By Alexandra Petri
Everything I read about the monarchy in Britain bewilders me and fills me with confusion. I keep seeing headlines like “King Not Greeted With Expected Lamprey Pie (He Would Find It Distasteful to Be Presented With Lampreys Under the Circumstances),” and I have to ask the people around me if I am in fact awake. I recently read an article explaining that King Charles is the monarch of all the whales, porpoises and other cetaceans, and I will be haunted by this information for the rest of my life.
So here is what I have pieced together about the coronation, based on this long, fugue-like parade of information.
The procession begins at Buckingham Palace at what is really 5:20 a.m. but the British claim is 10:20 in the morning (one of many British idiosyncrasies highlighted in the ceremony). The ornate carriage is drawn by horses. For a carriage drawn by horses it looks pretty good, like a real carriage! Those horses must be talented! After they have drawn it, the horses also pull it to Westminster Abbey, where England stores many of its greatest poets and also Rudyard Kipling.
There, the king will get to sit in something called the Coronation Chair, which resides in a little jail in Westminster Abbey the rest of the time, contemplating its crimes. It is famously flaky and fragile (it sounds as if whoever described this chair to the newspapers was mad at it) but has been restored so that it can hold both the king and, if something surprising happens, his important coronation rock, the Stone of Scone, a.k.a. Destiny.
This rock, like all the large rocks used in the ceremony, belongs somewhere else but was taken confidently by British people many centuries ago. It is supposed to be in Scotland now, but someone brought it back so it could participate in this ceremony. Reportedly the stone groans when a true monarch kneels on it but is silent when faced with a pretender. In my frantic Googling, I have not found any documented instances when the stone actually did groan, but maybe it groans quietly, so that only the king can hear.
Other lore claims that this stone is the same one that Jacob from the Bible used for a pillow when he was having all those dreams. I always thought that Jacob used the stone because he could not find a pillow, so I am confused as to why we are still using the stone. We have pillows now. The king has lots of them! I say, just use a regular pillow.
The ceremony of the coronation includes several parts. This coronation is supposed to be a more relaxed, casual one, so everyone involved will be wearing only up to three ostrich plumes and only their tiniest, most businesslike ermines. The king will be recognized (they will say, “That’s Charles!”), and then once he has been recognized, they will hand him the coronation Bible to take the coronation oath, in which he will vow to exercise Justice with Mercy. (These are two corgis who always like to be walked together.)
Then he will sit on the chair next to a screen while oil is dripped on him from a spoon. This is often how I spend my Friday nights, but in his case, it is a sacred ritual. What makes his situation different from mine is that the Archbishop of Canterbury is the one dripping oil on him, whereas I usually drip it myself, or have my 14-month-old drip it.
Then, as a special, almost democratic gesture, instead of just the peers being given the opportunity to pay homage to the king, everyone will be given the opportunity to pay homage to the king! This is known as the “homage of the people,” one of many wonderful opportunities given to people under a modern monarchy.
You don’t have to be the inheritor of large tracts of land, peerages and titles to pledge loyalty to your liege lord! Now anyone, no matter how humble their origins, can pay homage to a sovereign! (These are the kind of wonderful opportunities that we in America unwisely fought a whole revolution to avoid.) Other updates include the participation of other faiths and female bishops — just showing that anyone, if you work hard and believe in yourself, can glorify a monarch!
At this point I somewhat lose track of what is happening. I think next the king parachutes out of a helicopter in the arms of James Bond. This also doubles as the announcement of the next Bond, if he and the king have a successful jump. If the jump is lackluster, this is a bad sign for the reign and traditionally portends another three years of Boris Johnson. And Daniel Craig will be forced to resume the role of Bond until his death or the end of the monarchy, whichever comes first.
Finally, in order to be appointed Defender of the Faith, the king has to fight a bishop, possibly along with a rook and an enemy queen. This should be easy because the king is accompanied by so many knights, but, alas, they can move only in an odd L-shaped pattern. The whole situation is complicated by the fact that, once crowned, the king will be able to move only one square at a time. (Fortunately, England is full of squares.)
Please do not tell me if I am wrong about any of this; I have already explained it to the whales.
