Crown of Saint Edward (Heraldry).svg
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St Edward's Crown is the centrepiece of the Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom. Named after Saint
Edward the Confessor Edward the Confessor ; la, Eduardus Confessor , ; ( 1003 – 5 January 1066) was one of the last Anglo-Saxon English kings. Usually considered the last king of the House of Wessex, he ruled from 1042 to 1066. Edward was the son of Æth ...
, versions of it have traditionally been used to crown English and British monarchs at their coronations since the 13th century. The original crown was a holy relic kept at Westminster Abbey, Edward's burial place, until the regalia were either sold or melted down when Parliament abolished the monarchy in 1649, during the English Civil War. The current St Edward's Crown was made for Charles II in 1661. It is solid gold, tall, weighs , and is decorated with 444 precious and semi-precious stones. The crown is similar in weight and overall appearance to the original, but its arches are
Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...
. After 1689, it was not used to crown any monarch for over 200 years. In 1911, the tradition was revived by
George V George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until his death in 1936. Born during the reign of his grandmother Quee ...
and has continued ever since. In 1953, Elizabeth II opted for a stylised image of this crown to be used on coats of arms and other insignia in
Commonwealth realm A Commonwealth realm is a sovereign state in the Commonwealth of Nations whose monarch and head of state is shared among the other realms. Each realm functions as an independent state, equal with the other realms and nations of the Commonwealt ...
s to symbolise her royal authority. St Edward's Crown is normally on public display in the Jewel House at the Tower of London. In December 2022 it was removed for remodelling prior to the
Coronation of Charles III The coronation of Charles III and his wife, Camilla, as King and Queen of the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms will take place on Saturday, 6 May 2023, at Westminster Abbey. King Charles III acceded to the throne on 8 Septemb ...
on 6 May 2023.


Description

St Edward's Crown is 22-carat gold, with a circumference of , measures tall, and weighs . It has four
fleurs-de-lis The fleur-de-lis, also spelled fleur-de-lys (plural ''fleurs-de-lis'' or ''fleurs-de-lys''), is a lily (in French, and mean 'flower' and 'lily' respectively) that is used as a decorative design or symbol. The fleur-de-lis has been used in the ...
alternating with four crosses pattée, which support two dipped arches topped by a
monde A ''monde'', meaning 'world' in French, is an orb located near the top of a crown. It represents, as the name suggests, the world that the monarch rules. It is the point at which a crown's half arches meet. It is usually topped off either w ...
and cross pattée. Its purple velvet cap is trimmed with ermine. The crown features 444 precious and semi-precious stones, including 345 rose-cut aquamarines, 37 white
topaz Topaz is a silicate mineral of aluminium and fluorine with the chemical formula Al Si O( F, OH). It is used as a gemstone in jewelry and other adornments. Common topaz in its natural state is colorless, though trace element impurities can mak ...
es, 27 tourmalines, 12 rubies, 7
amethyst Amethyst is a violet variety of quartz. The name comes from the Koine Greek αμέθυστος ''amethystos'' from α- ''a-'', "not" and μεθύσκω (Ancient Greek) / μεθώ (Modern Greek), "intoxicate", a reference to the belief that t ...
s, 6 sapphires, 2 jargoons, 1 garnet, 1
spinel Spinel () is the magnesium/aluminium member of the larger spinel group of minerals. It has the formula in the cubic crystal system. Its name comes from the Latin word , which means ''spine'' in reference to its pointed crystals. Properties S ...
and 1 carbuncle.


