IV.—The Funeral, Monument, and Chantry Chapel of King Henry the Fifth. By W. H. St. John Hope, Esq., Litt.D., Hon. D.C.L. (Dunelm). Read 5th February and 12th February, 1914.

So much has been written about the abbey church of Westminster and the historical monuments wherewith it is filled that to most people it may seem superfluous to write anything more about it. But asa matter of fact the Abbey and its church are still an architectural and archaeological mine that has really been little worked scientifically, and it is for that reason that I venture to lay before the Society of Antiquaries, which has always had a special interest in Westminster Abbey, some notes upon the funeral, the tomb or monument, and the chantry chapel of King Henry V.

1. The King’s Funeral.

The French chronicler’s statement as to the route taken by the funeral procession after its arrival in England (but not through London) is confirmed by a document that may be taken next in order.

This is an entry on the Issue Roll reciting a payment of £300 12s 6d to Simon Prentot, ‘wexchaundeler’ of London,

for divers herses to be made by himat Dover, Canterbury, Ospringe, Rochester, Dartford, St. Paul’s London, and at Westminster, for the funeral of the most excellent prince and lord King Henry the fifth, brought from the parts of France through the vills and cities aforesaid and to be buried at Westminster aforesaid¹.

Note 1. 'On the 26th day of September.

Regarding various services to be performed by him at Dover, Canterbury, Horsham, Rochester, Dartford, St. Paul's in London, and Westminster for the funeral of the most excellent prince and lord, King Henry the Fifth, coming from the regions of France to England, to be conducted through the aforementioned towns and cities and to be buried at the aforementioned Westminster.

‘Die... xxvj° die Septembris.

Pro diversis herceis per ipsum apud Dovorr Cantuair Hospring Rouchestr Dertford Sanctum Paulum London. et Westmonasterium fiendis pro funere excellentissimi principis et domini Regis H. quinti de partibus Francie in Angliam per villas et Civitates predictas sic ducend et apud Westmonasterium predictum sepeliend.’ Issue Roll (Pells), ro Henry V, Easter, No. 645.

For the carriage and other necessaries of these herses and other lights for the said king's funeral, John Baldok, Roger Wylles, and John Redy were to provide all things, and to carry them from the city of London to the town of Dover and back again¹.

Note 1. 1422, 15th October.

'To arrange and expend for the carriages and other necessities for the funeral procession and other lights around the funeral of our dearly beloved lord and father who has passed away, within the liberties, etc., to be reasonably paid for from our money in this matter, to be arrested and collected. And to be carried from our city of London to the town of Dover and from that town back to the said city.'

‘Ad cariagia et alia necessaria pro herceis et aliis luminaribus circa funus carissimi domini et Patris nostri defuncti disponendis et expendendis infra libertates etc. pro denariis nostris in hac parte rationabiliter solvendis arestandum et capiendum. Et ea a civitate nostra Londofi usque villam Dovorrie et a dicta villa usque dictam civitatem revertendo cariandum.’ Rymer, Foedera, x, 255.

The average cost of the seven herses to be provided by Simon Prentot was just under £43, but there is no need to assume that they were all of equal magnificence. That provided at St. Paul’s for the funeral of King Edward III cost only £11, while on that set up for him at Westminster £59 16s 8d were spent. And it will be shown presently that after King Henry's burial his executors compounded with the abbot and convent of Westminster for £ 53 6s 8d for the herse and 200 torches. The seventh herse must therefore have exceeded the others in splendour.

There is one mistake in the Frenchman’s account, in the date which he gives for the arrival of the pageant in London. This he states was on the evening of St. Martin in hieme, that is, the 11th of November. But we shall see presently that the king’s body reached Westminster on Friday, 6th November,and was buried on Saturday the 7th. The procession must therefore have reached St. Paul’s on the evening of Thursday the 5th; and if it rested a night at Dartford, Rochester, Ospringe, and Canterbury, it should have arrived at Dover on the 31st of October, exactly two months after King Henry’s death.

