18 Ibid. I 103-105.Google Scholar

19 His words are: ‘regia dominica per mollitiem regis Stephani ad alios multosque dominos maiori ex parte migrassent.’Google Scholar

20 Brit. Mus. Additional MS 28024 fol. 21v. For this charter see also note 35 to Chapter II above.Google Scholar

21 Ibid. fol. 22r. This is the king's charter of confirmation to the younger William.Google Scholar

22 Materials for the History of Thomas Becket (Rolls Series 1877) III 18-20.Google Scholar

23 Great Rolls of the Pipe 65, 101-102.Google Scholar

24 William of Ypres had claimed the comté of Flanders and in 1133 had been expelled by Count Thierry (1126-1168). It is quite clear, however, that he had soon been reconciled to the count, for otherwise he could not have recruited the troop of Flemish knights in the service of King Stephen. There is evidence of a continuous series of agreements between kings of England and counts of Flanders for the supply of mercenary knights from 1101 onwards, and there is good reason to infer an earlier agreement (F. Vercauteren, Actes des comtes de Flandres 1071-1128 [Brussels 1938] nos. 18, 38, 41; Foedera I 6, 22-23). No agreement with Stephen has survived, but we must infer that it existed. Henry II went very far to court, and bore injuries from, the count, who in the end deserted him for the young king (Round, Studies in Peerage 172-176). Richard and John in turn pursued the same policy (G. Dept, G., Les influences anglaise et française dans le comté de Flandre [Ghent 1928] 52-68).Google Scholar

25 Chron. R. de Torigny 192; William of Newburgh (pp. 105-106) has a different list of surrenders but writes to the same effect.Google Scholar

26 Chron. R. de Torigny 193.Google Scholar

27 Walsingham ut supra 124.Google Scholar

28 Red Book of the Exchequer II 683; Great Rolls of the Pipe 139.Google Scholar

29 Ibid. 101-102.Google Scholar

30 Bracton, De legibus fol. 7 (cd. Woodbine II 37-38). Cf. S. Hoyt, R., The Royal Demesne in English Constitutional History (Ithaca 1950) 192207. For alienations prior to 1154, see ibid. 85-92.Google Scholar

31 The charter has not survived, but it is evident from the particulars given in the action of 1225 that its terms were identical with those of Henry's charter of 1155 (Foedera I 42). That Henry while yet duke had recognised Hugh as earl of Norfolk is clear from his writ in Delisle, L., Actes de Henry II (Paris 1916) I 67. That the four manors, Earsham, Walsham, Acle and Halvergate, were all ancient demesne is clear from the pipe roll of 1158 (Great Rolls of the Pipe 125).Google Scholar

32 Foedera I 18.Google Scholar

33 Curia Regis Rolls 9-10 Henry III (London 1957) 4 no. 24. The case is also in Bracton's Note Book (London 1887) III 69 no. 1036. The action was adjourned and the terms of the judgment are unknown; but the earl remained in possession (F. Blomefield and Parkin, C., Topographical History of the County of Norfollk [London 1810] xi 104).Google Scholar

34 Below, p. 168.Google Scholar

35 Bracton, , De legibus fol. 107 (ed. II, Woodbine 305).Google Scholar

36 Foedera I 42.Google Scholar

37 In the words of his son Richard of Ely: ‘scaccarii scientiam continuata per multos annos bellica tempestate pene prorsus abolitam reformauit’ (Dialogus de Scaccario [London 1950] 50).Google Scholar

38 Seven are named in letters of 16 January 1159 from Adrian IV to the king, the archbishops and bishops and Bishop Nigel himself, from whom the information doubtless came (Titus A. i fol. 49v-50v: JL 10535-10537). The most prominent are William Earl Warenne, [Roger] earl of Clare, Earl Aubrey [of Oxford] and Henry fitz Gerold [chamberlain].Google Scholar

39 Below, p. 167.Google Scholar

40 William Thorne's Chronicle in Historiae Anglicanae scriptores X ed. Twysden, R. (London 1652) 1869. It remains difficult to explain why John did not refer to this oath on occasions when it might be pertinent (Speculum 24 [1949] 53); but this difficulty cannot outweigh the evidence that Henry II gave an undertaking to maintain the rights of the Crown. The terms of the letter of the barons to Innocent III (loc. cit.) are consistent with Louis’ allegation.Google Scholar