Usage

Although it is regarded as the official coronation crown, only six monarchs have been crowned with St Edward's Crown since the Restoration: Charles II (1661),
James II James II may refer to: * James II of Avesnes (died c. 1205), knight of the Fourth Crusade * James II of Majorca (died 1311), Lord of Montpellier * James II of Aragon (1267–1327), King of Sicily * James II, Count of La Marche (1370–1438), King C ...
(1685),
William III William III or William the Third may refer to: Kings * William III of Sicily (c. 1186–c. 1198) * William III of England and Ireland or William III of Orange or William II of Scotland (1650–1702) * William III of the Netherlands and Luxembourg ...
(1689), George V (1911),
George VI George VI (Albert Frederick Arthur George; 14 December 1895 – 6 February 1952) was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 until his death in 1952. He was also the last Emperor of Ind ...
(1937) and
Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until her death in 2022. She was queen regnant of 32 sovereign states during ...
(1953). Mary II and Anne were crowned with small diamond crowns of their own; George I, George II,
George III George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until his death in 1820. Both kingdoms were in a personal union under him until the Acts of Union 1800 merged them ...
and William IV with the State Crown of George I; George IV with a large new diamond crown made specially for the occasion; and Queen Victoria and Edward VII chose not to use St Edward's Crown because of its weight and instead used the lighter 1838 Imperial State Crown. When not used to crown the monarch, St Edward's Crown rested on the high altar; however, it did not feature at all in Queen Victoria's coronation.


In heraldry

St Edward's Crown is widely used as a heraldic emblem of the United Kingdom, being incorporated into a multitude of emblems and insignia. As the United Kingdom is a constitutional monarchy with responsible government, the crown can also symbolise "the sovereignty (or authority) of the monarch." During the reign of Elizabeth II it was found on, amongst others, the Royal Cypher; the
Royal Arms of the United Kingdom The royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom, or the royal arms for short, is the arms of dominion of the British monarch, currently King Charles III. These arms are used by the King in his official capacity as monarch of the United Kingdom. Varia ...
; the Royal Badges of England; and the badges of the police forces of England and Wales,
NHS ambulance services National Health Service ambulance services provide free at the point of use emergency medical care to any person requiring treatment, regardless of immigration or visitor status, within the United Kingdom. These services are provided by National H ...
, His Majesty's Coastguard, the British Army, the
Royal Marines The Corps of Royal Marines (RM), also known as the Royal Marines Commandos, are the UK's special operations capable commando force, amphibious light infantry and also one of the five fighting arms of the Royal Navy. The Corps of Royal Marine ...
, the Royal Air Force and HM Revenue and Customs. It also formed the logo of
Royal Mail , kw, Postya Riel, ga, An Post Ríoga , logo = Royal Mail.svg , logo_size = 250px , type = Public limited company , traded_as = , foundation = , founder = Henry VIII , location = London, England, UK , key_people = * Keith Williams ...
, the United Kingdom's postal service. (In Scotland, the Crown of Scotland may appear in place of St Edward's Crown). Following the death of Queen Elizabeth II, the design of King Charles III's royal cypher was announced in September 2022, which featured the Tudor Crown rather than the St Edward’s Crown. According to the College of Arms, it is envisioned that the Tudor Crown will now be used in representations of the Royal Arms, badges and military uniforms.


History


Origin

Edward the Confessor Edward the Confessor ; la, Eduardus Confessor , ; ( 1003 – 5 January 1066) was one of the last Anglo-Saxon English kings. Usually considered the last king of the House of Wessex, he ruled from 1042 to 1066. Edward was the son of Æth ...
wore his crown at Easter, Whitsun, and Christmas. In 1161, he was made a saint, and objects connected with his reign became
holy relics In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains of a saint or the personal effects of the saint or venerated person preserved for purposes of veneration as a tangi ...
. The monks at his burial place of Westminster Abbey claimed that Edward had asked them to look after his regalia in perpetuity for the coronations of all future English kings.Keay, pp. 18–20. Although the claim is likely to have been an exercise in self-promotion on the abbey's part, and some of the regalia probably had been taken from Edward's grave when he was reinterred there, it became accepted as fact, thereby establishing the first known set of hereditary coronation regalia in Europe. A crown referred to as St Edward's Crown is first recorded as having been used for the coronation of Henry III in 1220, and it appears to be the same crown worn by Edward.
Ronald Lightbown Ronald Lightbown (1932–2021) was a noted British art historian and curator, specializing in Renaissance art. He wrote large monographs on the painters Sandro Botticelli and Carlo Crivelli. After a degree from the University of Cambridge, between ...
in Blair, vol. 1. pp. 257–353.


