A fourteenth-century Anglican church in
the Somerset parish of Burnham-on-Sea and Highbridge is not perhaps
the place where you might expect to find several remnants from the
lost Palace of Whitehall, the main London residence of England’s
monarchs until 1698. A second fire destroyed most of Whitehall,
with the exception of Inigo Jones’s magnificent neo-classical
Palladian-style Banqueting…
The sixteenth century
late-GothicSint-Andrieskerk on the Augustijnenstraat in Antwerp
preserves a monument with a quite extraordinary royal connection,
for which reason many English visitors in particular, seek it
out.In 1513,Augustine friars established a…
Located in the beautiful Gothic church of
St Mary’s at Bury St Edmunds, is the tomb of a princess of England
and a brief queen of France, the thirdwife of Louis XII. The wife,
daughter and sister of kings, she does not rest in the same royal
burial place as her…
As part of the ‘Great European Tour’ of
the Mozart family, which began from Salzburg in June 1763 and
extended across the Holy Roman Empire to France, the
Netherlands and Switzerland until November 1766, there
was a long visit to London from April 1764 until 1 August 1765. The
Mozart family arrived in London fresh from their stay in Paris,
arriving in England at Dover. Our best account…
Outside of the traditional burial sites
of Westminster Abbey and St George’s Chapel, Windsor, some English
(and British) monarchs are missing. The tomb of King John resides
in the chancel at Worcester Cathedral, not far from the chantry
that contains the grave of the son…
The new memorial that has been erected in
front of the Chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula on Tower Green marks
the spot ‘identified’ in the Victorian period as being the site of
the scaffold, which may have been a misunderstanding of the Tower’s
geography in proportion to…
The gallery of so-called ‘Windsor
Beauties’ is the name given to the collection of portraits painted
by Sir Peter Lely (1618-80) of celebrated courtesans and women of
the nobility in Restoration England, which can be seen – and
indeed, still admired – in the Communication Gallery at Hampton
Court Palace. Ten portraits today in The Royal Collectioncan be
identified as having…
A building in the Oxford suburb of
Marston preserves a unique connection with the lost world of
imperial Russia. Its typical late-Victorian exterior belies the
remarkable nature of its hidden history. In this building for a
period of time, personal possessions once owned by…
The Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria
– Mariabeing an establishedHabsburg prefix given to all the
daughters of Empress Maria Theresia to mark the dynasty’s special
veneration for The Virgin Mary – was born as the 15thchild of Maria
Theresia on 2…
On 6 July 1893, another royal wedding was
celebrated at the Chapel Royal, St. James’s Palace, between Prince
George of Wales – created Duke of York in 1892 – and Princess Mary
of Teck, the future George V and Queen Mary. Princess Mary of Teck
had been betrothed in December 1891 to Prince Albert Victor, Duke
of Clarence and Avondale, eldest son of the Prince and Princess of
Wales, who had…
