The Court of King Richard II and the Ashanti Ewers

The Art Newspaper has an article about the display in York at the York Army Museum of three bronze ewers taken as loot from the court of the Ashanti king by British troops in 1896. The three items have been brought together again from the museums which now hold them in this country. 

Now before we all go woke and start talking about restitution we need to consider the origin of these bronze vessels. The best known of the three, and now part of the British Museum collection, was made in England for use at the court of King Richard II, and bears his arms. The possible routes and times which could have brought this piece and its two companions from Europe to West Africa are discussed in the article. 

I have written before about these bronze items in a post in January last year which can be viewed at The bronze ewers from the court of King Richard II recovered from Ghana 

 

The online article about the current exhibition of the reunited ewers can be seen at Three medieval ewers shrouded in mystery go on display in York

The website of the York Army Museum can be visited at York Army Museum

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The Battle of Bossenden Wood

By chance I came upon a video from The History Chap

about the Battle of Bossenden Wood, which is said to be the last battle fought on English soil. It occurred a few miles outside Canterbury in May 31st 1838.

The background to this was in part the extraordinary career of the leader of the uprising and in part the political ferment and economic tensions of much of the 1830s.

The video can be seen at Britain's Strangest Battle: Redcoats vs the Messiah of Kent

Wikipedia has an account of the events with some additional details, and that can be seen at Battle of Bossenden Wood

These two accounts do not mention the strong Kentish tradition of political volatility and radical religious movements from the later medieval period onwards. There had been significant uprisings in the county in 1381, 1450, 1471, 1483, and 1554. This has been in part explained by its distinctive social and tenurial structure. I would also think that straddling as it does the principal land route from London to Dover, and then to the continent meant it was open to the rapid transmission of news and ideas. 

Lollards groups were established quite early in the history of the movement within Kent and remained active until the beginning of the sixteenth century reformation. Radical Religious movements also had support in the county in the early stages of the Civil War, and groups such as the Muggletonians survived there.

Factors similar to those which could lead to political descent Would likely also manifest themselves in religious dissent, and the two came together to a considerable degree in Wyatt’s rising in 1554, although as leader Wyatt had tried to avoid religious issues being raised by his followers.

Anglo-Catholic splendour

A friend has shared with me an excellent online portrait and description of the great church of the Holy Angels at Hoar Cross in Staffordshire. It is one of the greatest works of G. F. Bodley, together with Thomas Garner. At the time Bodley was the architect of choice for Anglo-Catholic patrons like Mrs Meynell-Ingram who was the sister of Viscount Halifax, the leading layman of the movement. Mrs Meynell-Ingram commissioned the church as a memorial to her husband who had died in 1871. The church was built between 1872 and 1876, and substantially extended during the years 1891 to 1906.

The feature on the church can be seen at The Church of Holy Angels – Hoar Cross

At the end are links to two other splendidly illustrated posts by the author. The first is about the Victorian churches of All Saints Leek and All Saints Denstone. The second is about one of A.W.Pugin’s undoubted, and best preserved, masterpieces, the Catholic Church of St Giles Cheadle, commissioned by the Earl of Shrewsbury.

Thinking about Agincourt

Today is the 610th anniversary of the battle of Agincourt in 1415. It seems an eminently suitable day upon which to share an idea I was ruminating upon the other day.

We can perhaps think of the Hundred Years War as a conflict that was bounded by a number of factors which inhibited both England and France from securing the victor they might desire, until, that is, French by a slow process of attrition, eased the now enfeebled English out of everywhere but Calais by 1453-4. Even then the English were back again in 1475, 1492, 1513, 1545, and, even after the fall of Calais in 1558, tried yet again in 1562. The Hundred Years War had no concluding peace treaty - the nearest thing to that was perhaps the Treaty of Amiens of 1802 when King George III agreed to no longer style himself King of France and removed the French quartering from his coat of arms.

If then this protracted conflict was not a single war but more an existential reality for both realms, which neither could win, intervening ambitious peace treaties such as Paris in 1259, Brétigny in 1360, Troyes in 1421 or even Cateau Cambresis in 1559, let alone extended truces and pledges of peace and amity, failed to bring what they seemingly offered.