41 Royal Letters of Henry III (Rolls Series 1862) I 551; Calendar of Papal Registers (London 1893) I 131.Google Scholar

42 Below, p. 168.Google Scholar

43 Foedera I 229; Cal. Papal Registers I 148.Google Scholar

44 I have not overlooked Dr. Hoyt, R. S.'s ingenious suggestion that some other promise might be construed as covering the maintenance of the rights of the Crown (Traditio 11 [1956] 256); but it is impossible to dismiss the positive evidence of a specific undertaking.Google Scholar

45 Speculum 24 (1949) 4950.Google Scholar

46 Ibid. 62-63.Google Scholar

1 David, Marcel, ‘Le serment du sacre du ixe au xve siècle,’ Revue du moyen âge latin 6 (1950) 218219.Google Scholar

2 The D text is in Cotton MS Tiberius B iv: for this passage see Anglo-Saxon Chronicles ed. Thorpe (Rolls Series 1861) I 339 or An Anglo-Saxon Chronicle ed. Classen and Harmer (Manchester 1926) 87.Google Scholar

3 Below p. 186.Google Scholar

4 Below p. 189.Google Scholar

5 For the use of the vernacular see Speculum 24 (1949) 46.Google Scholar

6 de Diceto, R., Historical Works (Rolls Series 1876) II 68-69. It is of no moment whether he went directly to a pontifical or, as Mr. Hoyt suggests with great probability, drew upon an earlier passage in his chronicle (EHR 71 [1956] 365).Google Scholar

7 Below, Appendix II.Google Scholar

8 Select Charters 116.Google Scholar

9 Constitutional History of England (Oxford 1896) II 109.Google Scholar

10 Either in 975 or 978: text in Liebermann, F., Gesetze der Angelsachsen (Halle 1903) I 214-217. 11 Below p. 189.Google Scholar

12 Gesetze der Angelsachsen I 521.Google Scholar

13 Select Charters 142. This undertaking is supplemented in his second charter of 1136 by a promise to respect ‘bonas leges et iustas consuetudines in murdris et placitis et aliis causis’ (ibid. 146).Google Scholar

14 Ibid. 158.Google Scholar

15 The allegation is contained in a frequently printed letter from Alexander III, who is undoubtedly repeating Becket (JL 11836).Google Scholar

16 Speculum 24 (1949) 4748.Google Scholar

17 Foedera I 75-76.Google Scholar

18 Ibid. I 145; Select Charters 334. The language of this document appears to have been influenced, directly or indirectly, by the Ordo Romanus: cf. patrum nostrorum with patrum tuorum in a similar context (below, p. 189). For the influence of Justinian's Institutes see below p. 170. J. Turner, G. suggested that Cardinal Guala was responsible for the unusual phraseology of the charter (Transactions Hist, R. Soc. N.S. 18 [1904] 255), but English chancery clerks could on occasion adopt the style of the papal chancery.Google Scholar

19 Hoyt, Mr. has argued in much the same sense though he does not come to a definite conclusion (Traditio 11 [1956] 241-257).Google Scholar

20 Becket Materials V 282: ‘de seruanda ecclesie Dei libertate sua.’ The letter of Bernard de la Coudre (ibid. VII 452) to the same effect cannot, of course, be taken as preserving Henry's words.Google Scholar

21 ‘In coronatione autem illius nulla ex more de conseruanda ecclesie libertate cautio est prestita’ (JL 11836: see note 15 above).Google Scholar

22 Becket Materials VII 216.Google Scholar

23 Epistolae Cantuarienses 308.Google Scholar

24 Below, p. 189.Google Scholar

25 Epistolae Cantuarienses loc. cit.; and see below p. 171.Google Scholar

26 Liebermann, F., Über die Leges Edwardi Confessoris (Halle 1896) 1416; Gesetze der Angelsachsen III 339.Google Scholar

27 Ibid. I 635-637.Google Scholar

28 Liebermann, F., Über die Leges Anglorum sacculo xiii ineunle Londoniis collectae (Halle 1894) 91.Google Scholar

29 He dated the earliest known manuscript c. 1205 and the text of the third recension c. 1200 (Gesetze der Angelsachsen III 340). This, of course, meant that he had abandoned his earlier arguments.Google Scholar

