Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady of Muswell

Remaining for another day in what are now the northern suburbs of London the Pilgrimage now goes to the shrine of Our Lady of Muswell.

My post from last year, with links to ones from previous years can be seen at Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady of Muswell

The modern Catholic Church of Our Lady of Muswell 
built in 1938, is described on the Taking Stock website at Muswell Hill - Our Lady of Muswell

I see that the image I had on a previous post about the most prestigious pilgrim to the shrine, King Malcolm IV, has disappeared. I am therefore reproducing it again in this post. It is taken from a charter granted by the King to Kelso Abbey which was founded by his grandfather King David I.

King Malcolm IV

Image: Wikipedia 

May Our Lady of Muswell intercede for us and our intentions 

Jesu mercy, Mary pray

Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady of Willesden

The next stational shrine on the Pilgrimage is that of Our Lady of Willesden. 

My article from last year about this king established place of pilgrimage can be seen at Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady of Willesden

By following the links within it my additional comments can be read, adding to my account from 2021 of what is known of the history of the shrine can be read at Our Lady of Willesden 

Most of the evidence we have is from just before or during the sixteenth century religious upheavals, and apart from references to the statue in thirteenth century records there appears little evidence as to the pattern of devotion at that period.

The medieval church at Willesden appears to have been a small rural parish church with a nave and chancel, with a tower and south aisle and chapel added to the nave about 1400, and which was very considerably enlarged in the nineteenth century.

Willesden Church from the south before the nineteenth century restoration and extension 

Image: Willesden Local History Society

There is an illustrated account by Andrew Pink of the church and shrine at Our Lady of Willesden

 

Wikipedia also has a quite detailed article, but it is not without errors - for example St Paul’s Cathedral did not have monks attached to it in the medieval period. It can be seen at St_Mary's_Church,_Willesden

The Church of St Mary Willesden before being restored and enlarged in the nineteenth century 

Image: Andrew Pink

May Our Lady of Willesden intercede for us and our intentions

Jesu mercy, Mary pray

Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady of Islington

The Pilgrimage now travels north to the hills immediately to the north of London and to three Marian shrines. Today brings us to the first of these, Our Lady of Islington.

Not a great deal appears to be known about this devotion to a statue which seems to have originally been set in a tree in the churchyard. The medieval church, said to have been rebuilt in 1483, was replaced in the mid-eighteenth century by the present building, although much of that was destroyed in a bombing raid in 1940 and subsequently rebuilt.

My post from last year, with links to previous posts can be seen at Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady of Islington

 

The medieval church at Islington

Image: A London Inheritance 

There is more about the history of the church and parish in an illustrated article at St Mary Islington - A Tower with a View - A London Inheritance

Statues of Our Lady situated in tress were not uncommon and we shall visit another example, in Norwich, on this Pilgrimage. Apparitions of the Virgin standing in a tree are also recorded, as at Evesham at the beginning of the eighth century, and also on this Pilgrimage, and, most famously in the modern world, at Fatima in 1917. 

Quite coincidentally, but doubtless providentially, today I came across a reference to the Belgian shrine of Scherpenheuvel in Brabant which also originated with a statue of Our Lady that was in a tree. Wikipedia has two entries about the history of the shrine at Scherpenheuvel-Zichem and at Basilica_of_Our_Lady_of_Scherpenheuvel

May Our Lady of Islington pray for us and our intentions

Jesu mercy, Mary pray 

Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady of Grace by the Pillar in St Paul’s

The Pilgrimage now travels from Westminster along The Strand with its episcopal residences and the Inns of Court and of Chancery to Temple Bar and Ludgate before stopping at the now tragically lost medieval Cathedral of St Paul.

 

The nave of St Paul’s  - ‘Paul’s Walk’ - by Wenceslas Hollar 

The shrine was at the further end on the south side

Image: Wikipedia 

My post from last year together with links to previous post about this shrine can be seen at Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady of Grace by the Pillar in St Paul’s. In that post I explored in particular more about the devotion to Our Lady of Grace. That is a particular aspect of Our Lay which we will encounter at Ipswich and Cambridge on this Pilgrimage.