It is as if the two principals, let alone their allies, could never achieve victory due to their own limitations, or the constraints of the times in which the events took place. Thus the great English mid-fourteenth century naval victories of Sluys in 1340 and Winchelsea/ Les Espagnoles sur Mer in 1350, and the land victories of Crecy in 1346 and, even more catastrophic for the French, Poitiers with the capture of King Jean II in 1356, were not the knock out blow they may have seemed in the immediate aftermath. In the following years the French offered huge swathes of land to the English, but failures to ratify in full, or the French insistence on retaining ultimate sovereignty over the territories involved meant no lasting peace was negotiated.

Neither England or France could have seemingly achieve that degree of advantage to dictate a lasting solution. Despite the difference in size and resources between France and England, the centralised and cohesive nature of the latter’s administration made it an extremely formidable opponent, Whilst the more diverse and fragmented nature of France made it prone to factional conflicts. There was therefore something of a stalemate, interrupted by campaigns that aimed to resolve the conflict, but which could never achieve it.

In this context Agincourt stands out as being different, along with the English victory at Verneuil a decade later, but that was a consequence of Agincourt. King Henry V’s victory on this day in 1415 was so crushing that it looked like the long desired or feared knock-out blow. Not only was the French army crushed, its leaders killed or captured, but the results seemingly crushed French political action and initiative. Circumstances at the court of the French king and the deaths of two successDauphins as the internecine feuds between the French princes resumed whilst King Henry sailed home to England, transformed for the moment into a major European ruler. Two years later he was back and began the systematic conquest of Normandy, the richest duchy within the Royal domain. Allied with Burgundy after the murder on the bridge at Monterau of Duke Jean the Fearless in 1419, by the summer of 1420 the English king could achieve the Treaty of Troyes which made him heir and regent of the kingdom of France. He spent much of the last year or so of his life fighting those who opposed it. Had he lived two months longer he would have succeeded King Charles VI as the French monarch. 

Whether King Henry V could have subdued the realm he was promised is, of course, unknowable, but the likelihood of a decisive English victory was never closer. This had come about because of the victory won by the then largely unknown English king and his depleted army at Agincourt. 

As a victory it very rapidly entered the national consciousness in England, partially through deliberate government messaging and propaganda, and also one can assume because it naturally resonated with the populace. When Shakespeare wrote about it almost two centuries later his audience knew the story, what they wanted was the emotion and exultation of St Crispin’s Day - and for another such victory over the old enemy they would have to wait for Blenheim in 1704.

Agincourt and the events of the reign of King Henry V did not deliver final victory in the Hundred Years War for the English, but it must have seemed close. For the French the catastrophic humiliation may have served to 

embolden them under King Charles VII to find the way to gradually reclaim their country, but it was no easy task. The rigidities of resources and the nature of political life and military campaigning imposed constraints it was almost impossible to overcome. What had happened at Agincourt made that impossibility look possible.

The King at the Vatican

On Thursday I watched the television coverage of the state visit by King Charles III and Queen Camilla to the Vatican and what bit was available of their subsequent visit to St Paul’s Outside the Walls.

The meeting with Pope Leo XIV and the service of Midday Prayer in the Sistine Chapel was dignified, and historic, if not quite for the reasons claimed in advance. 

So far as I know the exchange of chivalric orders between a Pope and a British monarch had not occurred before. The Papal order received by The King was the Collar of the Order of Pius IX. There is more about the Order from Wikipedia at Order of Pope Pius IX

I do have to agree with articles in the Catholic Herald and the Daily Telegraph that this occasion was the first time in something like five and a half centuries that a Pope and an English or British monarch had prayed together was misleading, implying that such occasions were almost routine in medieval centuries.

We know Anglo Saxon kings from the House of Wessex, ancestors of the King, including the future King Alfred, visited Rome on occasion, or like King Caedwalla who abdicated and retired there and built a church whilst living as a hermit, but thereafter, such visits or meetings were rare. 

King Cnut, while attending the Roman coronation of the Holy Roman Emperor Conrad II in 1027 would have met Pope John XIX and from Scotland King Macbeth in 1050 would have met Pope Leo IX. 

After 1066 King Henry I met Pope Calixtus II at Reims in 1119, whilst King Edward I and Pope Gregory X had met on crusade before their respective successions in the Holy Land in the early 1270s and again in Italy after the Pope’s election in 1272. The next reigning monarch from these realms to meet a Pope was King Edward VII who met Pope Leo XIII in 1903, King George V who visited Pope Pius XI in 1924, and then there were the visits to the Vatican by the late Queen, initially as Princess to Pope Pius XII, and his successors, and welcoming two of them to this country.