30 Speculum 24 (1949) 61. It should, however, be added that since the purported record of Richard I's coronation is, in fact, a directory of earlier date, there is no ground for dating the third recension of the Leges post 1189: see Appendix II below.Google Scholar

31 Ibid. 60-63.Google Scholar

32 The absence of any reference to Ireland in paragraph A3 of the tract, where we should expect to find it in a description of the land and islands belonging to the Crown, suggests that it was written before Henry II's expedition of 1171-1172.Google Scholar

33 Über die Leges Edwardi Confessoris 15-16; Gesetze der Angelsachsen III 341.Google Scholar

34 This is most easily verified from the older printed texts and most conveniently in Wilkins, D., Leges Anglo-Saxonicae (London 1721) 197209.Google Scholar

34a The argument is, however, of little value since Edward is called both sanctus and beatus by Osbert of Clare in his ‘Vita beati regis Eadwardi’ written in 1138 (Analecta Bollandiana 41 [1923] 63-123).Google Scholar

35 Über die Leges Anglorum 59-60. For the text of the Assize see ‘Benedict,’ Gesta I 278-280 or Select Charters 183-184. The relevant section of the Leges is in Gesetze der Angelsachsen I 656 A9-A12.Google Scholar

36 Liebermann marked fifteen common words, such as liberi homines, as borrowings from the Assize. The differences are, however, more noteworthy. According to the Leges the armed freemen are to be at the service of their lords: the Assize eliminates the mesne lords and makes the armed freemen responsible directly to the king. According to the Leges the array is to be held on the morrow of Candlemas (3 February). It is presumably with this in view that the Assize requires freemen to equip themselves by Hilary (13 January 1182). The purpose of the Assize is, in fact, the enforcement and reform of an existing institution and its provisions are largely transitory: Liebermann recognized (Über die Leges Anglorum 60) that the author either had practical knowledge or was using a reliable source. The Leges appear to be our sole source of information about the institution — which presumably represents the ancient fyrd — in the early years of Henry II.Google Scholar

37 These are paragraphs A2, A6-A8 of Liebermann's edition: the present division and numbering are mine.Google Scholar

38 Thus, clause (v) is obviously related to the first and second clauses of the oath in the Ordo Romanus, while Liebermann's paragraph A9 has much in common with paragraph 9 of the directory (below, p. 189).Google Scholar

39 ‘Lagam Eadwardi regis vobis reddo cum illis emendationibus quibus pater meus eam emendauit consilio baronum suorum’ (Gesetze der Angelsachsen I 522 [13]).Google Scholar

40 Glanville de Legibus ed. Woodbine, (New Haven 1932) 24: ‘procerum quidem consilio et principis accedente auctoritate.’Google Scholar

41 In a later passage (Gesetze der Angelsachsen I 640 n.) the author attributes to Edward the Confessor an oath of this character which he was unable fully to discharge. This story looks like an oblique reference to Henry II, while the ‘tempora regum Danorum’ when ‘sepultum fuit ius in regno’ may well be intended for Stephen's reign. That an apologue is here presented there can hardly be any doubt.Google Scholar

42 Above, pp. 138-139.Google Scholar

43 Epistolae Cantuarienses no. 324. The coronation was on 3 September and the letter was written after the seventeenth when the king confirmed the convent's charters: see Landon, L., Itinerary of Richard I (Pipe Roll Society 1935) 8, 147-148.Google Scholar

44 Epistolae Cantuariences nos. 322, 324. The interview took place at ‘Bruuhelle’ that is Brill, Bucks, presumably late in August; but Richard's precise itinerary at this time is uncertain (cf. Landon, op. cit. 2-3).Google Scholar

45 The relevant paragraph of the directory, as it can be reconstructed from Howden's version, reads: ‘Deinde ductus sit ad altare … Et ipse respondebit se per Dei auxilium omnia supradicta obseruaturum bona fide.’ This interrogation takes place immediately before the crowning (‘Benedict,’ Gesta II 82).Google Scholar

