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Recent News... Just for Pope Gregory... |
2001-11-16 - 5:06 a.m. U.K. Day 3: Gravity, a harsh mistress Blisters - I have blisters. Let me say, England in November is supposed to be *cold*, but they run the heat like a blast furnace. Inside a museum, you're still sweating in a thin t-shirt. So I wore thin little socks yesterday in the vain fight to regulate body temperature. Bad move. Very bad move. Kristen pointed me to the band-aids (I mean plasters) so I taped up my feet and we adventured out. First, we went to the post office - Royal Mail system gave me postcard stamps and adorable little 'Air mail' stickers for my post cards. We shuffled through an incredibly long line, but it moved along quite swiftly, Exit post office and drop the cards in a the friendly bright red mail boxes. (I don't know why you can't actually hand over stamped mail to the postal clerk to be mailed, but at least they have the boxes just outside.) The friendly tube takes us to Westminster Abbey. Breathtaking place - rife with English history and my favorite place so far. Ready for the vocabulary quiz? You can all (except Laura) play along. First thing is to sign up for the verger guided tour. [What's a verger? Seems to be enthusatic volunteers who dress in psuedo-priest robes and takes people on tours so they may better enjoy the abbey. Bonus round question - what's the difference between a verger and a docent?] Davey the verger, our wonderful guide, takes us straight to the shrine of St. Edward the Confessor. It's in a closed off section, so the only way to get there is on the tour. Westminster was built by Cuthbert on the Thorny Isle in the middle of the Thames. The Thames has since receded so centuries later it stand on solid ground. Edward was originally buried before the high altar and William of Normandy has himself crowned on Edward's grave - after Edward's canonization his body was translated to the current shire, but the original burial spot is still marked. In fact, all English monarchs are crowned in that exact spot in the 800 year old Coronation chair. The Shire of St. Edward includes many marvelous effigies which are, frustratingly, twice my height, so you really can't get a good look at the figures. Henry V was so determined to be buried in the Shire of Edward, he extended the Shire just to get his tomb squeezed in near the saint. Elizabeth I is also buried here - buried at Elizabeth's request in the same tomb are her sister Bloody Mary. Of course, the tomb is marked with a magnificent effigy of Elizabeth, no mark of Mary's presence. The Knights of Bath have their own stalls - still an active order of chivalry after all these years. Originally, the order was given by the Crown for personal service on the battlefield. Apparently, the current Queen uses the order to honor service to the country. The knights have their name, banner and crest over their personal choir stall in the Lady Chapel of the Abbey. So here's another trivia question for you: What's the difference between a cathedral and an abbey? And if you know the answer, riddle me this - why is there an abbey church in London when Henry VIII dissolved all the monasteries? I didn't know either, but apparently Westminster operates under the auspices of a royal deacon, answerable directly to the Sovereign, with a college of four canons who help them run the place, like the senior monks of old. Elizabeth I granted them this very unique charter because of the incredible history of Westminster. Davey our verger guide takes us to the Coronation chair - 800+ years old and still used for Coronation ceremonies. Every royal coronation since St. Edward's time has taken place here, with the exception of the two monarchs who weren't actually crowned (Edward V - remember that bit about the princes in the tower? He didn't leave to be crowned and Edward VIII abdication to marry Wallace Simpson.) The royal family of England is no longer buried here for a simple reason - they're full up. 3500+ people under the floors, no more room, try around the corner. Can you tell I really thought Westminster was amazing? We sat in the quire [which appears to be the original spelling of choir] stalls and heard about the monastic life in the days when it was a functioning Benedictine Abbey. We saw the tomb of the Unknown Warrior - the original concept of the unknown soldier memorials seen around the world. Darwin's buried here - which is amusing given how many church folk his History of the Species upset. Davey herded us out of the church proper and around to the cloisters area, which was the center of the monastic life in the day. We ended the tour at the chapterhouse - a gorgeous octagonal room where the monks met every day to hear a chapter of the rule of St. Benedict read. [Gave you that vocabulary word for free.] It was the original meeting place of the house of commons (conveniently close to Westminster palace), until the monks got tired of having the rowdy bunch underfoot and persuaded them to find a new meeting place. Besides, the foot-stamping was