Situated as it was at the eastern end of the nave - the popular meeting place known as ‘Paul’s Walk’ - in the largest city in the realm - it was well placed to attract pilgrims and casual visitors. Certainly after the reformation ‘Paul’s Walk’ became a very popular place to meet and share news and do business, and there is reasonable evidence to suggest this was the case beforehand. Wikipedia has an account of its later usage at Paul's_walk. It seems to have been also a place for cut-purses to operate alongside beggars, and also where boys played football, with the occasional consequent damage to the stained glass. On occasion it was a place for heresy trials as well as public celebrations of treaties and agreements.This was, then, a place for all sorts and conditions.

As a place of public resort the space beside the shrine was also chosen for the public display of the body of King Henry VI in May1471 before his burial at Chertsey.

The Choir screen of St Paul’s by Wenceslas Hollar

The image of Our Lady of Grace was to the right just before the central tower.

Image:Wikimedia Commons

 

May Our Lady of Grace by the Pillar in St Paul’s intercede for us and our intentions 

Jesu mercy, Mary pray

Battle of Tewkesbury 555th anniversary

Today is the 555th anniversary of the battle of Tewkesbury on Saturday May 4th 1471. The comprehensive Yorkist victory cost the lives of many leading Lancastrians and probably led to the death in the Tower of London later that month of King Henry VI. The triumph of the Yorkists seemed virtually unequivocal, and what remained of the Lancastrian faction of relatively little concern in the grand scheme of things.

Nathan Amin, who has written a very readable and balanced account of the Beaufort family, has a post based on part of that book on his Substack site Hiraeth about the battle and the fate of Edmund Beaufort Duke of Somerset. The article which has some fine photographs of the spectacularly beautiful Tewkesbury Abbey, where many of the prominent casualties were buried, and can be seen at The Fall of The Beauforts

As Nathan Amin would be the first to point out, even if the direct male Beaufort line died with Edmund and his younger brother John - they are buried under what is now the Abbey gift shop - their cousin Margaret had a son in Henry, Earl of Richmond whose future and descendants were unimaginable in 1471. In addition their elder brother Henry had left an illegitimate son, Charles Somerset, upon whom fortune also looked kindly. As a result his direct male descendants are the Dukes of Beaufort, and, ironically, provided some of the crucial DNA male-line evidence to help identify King Richard III.

Apart from the Duke of Somerset the single most important casualty of the battle was King Henry VI’s son, Edward of Westminster, Prince of Wales. This warlike seventeen year old was a more potent threat than his father, and without the Prince as a potential youthful challenger it was easy for King Edward IV to permanently remove King Henry upon his return to London.

The nearest thing to a contemporary painted portrait of Prince Edward is on the Oliver King panel from 1492-5  in St George’s Windsor. King had been secretary to the Prince, and then, like the future Cardinal Morton, with the seeming obliteration of the Lancastrians at Tewkesbury served King Edward IV, but then was to return to the service of the Lancastrian descended King Henry VII.

Edward Prince of Wales stands on the right hand side of the Oliver King panel in St George’s Windsor

Image: Dean and Canons of Windsor

The seal of Edward Prince of Wales

Image: The Heraldry Society 

In recent decades Tewkesbury has developed its annual Medieval Festival around the re-enactment of the battle into the largest such event in Europe. This year it will be held on July 11th and 12th. The website is accessible at Tewkesbury Medieval Festival

I have been several times and it is very stimulating and good fun. Tewkesbury itself is a delightful town with fine medieval and sixteenth century timber buildings, a good museum, and above all the Abbey. If you have not visited it I do urge you to do so.

Please join me in praying for the repose of those who were killed in the battle, executed afterwards, and all who participated.

Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady at the North Door and Our Lady of Pew In Westminster Abbey

The next destination on the Pilgrimage is Westminster Abbey, which had two particular centres of devotion to Our Lady. These were the image of Our Lady at the North Door in the now demolished Galilee porch to the North Transept and the image of Our Lady of Pew opening out from the north choir aisle. 

Our Lady of Pew was commemorated both in the Abbey and in the adjacent Palace, and was a particular focus for royal devotion. The most famous instance of this was by King Richard II  in 1381 during the crisis posed by the Peasant’s Revolt and his vow to dedicate England as the Dowry of Mary if he overcame the rebellion.