46 Inst. 1.1.1.: the same definition is in Dig. 1.1.10 pr.Google Scholar

47 In a thirteenth-century French translation the definition is rendered: ‘Justice est volentés ferme et pardurable qui rant à chascun sa droiture’ (Les Institutes de Justinien en français, ed. Olivier-Martin, F. [Société d'histoire du droit: Paris 1935] 4).Google Scholar

48 Above, p. 164.Google Scholar

49 The evidence may be summarized thus, the numbers in parenthesis indicating the clauses: Henry I and Stephen (3), Henry II (1 and 4), Henry junior (1 and 3), Richard (1 and 2), John (3 and 4), Henry III (2, 3 and 4).Google Scholar

50 All forms of the Fourth Recension have, after the oath, a rubric beginning: ‘Adiciantur predictis interrogationibus que iusta fuerint.’ The French rendering of this rubric in the second form is particularly striking: ‘Et puis à ceo serra ajustee ceo que la commune voudera ordiner solonc ceo que hom entendera que bien soit’ (Three Coronation Orders 40). Moreover, in a contemporary account of the coronation of Edward II it is noted that nothing was added to the recognized form of oath (BIHR 16.10). If the official account of Richard II's coronation is reliable (Munimenta Gildhallae Londoniensis II 478), the fourth clause of the oath (which is translated from the French into Latin with some help from the liturgical form) departed notably from the oath of 1308. The important deviations are italicized in the following extract: ‘de tenendo et custodiendo leges et consuetudines ecclesie ac de faciendo … eas esse protegendas et ad honorem Dei corroborandas quas vulgus iuste et rationabiliter elegerit …’ Here ecclesie is a mistaken rendering of droitureles, for which there is no equivalent in the liturgical oath. The qualification iuste et rationabiliter is new and important.Google Scholar

51 See above, chapter I note 65.Google Scholar

52 Traditio 6 (1948) 7577.Google Scholar

53 Rotuli Parliamentorum (London, without date) III 417. There is here a reference to chancery rolls for further details, in particular, presumably, to the official account of the coronation, which is entered on a close roll. Although this official account was circulated (BIHR 13 [1936] 133), nevertheless Walsingham (Historia Anglicana I 333) gives a spurious form of oath, apparently based upon a conflation of several sources.Google Scholar

53a The oath introduced into the text of Marlborough's Chronicle in William Camden's Britannia (London 1607) 800 is spurious. This is not in the original manuscript but is a fabrication either by William Howard or more probably by Camden.Google Scholar

54 Revue du moyen âge latin 6 (1950) 115180. I cannot, however, accept David, M.'s interpretation of the texts relative to England (ibid. 202-213).Google Scholar

55 Gesetze der Angelsachsen I 214-215.Google Scholar

56 Florence of Worcester, Chronicon ex chronicis (English Historical Society 1848) I 229.Google Scholar

57 For references see note 2 above.Google Scholar

58 Below, p. 189.Google Scholar

59 Gesetze der Angelsachsen I 636: ‘inspectis et tactis sanctis euangeliis et super sacras et sanctas reliquias.’Google Scholar

60 Below, p. 199, paragraph 14.Google Scholar

61 The rubric reads: ‘sacramento super altare … prestito.’ In the so-called Forma et Modus (see below, pp. 190-197) there is a note: ‘Et memorandum quod rex in prestacione iuramenti sui in coronacione sua [iurabit] super sacramentum altaris super altare positum coram omni populo.’ All the manuscripts are defective (cf. Legg, English Coronation Records 178): but see the English translation in Maskell, Monumenta ritualia II xlvii. In the Anonimalle Chronicle 110 it is said that Richard II was sworn on ‘la croice de Kaunterbury’: the editor identifies this with ‘the cross of St. Edmund’ (ibid. 186), which I have failed to trace. The cross of Canterbury was, in fact, a portable crucifix frequently used in the fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries for administering particularly solemn oaths in parliament (Rotuli Parliamentorum II 131; III 244, 357, 359, 368, 373, 524). The official account states that the king took his corporal oath, which would normally mean that he touched either the consecrated Host or the gospels (cf. Maskell, op. cit. II li-liv).Google Scholar

