At a time when it was a king’s duty to lead men into battle, resist evil, defend the good, execute justice and dispense mercy, the ritual of coronation sought to equip him with the necessary spiritual and symbolic temporal tools for the job.
The job spec may have changed since William the Conqueror. But as King Charles III, alongside the queen, became the 40th sovereign to be crowned at Westminster Abbey, such kingly and chivalrous virtues were still solemnly invoked.
Almost every syllable bore the weight of history in this five-act drama with a script more medieval morality play than 21st century.
The “recognition” before a 2,300-strong congregation of foreign royals, heads of state, former prime ministers, and charity and community representatives, saw him presented four times as “your undoubted king” to the compass points of the raised coronation theatre with no murmur of dissent.
The oath, upon which the Anglican church keeps its unyielding grip, heard him swear to maintain the Protestant faith and govern according to laws and customs.
In numerous costume changes, he was swathed in regal hand-me-downs for his investiture and crowning; the rich shimmering brocades having taxed the eyesight and calloused the fingers of embroiderers for more than 200 years.
Then, freighted with ensigns and relics of majesty – such as the Sceptre with Cross, Sceptre with Dove, and Saint Edward’s Crown, instilling kingly justice, equity and mercy among other desirable attributes – there was the Enthroning, and the Saxon cry of: “Stand firm, and hold fast.”
The grandeur, the colourful historic pageantry, the passing back and forth of priceless paraphernalia, was a dazzling visual feast.
All the sartorial splendour that could be mustered was on display. Senior royals were draped in mantles, cloaks and sashes, festooned with orders and decorations.
Quite how many subjects accepted the archbishop of Canterbury’s invitation to pledge lusty allegiance to “your majesty, and to your heirs and successors” in front of their television sets is unknown. Nevertheless, there was a reassuringly rousing chorus inside the abbey, topped off with “God save King Charles. Long live King Charles” and the optimistic: “May the king live for ever.”
But coronations are, first and foremost, a rite of passage with religion at the very core. And so for this king, devout in his faith, the anointing marked the most sacred and personal act.
Other European monarchies long dispensed with coronations, replacing simple oaths for ceremonials suggesting divine sanction of their head of state. Not so the UK, even if the origins of some of today’s rituals were, as Elizabeth II said in her coronation address, “veiled in the mists of the past”.
The king, sitting on the ancient coronation chair before his God, the religious act of setting him apart from others, is the whole point, lost as it may be on some of his increasingly secular subjects.
A divine moment requires a sublime soundtrack, and George Frideric Handel had provided an enduring one in 1727 for George II. The spine-tingling soprano strains of Zadok the Priest soared into the Gothic vaulted ceiling of the abbey, as they have at every coronation since. The king, shielded from view behind a screen, was anointed with chrism on his hands, head and breast.
Only one Prince of the Blood – the Prince of Wales – knelt in homage to declare himself “liege man of life and limb”. His brother, the Duke of Sussex, in suit with medals, was sidelined to the third row, with the minor royals.
The Duke of York was in full Order of the Garter. A wide-eyed Prince George, aged just nine but for whom this fate also awaits, did a masterful job as a page of honour, helping steer his grandfather’s long velvet train through the abbey.
With the Saint Edward’s Crown successfully placed on the royal head, the abbey erupted in a trumpet fanfare. Outside there were pealing bells and gun salutes.
As the king moved to his throne, and the acclamations of “God save the king” abated, it was time for Queen Camilla to take centre stage in an ivory, silver and gold palette Bruce Oldfield dress.
Her crowning with the Queen Mary’s Crown looked a little precarious at first as she appeared to nervously brush hair away from her eyes. On smaller scale it was no less significant. After the couple’s relationship history, seeing her crowned and enthroned seemed almost unbelievable.
The props would always have to do some heavy lifting to imbue the Disney magic achieved 70 years ago by a young, beautiful queen who was an unknown quantity in a coronation that punctured postwar gloom and has been described as a “last imperial hurrah”.
Her 74-year-old successor, the oldest British king to be crowned, is very much a known, with his number of realms in danger of diminishing fast.
But those props were magnificent: swords of justice and mercy, rods, crowns, spurs, rings, bracelets. There were deep purple and crimson velvet robes of state and of estate. All was presented and worn in strict order laid out in the 14th-century Liber Regalis, the coronation instruction manual.
An exquisite supporting cast, including the fantastically named Pursuivants of Arms – Rouge Dragon, Unicorn, Carrick, Rouge Croix, Portcullis, Bluemantle – in gold, crimson, blue and black heraldic tunics, transported us to another era.
The modern alchemy in this service was, in its deft weaving of elements reflecting societal change over seven decades – inclusivity, diversity, multi faith, youth – infused with a smattering of Welsh, Scots Gaelic and Irish Gaelic, the Ascension choir, and even a Byzantine chant.
As the archbishop of Canterbury said in his sermon addressing those present: “You work with charities and organisations, you build community, you serve the nation in Armed Forces, in emergency services, and so many other ways.”
He added: “You live your lives for the sake of others.”
Once crowned and consecrated, and having taken communion, it was time for another quick costume change for the leading man and lady, with the king swapping to the imperial state crown for the procession out of the abbey.
Then it was exeunt Charles and Camilla: great west door. Their curtain call would be on the Buckingham Palace balcony.