Holy relic

An early description of the crown is "King Alfred's Crown of gold wire-work set with slight stones and two little bells", weighing and valued at £248 in total. It was sometimes called King Alfred's Crown because of an inscription on the lid of its box, which, translated from Latin, read: "This is the chief crown of the two, with which were crowned Kings Alfred, Edward and others". However, there is no evidence to support the belief that it dated from Alfred's time, and in the coronation order it always has been referred to as St Edward's Crown. St Edward's Crown rarely left Westminster Abbey, but when
Richard II Richard II (6 January 1367 – ), also known as Richard of Bordeaux, was King of England from 1377 until he was deposed in 1399. He was the son of Edward the Black Prince, Prince of Wales, and Joan, Countess of Kent. Richard's father d ...
was forced to abdicate in 1399, he had the crown brought to the Tower of London, where he symbolically handed it to Henry IV, saying "I present and give to you this crown with which I was crowned King of England and all the rights dependent on it". It was used in 1533 to crown the second wife of Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn, which was unprecedented for a queen consort. In the Tudor period, three crowns were placed on the heads of monarchs at a coronation: St Edward's Crown, the
state crown A state crown is the working crown worn or used by a monarch on recurring state occasions such as when opening Parliament in Britain, as opposed to the coronation crown with which they would be formally crowned. Some state crowns might however b ...
, and a "rich crown" made specially for the king or queen. After the
English Reformation The English Reformation took place in 16th-century England when the Church of England broke away from the authority of the pope and the Catholic Church. These events were part of the wider European Protestant Reformation, a religious and poli ...
, the new Church of England denounced the veneration of medieval relics and, starting with the coronation of Edward VI in 1547, the significance of St Edward's Crown as a holy relic was played down in the ceremony.Ronald Lightbown in MacGregor, p. 257. During the English Civil War, Parliament sold the medieval St Edward's Crown, regarded by Oliver Cromwell as symbolic of the "detestable rule of kings".


Restoration

The monarchy was restored in 1660 and in preparation for the coronation of Charles II, who had been living in exile abroad, a new St Edward's Crown was supplied by the Royal Goldsmith, Sir Robert Vyner. It was fashioned to closely resemble the medieval crown, with a heavy gold base and clusters of semi-precious stones, but the arches are decidedly
Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...
. In the late 20th century, it was assumed to incorporate gold from the original St Edward's Crown, as they are almost identical in weight, and no invoice was produced for the materials in 1661. A crown was also displayed at the lying in state of Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England from 1653 until 1658. On the weight of this evidence, writer and historian Martin Holmes, in a 1959 paper for '' Archaeologia'', concluded that in the time of the
Interregnum An interregnum (plural interregna or interregnums) is a period of discontinuity or "gap" in a government, organization, or social order. Archetypally, it was the period of time between the reign of one monarch and the next (coming from Latin '' ...
St Edward's Crown was saved from the melting pot and that its gold was used to make a new crown at the Restoration.Barclay, pp. 149–170. His theory became accepted wisdom, and many books, including official guidebooks for the Crown Jewels at the Tower of London, repeated his claim as fact. In 2008, new research found that a
coronation crown A coronation crown is a crown used by a monarch when being crowned. In some monarchies, monarchs have or had a number of crowns for different occasions, such as a coronation crown for the moment of coronation and a ''state crown'' for general u ...
and sceptre were made in 1660 in anticipation of an early coronation, which had to be delayed several times. His other regalia were commissioned in 1661 after Parliament increased the budget as a token of their appreciation for the king. The crown at Cromwell's lying in state was probably made of gilded base metal such as tin or copper, as was usual in 17th-century England; for example, a crown displayed at the funeral of James VI and I had cost only £5 and was decorated with fake jewels. In 1671, Thomas Blood briefly stole the crown from the Tower of London, flattening it with a mallet in an attempt to conceal it. A new
monde A ''monde'', meaning 'world' in French, is an orb located near the top of a crown. It represents, as the name suggests, the world that the monarch rules. It is the point at which a crown's half arches meet. It is usually topped off either w ...
was created for the coronation of
James II James II may refer to: * James II of Avesnes (died c. 1205), knight of the Fourth Crusade * James II of Majorca (died 1311), Lord of Montpellier * James II of Aragon (1267–1327), King of Sicily * James II, Count of La Marche (1370–1438), King C ...
, and for
William III William III or William the Third may refer to: Kings * William III of Sicily (c. 1186–c. 1198) * William III of England and Ireland or William III of Orange or William II of Scotland (1650–1702) * William III of the Netherlands and Luxembourg ...
the base was changed from a circle to an oval. After the coronation of William III in 1689, monarchs chose to be crowned with a lighter, bespoke
coronation crown A coronation crown is a crown used by a monarch when being crowned. In some monarchies, monarchs have or had a number of crowns for different occasions, such as a coronation crown for the moment of coronation and a ''state crown'' for general u ...
(e.g., the Coronation Crown of George IV) or their state crown, while St Edward's Crown usually rested on the high altar.