62 Maskell, op. cit. II xlvii-xlviii.Google Scholar

1 The latest discussion is by Ward, P. L. in Speculum 14 (1939) 174176.Google Scholar

2 The texts are edited by Schramm in ZSS 55 Kan. Abt. 24.309-324, 325-332. The variant of the revised text printed by Hittorp, De divinis … officiis 147-152, follows more closely the order of the primary text. Schramm's views, both as to the date and character of these texts, have been questioned by Marcel David (following Mgr. Andrieu) in Revue du moyen âge latin 6 (1950) 124129. For the present purpose such differences of opinion are immaterial. It is not disputed that the revised version, in some form, was put into circulation in the second half of the tenth century.Google Scholar

3 Cf. also Ward, ut supra 175: but the recension of the type he describes does not seem to have been in circulation in England.Google Scholar

4 The A text is accessible in Legg, English Coronation Records 30-39; the B text in The Pontifical of Magdalen College ed. A. Wilson, H. 89-97.Google Scholar

5 Wilson, op. cit. 273; Ward, ut supra 174.Google Scholar

6 By both Wilson and Ward.Google Scholar

7 Pontifical of Magdalen College 92, 273, 275.Google Scholar

8 Ibid. xxiv, xxx.Google Scholar

9 Legg, , English Coronation Records 34. Three related manuscripts of B omit the prayer at this point, while the fourth retains it. The omission may be accidental. The prayer is repeated in the office for the queen. See Pontifical of Magdalen College 276-277.Google Scholar

10 Above, p. 177.Google Scholar

11 This is characteristic of both A and B texts and can hardly result from a casual omission.Google Scholar

12 The prayer retained is Deus qui solus habes immortalitatem: with Legg, English Coronation Records 37-39 compare Pontifical of Magdalen College 95-96. The text before the compilers of the Fourth Recension differed from either of these: see note 18 to Chapter III above.Google Scholar

13 So Ward ut supra 176.Google Scholar

14 Edited by Wickham Legg, J., Three Coronation Orders (HBS 19; 1900) 5364, 162-173.Google Scholar

15 Schramm in ZSS 54 Kan. Abt. 23.167-169.Google Scholar

16 Above p. 122. This is not an argument advanced by Schramm.Google Scholar

17 Three Coronation Orders 55. That the missing word is gens is indicated by a subsequent anthem at p. 62 beginning Letetur gens anglica. The editor (p. xl) suggests that obliviscor was here treated as a passive verb. The anthem continues: ‘In te enim exaltetur rex qui regat populum Dei anglicanum. Unguatur oleo letitiae et confortetur Dei virtute.’ The last sentence is derived from a continental source, where the anointing formula included the words ‘qui unctus est oleo laetitiae,’ as in the so-called Ordo of Erdmann and the Codex Ratoldi: the texts can be conveniently found in Bouman, C. A., Sacring and Crowning (Groningen 1957) 113, 119, where the formula is compared with that in the Second Recension (Edgar Ordo).Google Scholar

18 Legg, , English Coronation Records 30-39.Google Scholar

19 For variant texts see Bouman, , op. cit. 176-187: none seems nearer the text before the compiler.Google Scholar

20 Printed by Taylor, A., Glory of Regality (London 1820) 395405.Google Scholar

21 Three Coronation Orders 53-64: see note 14 above.Google Scholar

22 ZSS 54 Kan. Abt. 23.221-230.Google Scholar

23 Legg, English Coronation Records 15-23.Google Scholar

24 Claudius A.iii reads clems.Google Scholar

1 Marcel David seems to have been the first to recognize the text for what it is, though he did not appreciate its antiquity (Revue du moyen âge latin 6 [1950] 223). Roger of Howden himself called the text ordo coronationis regis and though he added ‘Ricardi,’ he may be assumed to have preserved the title of his document (‘Benedict of Peterborough,’ Gesta II 80; R. de Hovedene, Chronica III 9).Google Scholar