Everything I read about the monarchy in Britain bewilders me and fills me with confusion. I keep seeing headlines like “King Not Greeted With Expected Lamprey Pie (He Would Find It Distasteful to Be Presented With Lampreys Under the Circumstances),” and I have to ask the people around me if I am in fact awake. I recently read an article explaining that King Charles is the monarch of all the whales, porpoises and other cetaceans, and I will be haunted by this information for the rest of my life.
So here is what I have pieced together about the coronation, based on this long, fugue-like parade of information.
The procession begins at Buckingham Palace at what is really 5:20 a.m. but the British claim is 10:20 in the morning (one of many British idiosyncrasies highlighted in the ceremony). The ornate carriage is drawn by horses. For a carriage drawn by horses it looks pretty good, like a real carriage! Those horses must be talented! After they have drawn it, the horses also pull it to Westminster Abbey, where England stores many of its greatest poets and also Rudyard Kipling.
There, the king will get to sit in something called the Coronation Chair, which resides in a little jail in Westminster Abbey the rest of the time, contemplating its crimes. It is famously flaky and fragile (it sounds as if whoever described this chair to the newspapers was mad at it) but has been restored so that it can hold both the king and, if something surprising happens, his important coronation rock, the Stone of Scone, a.k.a. Destiny.
This rock, like all the large rocks used in the ceremony, belongs somewhere else but was taken confidently by British people many centuries ago. It is supposed to be in Scotland now, but someone brought it back so it could participate in this ceremony. Reportedly the stone groans when a true monarch kneels on it but is silent when faced with a pretender. In my frantic Googling, I have not found any documented instances when the stone actually did groan, but maybe it groans quietly, so that only the king can hear.
Other lore claims that this stone is the same one that Jacob from the Bible used for a pillow when he was having all those dreams. I always thought that Jacob used the stone because he could not find a pillow, so I am confused as to why we are still using the stone. We have pillows now. The king has lots of them! I say, just use a regular pillow.
The ceremony of the coronation includes several parts. This coronation is supposed to be a more relaxed, casual one, so everyone involved will be wearing only up to three ostrich plumes and only their tiniest, most businesslike ermines. The king will be recognized (they will say, “That’s Charles!”), and then once he has been recognized, they will hand him the coronation Bible to take the coronation oath, in which he will vow to exercise Justice with Mercy. (These are two corgis who always like to be walked together.)
Then he will sit on the chair next to a screen while oil is dripped on him from a spoon. This is often how I spend my Friday nights, but in his case, it is a sacred ritual. What makes his situation different from mine is that the Archbishop of Canterbury is the one dripping oil on him, whereas I usually drip it myself, or have my 14-month-old drip it.
Then, as a special, almost democratic gesture, instead of just the peers being given the opportunity to pay homage to the king, everyone will be given the opportunity to pay homage to the king! This is known as the “homage of the people,” one of many wonderful opportunities given to people under a modern monarchy.
You don’t have to be the inheritor of large tracts of land, peerages and titles to pledge loyalty to your liege lord! Now anyone, no matter how humble their origins, can pay homage to a sovereign! (These are the kind of wonderful opportunities that we in America unwisely fought a whole revolution to avoid.) Other updates include the participation of other faiths and female bishops — just showing that anyone, if you work hard and believe in yourself, can glorify a monarch!
At this point I somewhat lose track of what is happening. I think next the king parachutes out of a helicopter in the arms of James Bond. This also doubles as the announcement of the next Bond, if he and the king have a successful jump. If the jump is lackluster, this is a bad sign for the reign and traditionally portends another three years of Boris Johnson. And Daniel Craig will be forced to resume the role of Bond until his death or the end of the monarchy, whichever comes first.
Finally, in order to be appointed Defender of the Faith, the king has to fight a bishop, possibly along with a rook and an enemy queen. This should be easy because the king is accompanied by so many knights, but, alas, they can move only in an odd L-shaped pattern. The whole situation is complicated by the fact that, once crowned, the king will be able to move only one square at a time. (Fortunately, England is full of squares.)
Please do not tell me if I am wrong about any of this; I have already explained it to the whales.
