Game of thrones

With only a week to go before the long-awaited (by him at least) coronation of King Charles III at Westminster Abbey, anticipation is at fever pitch. Well, you could be forgiven for thinking so anyway based on all the press and media coverage it's getting. Public opinion polling, on the other hand, reveals a rather different picture.

While 46% of Brits polled said they would watch the TV coverage 70% of young people aged 18-25 said they were not interested in the royal family and only 33% of people of colour expressed any interest. This ceremony has been in the planning stage for years under the codename Operation Golden Orb, with a meeting held annually to finesse arrangements. With such meticulous and painstaking groundwork of course the ceremony will be flawless. The shambolic coronations of Queen Victoria and her predecessors that took place in an undemocratic, pre-film and TV age, would never be tolerated today. 

In the past, getting the crown on the monarch's head (preferably the right way round) before an exclusive audience of clergy and aristocracy and then crossing Old Palace Yard for a slap-up banquet in Westminster Hall was considered job done. Now, in our more democratised and irreligious times, letting the daylight in upon magic (in Walter Bagehot's famous phrase) has had the effect of sharpening-up proceedings considerably. The pomp and pageantry may be less relevant than ever but, boy, is it spectacular!

Despite centuries of accrued flummery and mummery the ceremony, at its core, is essentially the one used twice in Westminster Abbey to top-and-tail the fateful year of 1066. Firstly, Harold II was crowned King of England on 6 January, and secondly, on Christmas Day, it was the turn of his nemesis, William of Normandy (aka 'the Conqueror'), to stamp his authority. Their coronations had the vital role of legitimising both monarchs in the eyes of Church, barons and people. The stakes could hardly have been higher in that momentous year and the part played by the ritual in securing something like a smooth transition from Anglo-Saxon to Norman rule cannot be over-estimated. Nor was its significance in doing so lost on the English (and, later, British) monarchy.

The ritual to be followed was set down in the Liber Regalis (Royal Book) in 1382, an illustrated manuscript still kept at Westminster Abbey and referred to as a guide of conduct for all subsequent coronations. In it the blending of the spiritual and temporal (religious and secular) is seamless - Church and State are united in the person of the monarch and his (or her) coronation exemplifies it. The anointment with holy oil is a sacred rite with biblical roots going back to King Solomon - considered so sacred, in fact, that it is conducted under a canopy (or, in Charles' case, behind a screen) to shield its sublime mystery from the profane gaze of the hoi-polloi. 

But for all its mysticism and magnificence, make no mistake the coronation is an exercise in raw power. The return of the Stone of Destiny (or Scone) from Edinburgh Castle epitomises this. Edward I seized the sandstone block upon which Scottish kings were traditionally crowned in his invasion of 1296 and had it lugged to London to be incorporated into the Coronation Chair in Westminster Abbey. This was an overt symbol of Scottish subjugation to English rule and the fact that the stone, returned to Scotland in 1996, is still brought (under heavy guard) back to London for the coronation of the British monarch speaks volumes about where the power in this United Kingdom really lies. 

The fact that that power is no longer exercised directly by the constitutional monarch but on his (or her) behalf by the government of the day, makes it no less real. Rishi Sunak and his ministers act in the King's name and Charles, despite his past outspokenness as Prince of Wales, will know better than to challenge the realpolitik of his new position. The Ruritanian trappings of his investiture will blind neither him nor his government to the actuality of this.

The coronation may look like heraldry-meets-Hollywood but it's deadly serious power play.


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