2 EHR 68 (1953) 574582.Google Scholar

3 ‘Benedict of Peterborough.’ Gesta II 78-83.Google Scholar

4 Ibid. 82. 5 Hovedene, Chronica III 10.Google Scholar

6 Ibid. I 234.Google Scholar

7 Ibid. III 10. Howden had even altered this sentence as it stood in his first draft.Google Scholar

8 If tags were not used, the seams of the garment might need to be rent or cut: see above pp. 140, 143.Google Scholar

9 Above, p. 118.Google Scholar

10 Above, p. 169.Google Scholar

11 Hovedene, , Chronica III 217-218. In 1194, however, they were earls who bore the canopy.Google Scholar

12 Epistolae Cantuarienses 308: above, p. 132.Google Scholar

13 Red Book of the Exchequer II 756.Google Scholar

14 Above, p. 133.Google Scholar

15 If he was in England at the time of the coronation, he must have departed for the Holy Land very soon afterwards (EHR 68 [1953] 578).Google Scholar

16 Gesta II 80-83; Chronica III 9-12.Google Scholar

17 de Wendover, R., Flores Historiarum (ed. Coxe, ) III 5-7; another edition by Hewlett, H. G. (Rolls Series 1886) I 164-166.Google Scholar

18 Chronica III 9-10.Google Scholar

19 Historical Works I 524-525: above, p. 129.Google Scholar

20 For the haste on each occasion see above, p. 132.Google Scholar

21 It is evident that in France, whether for the coronation of Charles V or some previous one, the ring was introduced without a considered revision of the rubrics (Coronation Book of Charles V 34, 83).Google Scholar

22 As regards the oath and the anointing see above pp. 116, 159-161, 175, 181.Google Scholar

23 See the edition by Charles Johnson in Dialogus de Scaccario (London 1950) xlix-lii, 128-135.Google Scholar

24 Materials for the History of Thomas Becket V 280. The true reading of the verb is uncertain; it might be conterendos: no manuscript gives comprimendos. Howden incorporated this letter in his revision (Chronica I 233-235); but there is no reason to suppose that he was aware of it when he was preparing his first version, where the phrase occurs in the directory (Gesta II 82).Google Scholar

25 In either the A or B text: see Legg, , English Coronation Records 34; Pontifical of Magdalen College 92.Google Scholar

26 Hittorp's text reads: ‘clerici solemni apparatu ornati.’ This is an illustration of the wide verbal differences that might be expected between variant versions of the Ordo Romanus. Google Scholar

27 Above, p. 176.Google Scholar

28 Above, pp. 163-165.Google Scholar

29 Florentii Wigornensis Chronicon ex chronicis (English Historical Society 1848) I 229.Google Scholar

30 Above, pp. 176, 185.Google Scholar

31 English Coronation Records 112.Google Scholar

1 Signal Loyalty and Devotion of … Christians towards their Kings (London 1660) pt. 2. 241-249.Google Scholar

2 Printed HBS (1892) vol. II 63-72 and Legg, L. G. W., English Coronation Records 172-182.Google Scholar

3 Where titles are wanting a description is given in English.Google Scholar

4 Madan and Craster, Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library II pt. 1 (Oxford 1922) 335336. Nero C. ix is a miscellaneous volume: that part in which the directory is contained does not seem to have belonged to Westminster Abbey.Google Scholar

5 Legg, , op. cit. 172; Schramm, History of English Coronation 88.Google Scholar

6 Red Book of the Exchequer II 755-760; Legg, op. cit. 58-61.Google Scholar

7 Legg, , op. cit. 172; Schramm, loc. cit. and in Archiv für Urkundenforschung 15 (1931) 369370.Google Scholar

8 He is to provide oil and chrism and to see that the regalia are on the high altar (Legg, op. cit. 93, 99).Google Scholar

9 Legg, , op. cit. 94.Google Scholar

10 BIHR 16.6.Google Scholar

11 Chevalier, , Sacramentaire de Saint-Remy 222-227.Google Scholar

12 E. Schramm, P., Der König von Frankreich (Weimar 1939) I 193, II 93.Google Scholar

13 Above p. 115: for the oath see X. 5.7.13 §3.Google Scholar

14 B and N expand the text so as to imply that all the regalia were kept in the abbey; but these words seem to be derived from the Liber Regalis: see following note.Google Scholar

