i watched the coronation and then watched his mother’s coronation to see the differences.
elizabeth wore all the things (the bracelets of sincerity and wisdom!), charles just touched a few of them. they had a lot more bling in elizabeth’s, tiaras and coronets. people all over the abby, it looked like they put seating in the clerestory. way more people in the military parade.
charles really scaled back.
If Iast long enough, I will be really curious to see if and/or how much William scales back. I personally think that, notwithstanding the costs, that the whole thing is hugely overdone. As I mentioned upthread, even if there is a valid, functional reason to have a monarchy, surely the “change of command” could be greatly reduced, not to mention the all of the other stuff such as properties, jewels etc.
There is a natural reaction to say “waste of money” and call for it to be scaled back even further but there is no doubt that the general pageantry of royal, coronations, funerals and marriages etc. is a big drawer for the UK in terms of tourists.
I’m no royalist but I’m happy to have an unelected state figurehead that has zero practical power and have the state stump up for their occaisional state shindig with bells, whistles, cloaks and horsies. We do it quite well I think.
American, didn’t watch any of the coronation itself, but if it counts I’ve watched various youtube links to bits, Like the family assembling on the balcony, mostly wondering who all the young lads in the scarlet coats were? I needed name tags!
Best bit I’ve seen so far was one of horses following the carriage who was dancing around from column to column while all the others horses seemed to studiously ignore him. “Oh, that’s just Jimmy. He just never learned to sit still.”
This is actually a pretty good summary of how I feel about the whole thing.
In fact, I wish the King (and his heirs and successors) could have a separate Canadian coronation. If it were up to me, it would be something like this:
It would take place in one of the two parliamentary chambers in Ottawa. The throne there would be used and it would take place during a parliamentary session.
The crown would be the epitome of Canadian thriftiness: it would be a circlet with no arches, with the spikes shaped like maple leaves. It would be made of materials from the Canadian Shield: ordinary nickel with gold electroplate, and a modest small semi-precious stones (amethyst, garnet, etc) would be placed near the base.
There would be no religious element whatsoever. No prayers, bishops, etc. The crown would be placed on the King’s head by several (let’s say four) selected leaders of Indigenous communities.
We saw bits and pieces of the after-pomp when we stopped at my MIL’s place, but that’s about it. Spousal unit doesn’t understand why so many people got so excited about it. I don’t much like ceremonies in general.
The history is interesting to me, in a Trivial Pursuit sort of way.
I have to scoff whenever I heard a pundit talk about whether or not the ceremony should be “modernized”. That would precisely defeat the purpose, which is the connection to history.
Sure, the new king could docusign a document saying “I’m the King now” but what would be the point of that?
Use synthetic corundums (artificial rubies and sapphires) and you can be cheap as hell, and ostentatious as hell, simultaneously.
I am from the U.S., and wanted to watch it (I am a fan of history and an anglophile) but overslept. I did catch the bit on the balcony, which was probably the least interesting part.
It seemed curiously low-key. I’ve heard more fuss being made about England reaching the final of the Euros (or whatever it was they did, don’t follow football)
Here you go:
Ah, thank you. Pages, eh? There was another cluster of guys in blue coats on the far right. More sons of friends/etc. too?
It seemed somewhat strange to have all these "unknowns’ (at least to me) there, with all the talk of trimming down and in fact not having other obvious members of the family present.
They’re conservatives.
I’m not sure whether I’m a UK ‘republican’ or not.
But it seems like the alternative to a monarch is President Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (or something similar). We Brits are quite capable of electing such a clown, as we’ve shown.
Yes: I think we should stick with Charles…
DesertRoomie has a fascination with the Royals and we would have watched it but were on the return leg of a road-trip to DC. We also missed the Kentucky Derby for the first time in years.
We are watching the 8+ hour recording of the PBS feed now.
There were some additional youngsters, who are I believe Camilla’s grandsons. The older folk on the far right are the late Queen’s cousins (Princess Alexandra and the Duke of Kent, and the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester), who still do some deputising for the main players and count as working royals
COOOOOOOL!!!
Woke up too late to see it live but saw it on video; does that count?
Charles looked like an 80 year old grandfather where everyone make a huge deal out of his birthday party but he doesn’t want to be there.