Tea at Trianon: Baptism of Mary I

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, February 22, 2016

Baptism of Mary I

Via Tiny-Librarian:

The little princess was christened three days after her birth. The nobility of England gathered at the royal apartments to form a guard of honour as the baby emerged from the queen’s chamber in the arms of the Countess of Surrey. Beneath a gold canopy held aloft by four knights of the realm, the baby was carried to the nearby church of the Observant Friars. The way to the church had been cleaned, graveled and covered with rushes and the ceremony was carried out with all the pomp and circumstance required.

The procession of gentlemen, ladies, earls and bishops paused at the door of the church, where, in a small arras covered wooden archway, the baby was greeted by her godparents, blessed, and named Mary after her aunt, the Duchess of Suffolk, Henry’s favorite sister. Queen Katherine and her sister-in-law were on very good terms and would remain so, but the Queen was no doubt pleased at the choice of name for religious as well as family reasons. Mary (María) was also the name of her sister the queen of Portugal.

Acting as Mary’s godmothers was her great-aunt, Katherine of York, Countess of Devon, and the Duchess of Norfolk. Her godfather was Henry’s chief minister, Cardinal Wolsey. After prayers were said and promises made, Mary was plunged three times into the font water, anointed with the holy oil, dried, and swaddled in her baptismal robe. As Te Deums were sung, she was taken up to the high altar and confirmed under the sponsorship of Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury. Finally, with the rites concluded, her tittle was proclaimed to the sound of the heralds’ trumpets:

God send and give good life and long unto the right high, right noble and excellent Princess Mary, Princess of England and daughter of our most dread sovereign lord the King’s Highness.
Once the ceremony was complete, the little princess was returned to her mother in the Queen’s chamber at Greenwich Palace. (Read more.)