The Crown Jewels: The Official Illustrated History

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Of course, this is an age where, until now, really, the job of anyone who we would consider to be a scientist in modern terms was to read the works of classical antiquity and to understand what Aristotle, or whoever it was, had said about the nature of the world. It was a new dawn. Boyle learned from Petty an approach, I suppose, to inquiring and looking for yourself to understand — from how things behaved when you cut them or inflated them or exposed them to light — what the properties of the world were. Putting on a crown – a custom seen in diverse cultures from antiquity – has always been a useful way of asserting that it was you, not someone else, who was in charge in a period before these things were automatically long settled by primogeniture, notes Morris. It was there for a long time — 300 years, whatever it was, or is — but of course, what happened was that a sovereign acceded to two kingdoms. This happens quite often historically. It happened quite often with other kingdoms or countries in British history. William III was the king of Great Britain and Ireland, but he was also the overlord of what’s now the Netherlands. George I was the elector of Hanover.

William Petty was an older man, senior to Robert Boyle. Robert Boyle came to Oxford as a student in his early 20s, but he was rich and had friends. William Petty was already a very well-regarded member of the establishment in Oxford University. He was the older man in terms of experience and in terms of scientific experimentation, which is what was their great obsession. But on the other hand, Robert Boyle was the man with money and with the ability to commission and fund activities and so on. Charles II and the reconstruction of monarchy’ in Marcello Fantoni, George Gorse and Malcolm Smuts,eds., The Politics of Space: Courts in Europe and the Mediterranean, c. 1500-1750. Bulzoni, 2009KEAY: Well, it’s an interesting point. I think, if you’d ask that question of a lot of historians working a generation or two ago, they would have said it’s all about economic forces. It’s all about the class struggle, if you like. I don’t think that’s my view. George V also chose to wear the crown and had the stones set permanently, including dozens of aquamarines. COWEN: How much of that was sincere belief, and how much was that simply an arbitrary marker that different interest groups struggling for power fixed upon, and actually, the Civil War is about the interest groups struggling for power?

Although lots of things were done — when it comes to urban planning and so on — that we really regret now, I think you have to be really careful not to diminish the seriousness of intent of those people who were trying to conceive of what that world might be — more egalitarian, more democratic, involving more space, more air, more light, healthier — all these kinds of things. It’s not that they aren’t great people. A lot of them are; they’re wonderful people. But to me, it’s an utterly absurd basis on which to involve somebody in the process of legislation. Keay provides a fascinating portrait of the slippery, charismatic Charles II, and of his genuine love for his son . The brilliance of Keay’s account lies in her ability to convey the subtle intricacies of diplomacy and royal ambition … Keay tells the story with heart-breaking crispness‘ Obviously, also long past now, but the skeleton, if you like, of a monarchy which was once an empire that stretched around the world still has connections and associations that make the British monarchy of interest in places where the Swedish monarchy might not be, as it were. COWEN: Do you grade your renters the way, say, Airbnb does? Or anyone can come in and stay in the castle?Toyes and Trifles” the destruction of the English Crown Jewels’, History Today, 52 (7), July 2002, pp. 31-7 It’s incredibly important to remember how you have to try and take the long view because if you let things go, you cannot later retrieve them. We look at the decisions that were made in the past about things that we really care about that were demolished — wonderful country houses, we’ve mentioned. It’s fantastic, for example, Euston Station, one of the great stations of the world, built in the middle of the 19th century, demolished in the ’60s, regretted forever since.

Jardine, Cassandra (18 April 2009). "Heritage TV or a restoration comedy?". The Daily Telegraph . Retrieved 6 November 2014. It wasn’t so much that religious turmoil and republicanism were irreconcilable, but in the case of England, the revolution — the throwing off the monarchy — didn’t have sufficient buy-in from the political nation, let alone the nation as a whole. It was really brought about by an army coup. I think that meant it was fragile. KEAY: Well, yes, not a stupid answer. I think the answer is, it was really, in my view, overwhelmingly about religion. There’s a historian who works on this period who talks about it and says you shouldn’t think of it as a revolutionary war. It’s really one of the last wars of religion. That was the biggest of the issues. There was a related secondary issue about the extent of royal power. That was in the mix, but it wasn’t the first issue. The key objects that will be used during the course of the ceremony are those made in 1661 for King Charles II’s Coronation – St Edward’s Crown, the Sovereign’s Sceptre with Cross, and the Sovereign’s Orb – as well as the 12th century Coronation Spoon andWhen it comes to your point about heritage, I think it’s good to have a second chamber. I think there’s a debate to be had about what the basis of that is, in terms of how you would come to have a seat in it. But I believe that a concern for our environment and the buildings and places in which we live and were built by our ancestors is a really universal one, and it doesn’t require you to have a particular social slice of society in the House of Lords to ensure it’s protected. I don’t think there’s an easy solution. I don’t think there’s a kind of act that you could take in relation to that stone, which would involve Britain saying, “Well, that’s fine. We don’t need to have it anymore,” that would do anything other than cause infinitely more conflict and aggro because it would open up the whole question of all these other moments of conflict when the stone was taken. There’s a wonderful place up near Liverpool called Port Sunlight, which was all laid out by a great industrialist — absolutely the most beautiful place that you could imagine — for people who would be working for him. There’s something about the aspiration of beauty and a sense of responsibility for creating it. They probably won’t have that wonderful moment [which they have had in the past] when the King is crowned and all the peers put on their coronets and crown themselves, and when the queen consort is crowned all the peeresses put on their coronets with But it is really stark. I don’t know the answer to it. I think there are observations I would make. One, I would say that the idea of the philanthropic neighborhood development scheme has really gone, but there was a lot of that that happened in the late 19th, early 20th century, with landowners — and also company directors, and so on — doing things that were going to be beautiful.