ruining the floor - the original 13th century tile from the day's of Edward the Confessor is still there and still gorgeous. Most of the stained class was lost in the blitz, but some of the wall painting remains. The eight walls must've been amazing - lined with scenes of the salvation and the apocalypse - but only bits remain. However, just for Nia I will tell you there's both a dromedary (two hump) and a kamel in the borders of the remaining wall scenes. The acoustics were phenomenal. I wished for Cuan or Bryce or someone with a magnificent voice to make the room live. Just me humming 'Nomibus Domino' had the sound echoing off the walls and punching back through your gut. Then we went the Pyx which is derived from a Greek word meaning ... [insert guess here] and was a chamber used as the royal treasury. After it was pilfered once, stronger security measures were installed. There are two massive doors, each with three different keys for a total of six keys held by six different people. Also, the door sill is purposefully built so the outer door can't open all the way - which means no one can get the massive chests (also known as pyx or containers) of gold and valuables out of the room. Two original treasury chests are still in the room today (see bit about the door) as well as a cope chest. Cope - you get to look up for yourself, but I'll give you a hint. The chest was quarter-circle shape. [While you're at it, look up ophrey - cause many of the textiles from the V&A room were pieces of ophrey bags and I haven't figure that one out yet.] Go to Westminster Abbey and take the tour. Along the way, you'll see Parliment Houses and Big Ben. We took the tube to St. Paul's. Three train lines later ... Me: I'm so tired of switching trains every two stops. I want to just sit my ass on the train and get off when we get there. ... we reach the Cathedral. It's lovely and well worth a look, but it's very 17th century - which you could attribute to the Great Fire of London 1666 burning the medieval church to the ground - so it doesn't have nearly as rich a history at Westminster Abbey. We climbed the steps to the whispering gallery and spent a while trying to listen in on other's conversation 259 steps/99 feet above the chapel floor. Then we decide (cause why is it we all climb to the top of things? Shades of Montmarte) to climb the next ~120 step to the Stone Gallery - great view of London, but there are still more stairs to the Golden Gallery, the tip top, the highest point, so of course we climb. Me: Don't count the steps, don't count the step ... Geez where is the top? St. Paul's didn't hold us for long, so we beat feet for the National Gallery and zip straight to the medieval wing. 530 steps, but we got a great view of the Thames and London bridges. So, we decide to squeeze in the National Gallery of Art. Delicious place - went straight to the 1200-1500s wing and spent an hour and a half wandering the galleries. The trip ends one of my pilgrimages - the National Gallery, London houses one of Uccello's Battle of San Romano series of paintings. I love this painting - two copies hang in my sewing room - but I spent half an hour savoring the reality. It's a gorgeous painting rife with heraldric display. The Medicis envied the series so much they had it, um, liberated, from the original owners and installed in the Medici palacio. We also found the picture of 'St. Peter and St. Dorothy' painting that Gen used as the basis of her white dress. [Gen - looks like the underdress is cut velvet - gold and faded red, but the lining is shiny gold lame with red patterns - more of a cloth of gold.] We end the trip with the mandatory bookstore stop - rummaging through prints and postcards. Unfortunately, I can't look up the copy of the St. Dorothy picture because it is attributed to 'the Unknown Master of the St. Bartholomew altarpiece' - which doesn't fit in the alphabetical find the artist indexing scheme. So I ask the clerks how you can get copies of arts that aren't on in the gift shop racks. Coffee? I'm sorry the cafe is just closing, but you can ... directions to a coffeehouse follow. I stare at the woman until I realize she heard 'copy' as 'coffee'. I'm considering faking a British accent in hopes of being better understood. I'm sure Laura is laughing her ass off. Much enunciation later, the answer is you can probably order copies from the National Gallery Picture Library. [[email protected] - Gen, you're looking inventory number 705] By now we are pretty beat, so we take a long Tube rush hour ride (ick) back, rummage the local grocery store for convenience food for dinner and trundle to Beth's where I happily sit down and soak my feet. Wait, the phone - Beth's back from Estonia, in the Tube and is bringing Dan (of sausage fame) home for further venturing in search of malty goodness. We squeeze one pint in before last call, then pick up more cider in the local convenience store. Do you know they make curry flavored Pringles in U.K.? There are strangely yummy and good with cider. � � � 
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