Jacobites might opine, of course, that in the eighteenth century the three claimant Stuart Kings, James III and VIII, the other Charles III, and Henry IX and I - who are all buried in St Peter’s - regularly met Popes, although only the first was officially recognised as monarch by the Papacy. Some of the later Stuart claimants as Italian and Bavarian rulers doubtless met other Popes.

Similarly the revival of the English royal link with St Paul’s Basilica and Abbey by making His Majesty the Royal Conrator on lines similar to those between France and the Lateran and Spain and Sta Maria Maggiore is a good and positive, as well as historic, thing to do. So too was the gift to His Holiness of the status of Papal Confrator of St George’s Windsor. 

I am sure this, quite rightly, appeals to The King’s sense of history and his genuine commitment to inter-church relations. 

We have indeed, happily, come a long way from the sixteenth century reformations and the active, or indeed passive, discrimination against Catholics here in the UK, even if relics of it still survive.

At same time, as some of the better informed commentators have pointed out, however the real theological differences remain - exemplified by the announcement of the impending appointment of Dame Sarah Mullaly - I wonder if that should be Doolally or Mulligatawny - as “Archbishopess”of Canterbury and the further splintering, if not shattering, of the Anglican Communion.

It occurs to me that the ecclesial changes within the King’s lifetime have made the dialogue between Rome and Canterbury, for all the high level meetings, the work of ARCIC, and the much more obviously friendly personal relationships that have developed on an individual and institutional basis, actually more difficult. This is has been due to the importation of new - and very dubious - ideas by many Anglicans. For all the outward distance the communions headed by Pope Pius XII and Archbishop Geoffrey Fisher had fundamentally more in common than they do today. 

Tudor royal locket in the news again

Several websites have had report upon the announcement of the launch of an appeal to acquire for the British Museum the early sixteenth century gold locket found in Warwickshire in 2019. Thought to be associated with a joust in October 1518 it bears the initials and plant badges of King Henry VIII and Queen Katherine of Aragon.

The Daily Telegraph has an article about the locket and the appeal at Proof that Henry lost his heart to his first wife (who kept her head)

The BBC News website also covers the story with additional illustrations at Golden 'Tudor Heart' Necklace Sheds New Light on Henry VIII's First Marriage

The Art Newspaper has a report about the locket which can be seen at Golden 'Tudor Heart' Necklace Sheds New Light on Henry VIII's First Marriage

The link on The British Museum website for donations to the purchase fund can be accessed at The Tudor Heart appeal

This seems to be a very well worth while cause to give to so as to secure the item for the national collection.

The Norbertine Rite

I came by happenstance upon a video that introduces the life of St Norbert of Prémontre and the Order of White Canons he founded and their distinctive Rite for the celebration of Mass. As the video explains after the Council of Trent and the promulgation of the Mass of 1570 the Canons moved towards using that liturgy but some distinctive Norbertine usages survived, notably the distinctive almuce and several of these are described and shown.

Today the Canons are referred to as Norbertines after their founder, but I equally think of them as Premonstratensians, as that is the term used by medievalists to refer to the Order. There were a considerable number of their houses in medieval England, especially in the east and north. Today they still serve several parishes in England, as well as in Europe and the US.

The video can be seen at The Lost Mass of St. Norbert

Recreating Bishop Lyhert’s vestments

The Art Newspaper has a most interesting report arising from the extensive restoration and redisplay of the collection at the Castle Museum in Norwich. Amongst the items in the collection are some fragments of silk from the vestments found at the end of the nineteenth century in the tomb in Norwich Cathedral of Bishop Walter Lyhert. He was diocesan from 1446 until his death in 1472. His most celebrated contribution to the cathedral was the beautiful lierne vault which elegantly crowns the twelfth century nave. He also appears in the Paston Letters both in connection with disturbances at Bishop’s ( now Kings ) Lynn at the end of the 1450s and then in 1469 in the family’s unsuccessful attempts to frustrate the marriage of the younger Margery Paston and the family‘s bailiff Richard Calle. 

Before becoming Bishop of Norwich the Cornish born Lyhert had served since 1435 as Provost of Oriel College in Oxford. I have therefore, as an Orielensis and an historian of the late medieval church, a particular interest in him and his Oriel colleagues who became bishops in that era. I wrote a biographical account of Bishop Lyhert for The Oriel Record in the 1990s.  