The Latin account of the king’s funeral is to be found in the Aizsfory of England of Thomas of Walsingham, who writes of the grief of his subjects for King Henry’s death, of the honours paid to his memory by the French people, and of their desire to have him buried in France. He describes shortly the bringing over of the king’s body into England, and lastly his funeral in terms which I have ventured to translate:

The equipment of the dead King, if it would please you to know, was as follows: There was placed upon the chest in which his body was, a certain image very like in stature and face to the dead King, arrayed in a long and ample purple mantle furred with ermine, a sceptre in one hand, and a round gold ball with a cross infixed in the other; with a gold crown on the head over the royal cap, and the royal sandals on his feet. And in such wise he was raised on a charet that he might be seen of all, that by this means mourning and grief might grow, and his friends and subjects might the more kindly beseech the Lord on his soul’s behalf. Moreover, there was borne a thousand torches, carried by venerable persons about his body, and golden and silken cloths were offered for the same. There were also led to the high altar of Westminster three dextriers with their riders, as is customary, [word omitted] with the arms of the King of England and France, [and] very excellently armed. And thereupon the riders were there despoiled, their arms utterly taken away, besides the banners that were borne about the body of the dead man, containing the arms of St. George, of England and France, and images of the Holy Trinity and of St. Mary.

And so the body of the said King is brought to the monastery and, with the service of the prelates and chief men of the realm, was honourably buried among the Kings of England there between the shrine of St. Edward and the chapel of the Holy Virgin, in the place where the relics were kept there¹.

Note 1. Appendix B.

The fourth account of the funeral is by Edward Hall, in his Union of the two noble & illustre famelies of Lancastre and Yorke¹. He states that the king’s body ‘was embaumed and closed in lede’, and laid in a ‘charet’ with a representation of the king; but the charet, he says,

was drawen with syxe horses richly trapped wt severall armes, the first wyth the armes of S. George, the .ij. with tharmes of Normandy, the .iij. with the armes of King Arthur, the .iiij. wyth the armes of S. Edward, the fyft wyth the armes of Fraunce onely, and the syxt with the armes of England and Fraunce.

Hall also states that the banners of the saints were borne by the lords Audley, Morley, Lovel, and Zouch, the king's standard by John lord Dudley, and the king’s banner by the earl of Longueville.

The Hachementes [he continues] wer borne onely by capitaynes to the nombre of .xij. and rounde about the charct rode .ccccc. men of armes al in blacke harnes, & there horses barded blacke wyth the but of their speres upward. ... Besides this, on every syde of the charet went .ccc. persons holdyng long torches, & lordes bearyng baners, banerots & penons. With this funerall pompe he was conveyghcd from Boys de Vincens to Paris, and so to Roan, to Abbevile, to Caleys, to Dover, and so throughe London to Westminster, where he was buried with suche solempne ceremonies, suche mournyng of lordes, such prayer of pryestes, such lamentynge of commons as never was before that daye sene in the Realme of Englande.

Note 1. London, 1548. The Victorious Actes of Kyng Henry the fifth, fol. 1.

Of these accounts, Thomas of Walsingham’s short chronicle 1s of value for its minute description of the king’s funeral effigy. He also refers to the offering of gold and silken cloths, and tells us the devices of the banners carried by the four lords, but there is no evidence to confirm his story of the three dextriers and their riders being led up to the high altar of Westminster and there stripped of their arms and armour.

The Heralds’ College account is of the first importance by reason of its fullness, and it may, I think, be taken as the official record of the conduct and order of ‘thys dolorous dole’, as Hall calls the procession, after its arrival in England.

Whence Hall got his account it would be interesting to know, as it contains several interesting additional facts, but there is a curious discrepancy between his and the Heralds’ College account as to the number of the horses that drew the charet. The Frenchman distinctly states that only four horses were used in France, but the Heralds’ College account enumerates five, and Halls six.

There arises a further question as to the arms on the horses’ trappers. The French chronicler calls them ‘the old arms of England’, the king’s own arms of France and England quarterly, the undifferenced arms of France, and the arms of King Arthur, which he describes as ‘a shield of azure with three crowns of gold’. These last are, of course, what we should call the arms of St. Edmund, and possibly the ‘old arms of England’ were those of St. Edward rather than st. George. The Heralds’ College account describes the trappers of the five horses as bearing the arms of St. George, of England, of St. Edmund, of England again, and of St. Edward; while Hall decks his six horses in trappers of ot. George, Normandy, King Arthur, St. Edward, France, and England quartering France. If by Normandy is meant the leopards of England, and King Arthur's arms are again St. Edmund’s, then Hall agrees with the Frenchman, but he adds England and St. George. The Heralds’ College account, too, would fall into line if we may assume that the second trapper of England was actually of France and England quarterly, and that a sixth horse with a trapper of France has been overlooked by the chronicler.