My post from last year has links to previous articles and links about these two shrines. It can be seen at Marian Pilgrimage - Our Lady at the North Door and Our Lady of Pew in Westminster Abbey

I found a piece about the small chapel of Our Lady of Pew on the Murray and Blue blog site which clearly indicates how it was a private space where King Richard II could attend Mass or pray within sight of the chapel of St John the Baptist, who was his personal patron. Lying as it does between the shrine of St Edward and the chapel of St John it can perhaps be understood as the centre point of the King’s spirituality. I am not sure that the Wilton Diptych, which encapsulates so much of King Richard’s spiritual and regal vision, would have been kept in the small chapel, but it might have gone there with the King on occasion. The post can be viewed at The little chapel in Westminster Abbey, beloved of Richard II….

As is described in more detail in the linked articles the modern statue is copied from a medieval alabaster one now in Westminster Cathedral.

The Shrine of Our Lady of Pew

with the modern statue and surviving medieval painted mouldings

Image: Wikimedia Commons

May Our Lady at the North Door and Our Lady of Pew intercede for us and our intentions 

Jesu mercy, Mary pray

Royal celebrations in Sweden

This past week has seen a great gathering of members of Royal families from Europe and beyond in Stockholm to join in the celebration of the eightieth birthday of King Carl XVI Gustaf on April 30th.

The King of Sweden

Image: Swedish Royal Palaces

The King is the longest reigning monarch in Swedish history and in his fifty third year in the throne. I recall his accession in 1973 and how some newspaper pundits were writing off the future of the Swedish monarch. The age gap between his almost ninety one year old grandfather and his youth at only twenty seven  were presented as hindering the chances of the institution.

Shortly before his death King Gustaf VI Adolf had accepted the new version of the Instrument of Government revising the 1809 constitution. The new form removed from the monarch the formal powers to appoint the prime minister or signing legislation into law, whilst retaining a national representative and ceremonial role. This came into effect in 1975.

If constitutional change was in the public sphere for discussion the Royal family faced anther problem. Because of the very strict regulation of royal marriages,  which could not be contracted with commoners the formal Royal family coomprised just the  unmarried King and his unmarried uncle Prince Bertil. The other two surviving sons of the late King had renounced their rights to marry commoners. This was a policy which had been very strongly maintained by King Gustaf VI Adolf  whilst Crown Prince.The new King’s four sisters were also married to commoners, and there was no provision for female succession to the Crown. 

In 1976 the King married Queen Silvia, and this year will also see the public celebration of their Golden Wedding. Here there was a youthful monarch and his consort who were blessed with three children, and women admitted to full rights of succession. A Royal house that for decades was, and appeared, middle aged and indeed elderly now had a youthful image, and which has continued with the birth of grandchildren to the King and Queen.

The revision of the constitutional position of the Swedish monarch may have appeared alarming to those of us of a traditional outlook, but to the outside world has not diminished the public perception of the monarchy. I have seen it argued that in Sweden itself the changes actually increased support for the institution.

Interestingly one have alongside the others was suspending the bestowal of the various chivalric orders other than to the Royal Family itself, which in reality really meant the most senior one, the Order of the Seraphim. In the last two or three years this policy has been abandoned and the other orders given as in other realms as public recognition for service.  

 

Furthermore the public face of the Swedish monarchy is not, as so many unthinking commentators say, the tired out trope of an unceremonious, bicycling royal house. On state occasions Sweden can put on a traditional ceremonial and military display to rival any other western monarchy.

The gloomy predictions of 1973 have, happily, not come to pass.

A friend and I were agreeing that one disappointment about the celebrations culminating in a gala banquet in Stockholm on the King’s birthday, complete with tiaras and orders and decorations, was that no member of our own Royal Family was present. The King and Queen were of course on their very successful state visit to the United States, and the Kings of The Netherlands and of Spain were committed to other events, but their families were present. One would have thought that a member of the House of Windsor could have attended. Not only are they related, several times over, but Sweden is now an ally through NATO - unthinkable in 1973 - and a country with close cultural connections. People in the UK expect foreign royalty to attend events here, yet here was a chance to reciprocate that was not taken up.

With congratulations and every good wish to the King of Sweden on his birthday and to the Swedish Royal Family.

St Helena and the Finding of the True Cross

The New Liturgical Movement website has an article today, the traditional feast of the Invention or Finding of the True Cross, about a cycle of paintings in the Franciscan church of Santa Croce in Florence. These are dated to about 1335 and a few years later, and depict the background to St Helena’s visit to the Holy Land in search of the True Cross and her successful recovery of it.

The illustrated article can be viewed at A Legend of St Helena, the Discoverer of the True Cross