The study of the surviving portions of the fabric in the Norwich Museum collection and in the V&A in London taken from the bishop’s tomb when it was located in 1899 has made possible both recreation of the design and the ability to produce new fabric. This will be used to make copes for use by the Canons, and thereby to recreate something of the liturgical spectacle of worship in the cathedral in the mid-fifteenth century. Other pieces will be used in the display in Norwich Castle.

The article can be seen at After 550 years, a fabric found in a Norwich bishop’s tomb is recreated

St Teresa of Ávila

Today is the feast of St Teresa of Ávila. She is a saint to whom I feel a strong attraction, Not just as a spiritual guide, but as an example of very down to earth, practical Christianity.

Spiritual writing and guide to prayer most notably The Interior Castle are justly famous, and full of insight. However, her more prosaic accounts of her life in her Autobiography which owes a considerable debt To Saint Augustine’s Confessions as an Account of her spiritual growth, and The Book of the Foundations which records her trials and tribulations, as well as her successes in establishing her reformed Carmelite houses, together with her Letters which reveal much of her life, and of her steely determination in creating the Discalced Carmelites. Reading these words reveals a distinct and engaging personality, And it is to encounter the practicalities and the inner life of a sixteenth century woman. They must have a wider interest than that just of the pious searcher after spiritual insight.

For those who i’m looking for an introduction to her life the Wikipedia account at Teresa of Ávila outlines her life and writings as well as her posthumous cult, relics and influence.

This year has seen a renewed study of her substantially incorrupt remains and their public veneration. This is covered in a video which also outlines her life and which can be seen at When a 400-Year-Old Tomb Opened and the Body Was Perfect

Teresa of Ávila, by Rubens. This is the portrait of Teresa that is probably the most true to her appearance. It is a copy of an original 1576 painting of her when she was 61.

Image: Wikipedia

St Teresa Pray for us

Fortified churches of Transylvania

One of the irritants in watching so many videos are the AI generated voice overs. It seems that those compilers who use them also succumb to an overblown literary style for the scripts they write. The combination is deeply irritating for the viewer.

A good example of this is the video I want to draw to the attention of readers. Notwithstanding what I have just written, and also allowing for the rushed diction of the narrator, take a few gulps of air, or a stiff drink, to steel yourself and watch what is otherwise a visually impressive account of a number of the remarkable fortified churches of Transylvania. For no very clear reason, certainly one that is not explained, the video begins with the fortified Valère basilica at Sion in Switzerland before travelling east to Transylvania for the other churches it considers.

What emerges, for all the technical criticism of the presentation that I have made, are a group of quite astonishing buildings - astonishing both in their architecture and decoration, and astonishing in their survival.

The video can be seen at Top 10 Catholic Strongholds You’ve Never Heard Of | Catholic Documentary

The Rite of Blessing Portable Altars

I chanced upon a video of Cardinal Raymond Burke blessing a number of portable altar stones. As the video says this is a rite rarely seen by the faithful. I had not witnessed it although I had  read a description of the ceremonial. Some years ago I did witness the rite of consecrating a fixed altar by the then Archbishop Nichols at the Oxford Chaplaincy, and the two ceremonies are, naturally, essentially the same, but with some obvious visual and ceremonial differences.

The Catholic Encyclopaedia has an entry about such movable altar stones at CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Portable Altar

Portable alter stones have a long history. The earliest example I have seen is from among the relics of St Cuthbert at Durham Cathedral and is, I assume,  one he travelled with as a bishop and may have had in his last days in his retreat on Inner Farne. An amazing survival and a precious link with a great and saintly figure from the seventh century.

I first looked into this topic in connection with my research into the life of Bishop Richard Fleming. Following his consecration in Florence as a bishop by Pope Martin V in 1420 he obtained an indult for his brother Robert  and his wife to have a portable altar for domestic use. I am tempted to think that maybe one of Richard Fleming’s first episcopal actions was to consecrate such an altar stone for his brother and sister-in-law.

The video with Cardinal Burke can be seen at The Rare Catholic Ritual You’ve Never Seen Before

A new Grand Duke of Luxembourg

Thanks to YouTube I managed to catch most of the ceremonial and celebrations that marked the abdication of Grand Duke Henri and the accession of Grand Duke Guillaume V in Luxembourg last Friday.

The smaller scale of the capital, with the Grand Ducal Palace and the Chamber of Deputies side by side. and the crowds right in front of these locations conveys the intimacy and intertwining of public life in the Grand Duchy alongside that of its citizens. I imagine this is similar to the world of the smaller German states and their ruling families between 1871 and 1918.