Now what is the meaning of this account? I think it points, first, to the provision of such new things as were deemed necessary to freshen up the funeral pageant, after its two months’ journey through France, for its passage through Kent and London; and secondly, but chiefly, to the decoration, over and above the wax chandlery of Simon Prentot, of the seven herses, which had to be ready against the arrival of King Henry's body in England.

As regards the first point, it will be noticed that whether on account of our hilly roads, or for the more honour and glory of the pageant, the charet was now to be drawn by two more horses than when in France, for the account definitely mentions the making of six ‘crests’ with St. George’s arms for six horses, and the covering of six traces for the charet, thus confirming Hall’s statement. Two new trappers were also made with the arms of St. Edward and St. Edmund. For these and the covering of the traces five pieces of rich blue tartaryn were bought.

The rest of the items, with the exception of four bastard saddles with their harness, clearly belong to the herses. Thus the account provides for twenty pieces of short (or narrow) black buckram, and nine pieces of long (or broad) buckram. From these were probably taken the 220 ells for the valances of the herses that were ‘beaten’ or decorated with gold by Thomas Daunt. The scutcheons of the arms of the king and of St. George, the eight banners of the king’s arms, and the sixteen banners of St. Edward and St. Edmund, were no doubt for the decoration of the herses, which would include the tunic and shield with the king’s arms beaten by Daunt, and the crest and helm that he painted. All these ornaments could easily be transported from place to place, as the procession moved on, but the valances covering the herses and their barriers, and the canopied framework of tapers set up by Simon Prentot, were probably separate works at each station.

Both chronicles and documents have now brought us to Westminster, where we can continue the story by the help of the account rolls of the sacrists of the Abbey; and the story that they tell is both interesting and instructive.

The most important of the rolls which have been preserved is that of Roger Cretton, sacrist, for the period from Michaelmas, 1422, to the same date in 1423.

he first of his payments is of £18 6s. for the making of sixty wax torches, which were decorated with arms and shields for 3s. 11a. more. As the amount of the wax was 874 lb., each torch must have weighed about 143lb. They were carried by sixty poor men in black gowns and hoods, who received a shilling apiece for their labour¹.

Note 1. Expense facte circa interlamentum domini regis

In Ix Torchys emptis ponderantibus vilj° di. xxi Ib. Cere precium Centene xlijs. et precium libre iid. ob. xvilj li. vjs.

In lx pauperibus amitis togis nigris portantibus dict. lx torchis Ixs,

Et solut. pro armis et scutis firmatis super dictis Torchys lijs. XJd.

Et solut. ij hominibus portantibus capas usque ad gardinum quondam fratrum predicatorum viijd

Next comes a payment of 8d. to two men carrying copes to a garden formerly belonging to the Friars Preachers, whose house was at Blackfriars. The copes were, no doubt, for the use of the monks, who seem therefore to have met the procession either at St. Paul’s or Ludgate, and, with the sixty torch-bearers, convoyed it to Westminster. [See note 1 above]

For this, the last stage of its journey, the king’s body was again drawn by four horses only, in new trappers with the king's badges, instead of hitherto with his arms.

On arrival at the Abbey the doors of the church were thrown open, and the procession entered, the charet with the coffin, followed by the mourners, being drawn by the four horses up the new nave, now nearly finished through the munificence of the dead king himself, to the entrance of the quire. In connexion with this Roger Cretton’s account has:

In carrying sand and to labourers hired for making a way for bringing in horses into the church, and for straw and hay bought for strewing upon the said way 4s. 4d¹.

Note 1. For the removal of dung and the hiring of laborers to make the road for bringing horses into the church, and for the straw and hay purchased to lay on the said road, 4 shillings and 4 pence.

In zabulo cariando et laborariis conductis pro via facienda pro equis introducendis in Ecclesiam et pro stramine et feno emptis super dictam viam struendis iiijs. iiijd.