20th to 21st century

Edward VII intended to revive the tradition of being crowned with St Edward's Crown in 1902, but on coronation day he was still recovering from an operation for appendicitis, and instead he wore the lighter Imperial State Crown.Rose, p. 35. Jewels were hired for use in the crown and removed after the coronation until 1911, when it was permanently set with 444 precious and semi-precious stones. Imitation pearls on the arches and base were replaced with gold beads which at the time were platinum-plated.Rose, p. 29. Its band was also made smaller to fit George V, the first monarch to be crowned with St Edward's Crown in over 200 years, reducing the crown's overall weight from to . It was used to crown his successor George VI in 1937, and Queen Elizabeth II in 1953, who adopted a stylised image of the crown for use on coats of arms, badges, logos and various other insignia in the
Commonwealth realm A Commonwealth realm is a sovereign state in the Commonwealth of Nations whose monarch and head of state is shared among the other realms. Each realm functions as an independent state, equal with the other realms and nations of the Commonwealt ...
s to symbolise her royal authority. In these contexts, it replaced the Tudor Crown, which had been instated by Edward VII in 1901. Use of the crown's image in this way is by permission of the monarch. On 4 June 2013, St Edward's Crown was displayed on the high altar in Westminster Abbey at a service marking the 60th anniversary of
Elizabeth II's coronation The coronation of Elizabeth II took place on 2 June 1953 at Westminster Abbey in London. She acceded to the throne at the age of 25 upon the death of her father, George VI, on 6 February 1952, being proclaimed queen by her privy and executive ...
, the first time it had left the Jewel House at the Tower of London since 1953. In December 2022 the crown was removed from the Tower of London to be resized ahead of the
Coronation of Charles III and Camilla The coronation of Charles III and his wife, Camilla, as King and Queen of the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms will take place on Saturday, 6 May 2023, at Westminster Abbey. King Charles III acceded to the throne on 8 Septembe ...
on 6 May 2023.


See also

*
Coronation crown A coronation crown is a crown used by a monarch when being crowned. In some monarchies, monarchs have or had a number of crowns for different occasions, such as a coronation crown for the moment of coronation and a ''state crown'' for general u ...
*
Canadian royal symbols Canadian royal symbols are the visual and auditory identifiers of the Canadian monarchy, including the viceroys, in the country's federal and provincial jurisdictions. These may specifically distinguish organizations that derive their authority fr ...


References


Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * *


External links

*
The Crown Jewels
at the royal family website {{Canadian royal symbols Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom Individual crowns Crowns in heraldry National symbols of the United Kingdom National symbols of Canada 1661 works Edward the Confessor Charles II of England