The constitutional position of the Luxembourg monarchy is set out by Wikipedia at Monarchy of Luxembourg

For those who want to know more about the emergence of Luxembourg as an independent Grand Duchy in the nineteenth century Wikipedia has a number of relevant interlinked articles including Partitions of Luxembourg, which is especially relevant to the events of 1831-39 and the Luxembourg Crisis of the later 1860s, which led to the final recognition ot the Grand Duchy as sovereign and independent.

There is a good map from Brilliantmaps.com showing the original extent of the old Duchy of Luxembourg and the various territorial losses it has suffered in partitions since 1659 at The Partitions of Luxembourg

At the public events to mark the succession members of the Grand Ducal family and their guests could be seen wearing the insignia of at least two of the Luxembourg orders of chivalry

Most prominent was the golden riband with blue selvedges of the Gold Lion of House of Nassau. Created in 1858 by King-Grand Duke Willem/Guillaume III it is still under the joint sovereignty of the Dutch and Luxembourg monarchs. However whilst it is not the pre-eminent Dutch Order it is in Luxembourg. Wikipedia has a description of it together with illustrations at Order of the Gold Lion of the House of Nassau

More junior members of the Grand Ducal House could be seen wearing the riband of the Order of Adolphe of Nassau. This was founded for the Duchy of Nassau by the last reigning Duke Adolphe, and revived by him as an Order for Luxembourg when he inherited the Grand Duchy in 1890. It is named after the only member of the dynasty to be elected as King of the Romans, the eponymous thirteenth century Adolphe of Nassau. The insignia of the Order are described and illustrated at Order of Adolphe of Nassau

I did not observe anyone wearing the riband of the other two Grand Ducal Orders, those of the

Oak Crown - described and illustrated at Order of the Oak Crown - or the more modern Order of Merit, which is covered in Order of Merit of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg

Something of the earlier history of the House of Nassau and its territories can be gleaned from Wikipedia at Nassau, Rhineland-Palatinate and at Nassau Castle for the town and castle of Nassau.

The history of the family and its branches, notably those of Weilburg and of Orange, can be seen at House of Nassau

The history of the comital and later ducal territory of Nassau down to 1866 can be seen at County of Nassau and at Duchy of Nassau

The castle at Weilburg is described and illustrated at Schloss Weilburg

With prayers and every good wish for a long and happy reign for Grand Duke Guillaume V and Grand Duchess Stéphanie.

Visigothic Eagle brooches from Spain

Two early sixth century Visigothic brooches in the form of a pair of eagles are featured in an article from LiveScience.com. The cloisonné and jewelled brooches are dated to 501-533, and are now housed in the National Archaeological Museum in Madrid.

They were discovered more than a century ago at Alovera in central Spain. There is more abou the site and a larger photograph of one of the brooches on Wikipedia at Alovera

The details of their discovery are unfortunately less well recorded than they might have been today, but they appear to have been worn as cloak fastenings by royal or aristocratic women. The eagle design appears to indicate the elite status of the wearer and the design might suggest a form of proto-heraldry.

The article can be seen at Eagle brooches: 1,500-year-old pins filled with dazzling gems and glass — and worn by powerful Visigoth women

Excavating Leicester city centre

Recent archaeological work in the historic urban centre of Leicester is outlined in an article from Artnet News. 

More evidence has been revealed about the Roman town which underlies the mediaeval and modern city. The work has also revealed evidence for the medieval market place and its associated municipal buildings, including a grim prison, and even indications of the post holes for medieval market stalls.

The article can be seen at 'Vile' Dungeon Discovered Under U.K. Market Square | Artnet News

New evidence from the Shroud of Turin?

The Zenit website recently had a report about further research into the image on the cloth and suggesting that the front teeth of the lower jaw are visible in a way consistent with the effect of a burst of energy.

The main argument from that is that what is depicted on the cloth are indeed the effects of a release of radiant energy at the moment of Resurrection.

The article can be seen at Discovery in Turin's Shroud confirms burst of radiant energy at Resurrection

The Archbishop of Canterbury designate

The announcement yesterday of the nomination of Dame Sarah Mullally as the next Archbishop of Canterbury caught the headlines amongst so much else. I was a little surprised, having thought that the Anglican powers-that-be would perhaps wait until the next appointment to Canterbury or York to advance a woman.