15 Legg, op. cit. 107: ‘Dicta vero sceptra liberabuntur … abbati Wesmonasterii … ut una cum aliis regalibus in dicto monasterio, prout per bullas papales et regum cartas ac antiqua et semper obseruata consuetudine plenius habetur quod sit locus regie institucionis et coronacionis ac eciam repositorium regalium insignium imperpetuum …’ The latter words are derived from a spurious bull of Nicholas II (JL 4462). For these Westminster forgeries which began in the twelfth century, see above p. 147.Google Scholar

16 Above p. 188.Google Scholar

17 Foedera I i.160; Rotuli Litterarum Clausarum, I 417b. It is clear from the account of the executors of William Marshal that the ‘thesaurus regis Iohannis de Corf’ was the principal repository for precious fabrics, of which the king possessed a large quantity (P.R.O., E. 364/1 mem. 3).Google Scholar

18 Legg, op. cit. 54.Google Scholar

19 Ibid. 55.Google Scholar

20 This has been disputed (W. Lethaby, R., Westminster Abbey Re-examined 127-129); but the evidence seems conclusive (T. Tout, F., Chapters in Medieval Administrative History II [Manchester 1937] 52-58; Westlake, H. F., Westminster Abbey 430-446).Google Scholar

21 Cole, Henry, Documents Illustrative of English History … (London 1844) 277.Google Scholar

22 Lethaby, op. cit. 127.Google Scholar

23 Tout, op. cit. 55. A contemporary writes to much the same effect: but the position of the monks was ambiguous — they were ‘tanquam custodes’ (W. Rishanger, Chronica et Annales [Rolls Series 1865] 420).Google Scholar

24 Cole, loc. cit. Google Scholar

25 Three Coronation Orders 121-124: the text as printed is corrupt. The French descriptions of the garments are as follows: ‘un tynycle de samit q'est de la eglise de Westmoustier; la cote saint Edward qi demurt à Westmoustier; le cole de la tresorie de Westmoustier; le mantiel doré q'est de la tresorie de Westmoustier.’ The garments as a whole are ‘les ornamentz reaux de saint Edward.’ It is possible that the cowl (more usually stole) and the pall, which certainly was fashioned like a cope, actually came, as stated, from the treasury of the abbey and were in origin ecclesiastical vestments. Apparently the garments had been returned to the abbey after the coronation of 1308 (note 36 below).Google Scholar

26 Legg, , op. cit. 79-80.Google Scholar

27 Higden, R., Polychronicon (Rolls Series 1886) IX 45, 77-78. The king of Armenia was Léon of Lusignan, who died at Paris in 1393. This continuation of the Polychronicon is a contemporary narrative by a Westminster monk: see Robinson, J. A., ‘An unrecognised Westminster chronicler,’ Proc. Brit. Acad. 3 (1907-1908) 61-92.Google Scholar

28 Polychronicon IX 222.Google Scholar

29 Proc. Brit. Acad. ut supra 71-72.Google Scholar

30 Legg, , op. cit. 191-192. The inventory which gives us this information does not include the vessel, in the form of an eagle, containing unguent, which was apparently in the king's Jewel House; see the order of 6 November 1429 in Foedera X (1710) 436. This, however, was a recent invention (Legg, op. cit. xxxvii).Google Scholar

31 Lethaby, , op. cit. 85, 98: for architectural details see Historical Monuments Commission. Inventory of … London, I, Westminster Abbey (London 1924) 79b-81a.Google Scholar

32 Ibid. 28b. The body of the Confessor was translated on 13 October 1269 (Annales Monastici IV 226-229).Google Scholar

33 ‘Benedict of Peterborough,’ Gesta II 84; Wendover, Flores Historiarum III 140; ibid. IV 2.Google Scholar

34 Foedera I i.497.Google Scholar

35 Chevalier, , Sacramentaire 225.Google Scholar

36 Foedera I ii.509.Google Scholar

37 BIHR 16 (1939) 6, 10. Note that in the record of the coronation there printed it is stated that ‘totus apparatus in quo [rex] coronatus erat’ was returned to the abbey church to which it belonged — ‘cuius erat.’Google Scholar

