Nicole Marafioti - The Kings Body: Burial and Succession in Late Anglo-Saxon England

Tables

Figures

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On 5 January 1066, Edward the Confessor died in his palace at Westminster. A few years later, the kings anonymous biographer produced the following account of his burial:

The funeral rites were arranged with royal expense and honour, as was fitting, and with the infinite mourning of all. They carried his blessed remains from his palace home into the church of God, and offered prayers and sighs along with the psalms, all that day and the following night. Meanwhile, when the day of the mournful celebration dawned, they blessed the funeral office they were to conduct with the singing of masses and relief of the poor. And so, the body was buried before the altar of St Peter the Apostle, washed in the nations tears, in the sight of God.

The authors foremost purpose in this passage was to illustrate the countrys grief at the loss of its beloved king, but he incidentally provided one of the few existing descriptions of an Anglo-Saxon royal funeral. We learn from this passage that Edwards body was publicly carried into its burial church, where mourners kept vigil until it was interred before the high altar the next day. We are told that the funeral office was accompanied by masses and the distribution of alms, all conducted with the honour and expense worthy of a king. We may also assume that a considerable number of mourners were present, including prominent laypeople who accompanied the body from the palace and clergymen who prayed and kept vigil over the royal remains. Yet while this excerpt provides an exceptionally detailed account of the burial of an eleventh-century English king, there were still aspects of the funeral that the author did not address. Who exactly was present? How was the body displayed? What sort of memorialization did the king receive afterwards? Although Edwards biographer showed considerable interest in the liturgical and processional aspects of the kings funeral, he found few of its mundane elements worth relating.

This silence is emblematic of most depictions of Anglo-Saxon royal death. Unlike Continental chroniclers, who regularly provided detailed accounts of rulers funerals, tombs, and bodies, Insular authors shied away from explicit descriptions of their dead kings. Most pre-Conquest English texts offered few details about royal burial and memorialization, simply noting where a monarch died and where his grave was. However, despite their cursory treatment in contemporary writings, kings funerals and tombs were not modest or obscure. As royalty, kings received privileged burial inside churches alongside abbots, bishops, and saints; as influential and wealthy Christians, they benefited from memorial masses and inclusion in monastic