Coronation of the British monarch

The Coronation of the British monarch is a ceremony (specifically, initiation rite) in which the monarch of the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth Realms is formally crowned and invested with regalia. The coronation usually takes place several months after the death of the previous monarch, for the coronation is considered a joyous occasion that would be inappropriate when mourning still continues. (It also gives planners enough time to complete the elaborate arrangements required for great State ceremony.) For example, Elizabeth II was crowned on June 2, 1953, despite having acceded to the throne on February 6, 1952, the day of her father's death.

Notes

:1. At George IV's coronation, however, the Barons bore the canopy behind the King rather than over him; various accounts explain the irregularity. Henry Rivington Hill writes, "His Majesty's reason for walking before the canopy appears to have been that the people at the top of the houses might be able to see him, as he frequently looked up almost perpendicularly." One anonymous account suggests, "At first all seems to have gone well, but on returning to Westminster Hall, the elderly bearers began to tire at their task, causing the canopy to sway from side to side. The King feeling nervous that it would descend on his head, thought it safer to walk slightly in front of it. This however, did not suit the stout hearts, though weak bodies, of the Barons, whose privilege and duty it was to bear the canopy exactly over the King, so they hastened their steps, the canopy swaying more and more with the increased pace. The King now became genuinely alarmed, and though of portly habits quickened his pace, and, as the canopy surged after him, at last broke into a somewhat unseemly jog trot, and in this manner they all arrived at Westminster Hall."

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:2. According to one popular legend associated with the anointing, the Virgin Mary miraculously appeared before St. Thomas à Becket and gave him a vessel of holy oil to be used for anointing. The myth was most likely invented to rival a similar French legend that the Holy Spirit descended from Heaven, bringing a vessel containing anointing oil for a coronation.

Related Topics:
Virgin Mary - St. Thomas à Becket - Oil

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:3. George IV was estranged from his wife, Queen Caroline, at the time of his coronation. He not only refused to allow her to be crowned at the ceremony, but also excluded her from the entire coronation itself.

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