38 Above, p. 147.Google Scholar

39 Complete Peerage (London 1945) 12 app. 57-63.Google Scholar

40 For this see BIHR 16 (1939) 25; Speculum 24.59 note.Google Scholar

41 For the texts see above p. 179. The note is printed by Legg, English Coronation Records 179, and Prynne, Signal Loyalty 2.249.Google Scholar

42 Legg, , op. cit. 81-82, 85.Google Scholar

43 For the abstract see Legg, , op. cit. 180-181; Prynne, op. cit. 248-249. The rubrics are scattered throughout the text (Legg, op. cit. 83-108).Google Scholar

44 B inserts per medium ciuitatis Londoniarum: L has similar reading. (From this and other parallels it would seem that the exemplar behind B and N had been modified in the light of the rubrics in L.)Google Scholar

45 B: communitate ciuitatis predicte.Google Scholar

46 B: cum proceribus et aliis.Google Scholar

47 PB insert et sedes.Google Scholar

48 B: serice facte et aperte.Google Scholar

49 B: annexis casulis.Google Scholar

50 B inserts In qua processione erunt archiepiscopi, episcopi et alii prelati. L: ordinetur in ecclesia per archiepiscopos, episcopos, abbatem et conuentum Westmonasterii processio.Google Scholar

51 P: ambulabunt.Google Scholar

52 BNP: crux.Google Scholar

53 BN insert regis de ecclesia Westmonasterii.Google Scholar

54 BN insert de palacio.Google Scholar

55 BN omit in processione.Google Scholar

56 This paragraph appears to be defective. The chalice and paten would not be carried by laymen, and in L the rubrics direct that they should be carried by bishops. In paragraph 32 there is a reference to predictos gladios, but no mention is made here of the swords of state. L, however, at the point where it is based upon this paragraph has a rubric: ‘Deinde sequuntur tres comites gladios gestantes induti serico.’Google Scholar

57_57 P omits supradictam … Westmonasterii.Google Scholar

58 BN insert esse paratus: not in L.Google Scholar

59 BN add vel alius eum coronaturus.Google Scholar

60 P: Domine sanctum etc. BN: Deus fidelium etc.Google Scholar

61 BN: altari predicto.Google Scholar

62 P omits donec and continues super letania et lectio.Google Scholar

63_63 N omits in modum … in capite.Google Scholar

64 P inserts qui postea debent comburi: BN insert postea debent comburi. (A marginal gloss has been transferred to the text.)Google Scholar

65 BNL: gerente.Google Scholar

66 BNL: sandariis.67_67 BN omit. Cf. Reims: Porro in accinctione gladii, in unctione, in dacione sceptri et virge, in imposicione corone … archiepiscopus dicit oraciones que suis in locis in ordinario continentur.Google Scholar

68 BNL: sandariis.Google Scholar

69 Cf. Reims: et incontinenter dare seneschallo … ad portandum ante se.Google Scholar

70 (The text as it exists provides for the coronation of king and queen. References to the queen are here omitted, since they formed no part of the primitive text: the passages enclosed in brackets are conjecturally restored).Google Scholar

71 Reims: descendunt rex et regina de soliis suis et accedentes humiliter ad altare percipiunt …Google Scholar

72 BNP insert scilicet comes Oxonie. (A later gloss.)Google Scholar

73 Reims: coronas de capitibus eorum quibus …Google Scholar

74 Reims: Capitibus eorum modicas coronas et sic vadunt …Google Scholar

75_75 P. omits quam … suum.Google Scholar

76 BN insert rex reuertetur ad palacium. (A side note incorporated in the text.)Google Scholar

77 (If these swords had been previously mentioned, it would have been in paragraph 8.)Google Scholar

78 BN insert ac dictis baronibus de quinque portubus pannum cum hastis super caput regis portantibus … There is nothing corresponding in L.Google Scholar

79 BN cameram.Google Scholar

80 BN insert predicta Westmonasterii ad custodiendum cum aliis regalibus. L has similar words. Google Scholar