Royal Weddings
By Emily Brand
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About this ebook
Royal nuptials are always a cause for excitement both at home and abroad, and never more so than when the couple in question are young, glamorous and bathed in the glow of genuine romance. But the meaning invested in royal weddings, and the manner in which they are conducted, have changed dramatically as ideals have shifted about the monarchy and about marriage itself.
This book charts almost a thousand years of British royal weddings, from Henry I – whose bride was believed by many to be a runaway nun – through Henry VIII's six attempts at matrimony, to the highly public weddings of recent years including that of Prince William and Kate Middleton as well as the engagement of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.
It explores the traditions, symbols and rituals of the ceremonies themselves as well as the popular festivities and commemorative wares that have become a central means of marking the event.
Emily Brand
Emily Brand is a writer and historian with a special interest in the long eighteenth century, especially English social history and romantic relationships c.1660–1837. She has lectured on eighteenth-century seduction and women's lives at the V&A, the National Maritime Museum and the BBC History festival among others. Her most recent book The Fall of the House of Byron (John Murray, 2020) was selected as BBC Radio 4's Book of the Week, a Sunday Times, Mail on Sunday and BBC History Magazine Book of the Year and shortlisted for the 2020 Elma Dangerfield Prize. Emily's tongue-in-cheek Mr Darcy's Guide to Courtship was a Publishers Weekly 'Pick of the Week' and featured in Stylist Magazine's '30 Books Every Woman Should Read'
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- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5this book has a compelling story line and was actually hard to put down. If you have some great stories like this one, you can publish it on Novel Star, just submit your story to hardy@novelstar.top or joye@novelstar.top
Book preview
Royal Weddings - Emily Brand
INTRODUCTION
SINCE THE NORMAN CONQUEST, the journey of the oldest and most revered of British institutions, the monarchy, has been touched by turmoil, intrigue, sacrifice and romance. The aims of those taking the throne have varied wildly, and the concept of monarchy itself has been transformed by changing national ideals and international circumstances. But at least one aspect of rule seems to have endured every jolt of the royal carriage. Pomp, pageantry and public ceremony have persisted as central features of the royal court, often at once celebrating and consolidating the power of the monarch at its heart. Stamping the royal seal on significant occasions, from the lavish sporting tournaments of the lost Greenwich Palace to the thirty-eight coronations solemnised within the walls of Westminster Abbey, the history of the British royal family is coloured with self-conscious displays of magnificence.
But what of the most enchanting of all royal occasions, the wedding? In modern times, the mere prospect of such an occasion can stir feverish national and international excitement. Promising a unique blend of stately tradition and contemporary glamour, the marriages of Britain’s foremost family have continued to appeal to an increasingly wide audience.
Why should this be? History illustrates that things certainly haven’t always been so. Looking back through the centuries, it is clear that both the meaning invested in the royal wedding and the manner in which the ceremonies are conducted have changed dramatically. Venues have varied from the many palaces scattered around London to the sacred grandeur of York Minster and, if we are to believe medieval gossip, a small manor nestled in the woodlands of Northamptonshire. The hurried late-night services that bound some royal couples in matrimony contrast sharply with the splendour and public festivities that attended many others.
Nevertheless, a monarchy whose authority lies in its antiquity cannot be disentangled from the traditions that it inherits. The rituals and symbols springing from allegories of love, political gesture or simply personal preference have become traditions that have been passed down the generations. The European influence, too, is evident – the royal family absorbed the cultural traditions as well as the blood of other nations, and was in turn bound through wedlock into other courts. No doubt owing in part to her own skilful direction and dynastic ambitions, Queen Victoria’s impressive brood married into almost every royal house in Europe.
Forging these marital ties with foreign nations was itself something of a routine, even a fixation, for British royalty until the twentieth century. The politics that simmered beneath the request for a hand in matrimony were usually the primary, if not the only, reason for marriage. In fact, the formalities of engagement had most likely already been orchestrated by government officials without a glimmer of concern about the couple’s wishes. For the rich in general, and the royal family most particularly, marriage was a mercenary affair of national importance; as writer Hester Chapone lamented in 1773, the whole process took on the aspect of ‘mere Smithfield bargains, so much ready money for so much land, and my daughter flung into the bargain!’
The etiquette of a royal wedding might vary according to the status of those entering into wedlock, but wherever possible it was preferred that a foreign bride-to-be should make the journey to be married, and settled, in England. The apprehensions of these young princesses, who had often not yet mastered the language, cannot have been soothed by the fact that they were to become the property of their adoptive nation. A congratulatory sermon composed for the approaching nuptials of Frederick, Prince