It is now over twenty years since I left the Church of England, and then from a strongly Anglo-Catholic position. Such an appointment no longer concerns me directly. 

However the Church of England is part of our constitution and national establishment, and that fact is appreciated by people who are Catholics in full peace and communion. 

I still have Anglican friends and am aware of an Anglican tradition that cannot be happy with this appointment and what it implies, and who, dare I say it, are running out of sand in which to bury their heads like ostriches.

Dame Sarah’s views are mixed on issues where faith and contemporary social issues meet. She has, perhaps as a former nurse, been steadfast in her opposition to the Assisted Dying Bill. Less reassuring are comments she has made, which are both worrying, as well as gnomic, on abortion  and same-sex blessings.

The media stress  is on her being the first woman to be nominated to the Primacy of All England - no-one has yet found a transgender predecessor. During the discussions about the Church of England legislating for ‘Women Bishops’ I remember the suggestion being made that the two Archbishoprics might be reserved for men as a concession to unity and the idea of ‘male headship’ if and when women were allowed to become ‘bishops’. That has clearly gone by the board. 

Those who speak of and fear the ‘Feminisation’ of Christianity in our society may well see their anxieties realised as the public face of the national Church becomes ‘Mother’ in God, not Father.

For Anglicanism as a whole I cannot see it going well, as has already been indicated, with Evangelicals focussed on the issue of male headship, nor with Global South Anglicans who are often of that Evangelical tradition. Another nail or two, or five or ten in the coffin of the Anglican Communion.

Ecumenical relationships may not suffer with the Lutheran churches that already have women ‘bishops’. Judging by some of the positive ‘mood music’ responses about her appointment coming out from some in Rome relations with the Holy See will doubtless continue at a polite level of meetings, but I imagine joint services at one of the Roman basilicas will be less likely. For the Orthodox there will probably be a much more substantial and suitable barrier, so a trip to the Phanar is not very likely.

In addition to those issues there is the dismal inheritance of the Church of England. The Welby years and Covid have done nothing for church attendance, many parishes feel they are being discriminated against in favour of headline grabbing initiatives to give away the Church Commissioners money, and the continuing issues around clerical and lay abuse of individuals within the Church.

This, of course, brings us back to Justin Welby. Without doubt this incompetent, self-satisfied, bullying little man has been, with the sole exception of the appalling heretic Thomas Cranmer, the worst ever Archbishop of Canterbury. That is no mean, or desirable, achievement. He is the first amongst more than a hundred predeceases  to have to resign for utter incompetence. Even the pluralist Stigand in the eleventh century was at least a patron of the arts.

Justin Welby pushed through the appointment of women bishops, finally destroying residual Anglican claims to any degree of Catholicity, turned a blind eye to abuse by his Evangelical friends, yet obstinately traduced the reputation of one of the most distinguished bishops of the twentieth century ( and there have not been many of them ) blithely went along with closing all churches in Covid - his Easter Holy Communuin celebrated on his kitchen table being the highlight, and which I know, caused one friend to swim the Tiber, and his involvement in the liturgical shambles that was the King’s Coronation.

Dame Sarah has been passed a bitter chalice, but hopefully cannot do worse. Hopefully.

The Restoration of the English Catholic Hierarchy in 1850

Michaelmas Day was the 175th anniversary of the restoration of the English and Welsh territorial Hierarchy and their dioceses by Bl. Pope Pius IX in 1850. This was in the bull Universalis Ecclesiae  This was to be followed by the re-establishment of the Scottish Hierarchy in 1878.

There is an account of the Papal action, and the response to it on the part of the more violent Protestant tradition in England from Wikipedia at Universalis Ecclesiae.

With this bull the Pope restored a national diocesan system - albeit with new territorial designations - that had ceased to exist with the deaths in prison at Wisbech Castle of Bishop Thomas Watson of Lincoln in 1584 and that in exile in Rome of Bishop Thomas Goldwell of St Asaph in 1585.

The original arrangement of the Archbishopric of Westminster with twelve suffragens, the dioceses based on the old Districts and Vicars acting on behalf of the Pope, has now evolved into one with five archdioceses and a total of twenty dioceses.

Unlike the quite considerable celebrations in 1950 to mark the centenary there has been little this year to mark the anniversary. However the Archdiocese of Westminster has produced a video with some account of the events of 1850 and an interview with Cardinal Nichols which can be seen at Restoration of the Hierarchy: 175 years of the Diocese of Westminster

Laus Deo