At the quire door the representation of the king and his coffin were taken from the charet and borne up to the presbytery, where they were laid within the sumptuous herse which Simon Prentot had set up, probably on abbot Richard of Ware’s mosaic pavement before the high altar.

Of the herse itself no description has come down to us, but it no doubt closely resembled that set up on the same spot a hundred years later for abbot John Islip. The sacrist’s account tells us that it was railed in, like Islip’s herse, by barriers covered with black cloth, and we may assume that the sixty poor men with their great wax torches stood round about it.

How these thirty tapers could be symmetrically arranged I leave to the ingenuity of others to show.

There is nothing in the accounts to tell how long the great herse remained standing, though we may assume that it did so until after the month’s mind, the only entry relating to it being 4 payment of 2s. 8d.

In expenses made upon the chandelers working about the herse and in taking down of the same¹.

Note 1. In the expenses incurred for the Candlestick workers around the herse (or bier) and in the deposition of the same, 2 shillings 8 pence."

In expensis factis super Candelarijs operantibus circa herciam et in deposicione ejusdem ijs. viijd.

On the back of Roger Cretton’s roll is a series of entries of the greatest interest, relating not only to purchases connected with his own office, but giving full particulars of the things used at the funeral, which became, as was customary, the perquisites of the Abbey through having been brought into the church.

First he notes the purchase of two ‘torchys’ for the high altar, and of the sixty torches already noticed that were bought for the king’s funeral¹.

Note 1. Torchys.About the purchase of two torches for the High Altar. About the purchase of sixty torches for the burial of Lord King Henry VI, the former King of England. Total sixty-two torches.

De empcione ut infra ij Torchys pro Magno Altari. De empcione pro interamento domini Regis Henrici vi nuper Regis Anglie lx torchys. Summa lxij Torchys.

Under the heading of ‘timber’ he has two loads onhand. Also by purchase 12 loads of oak timber, and 12 loads of elm timber, ‘and from two loads of oak timber from the barriers made to keep the herse at the time of the burial of the lord King Henry V, as appears below'¹.

Note 1. Timber. Concerning the delivery of 2 loads of timber. About the purchase of 12 loads of oak timber as below. And about the purchase of 12 loads of elm timber as below. And about 2 loads of oak timber resulting from the barriers made to protect the bier at the time of the burial of Lord King Henry V, as appears below. The total: 28 loads of timber.

Meremium. De Rem ij lodys meremij. De empcione ut infra xij lodys meremy quercini. Et de empcione ut infra xij lodys meremij ulmini. Et de ij lodys meremy quercini provenientibus de barruris factis ad salvandam herciam tempore interamenti domini Regis H. v^ti ut patet inferius. Summa xxviij lodys merem.

06 Nov 1422. Next comes a list of the gold cloths (Jann aurei) that were offered on behalf of the King and Queen Katharine (neither of whom was present), and by the lady Joan ‘formerly queen’ (age 52) and twenty other lords and ladies of the realm. The heading is of interest as giving us the exact day of the king’s burial.

Received 222 gold cloths offered both on Friday on the feast of St. Leonard the abbot at Placebo et Dirige and at mass on the morrow on the day of the burial of the lord Henry the fifth formerly King of England.

Since St. Leonard’s day is, and has always been, kept on 6th November, King Henry was buried, as already stated, on Saturday the 7th.

Of the 222 gold cloths, Queen Joan redeemed the twenty-four offered by herself by payment of £33 6s 8d; three more were delivered to the Lord Bourchier; and the Earl of March compounded for the thirteen offered by him in his absence with a gown of cloth of gold of Damascus. The remaining cloths were delivered into the vestry¹.

Note 1. See the complete list in Appendix D.

The vestry also received four great banners, probably those carried by the four lords, with the arms of St. George and of the King, and with images of the Trinity and our Lady, as described by Thomas of Walsingham; also fifteen little banners, probably those of St. Edward and St. Edmund beaten by Thomas Daunt.

The vestry further received thirty-nine ‘pensyles’, a cloth of the Trinity, probably from the charet, and 120 yards of valances.’

Note. This entry has two notes which refer to the preceeding note which we have not included.

The ornaments of the boiled leather representation of the king that lay upon his coffin come next, and are fully described as follows:

Mantle, gown and Kirtle. Also received one long mantle of purple velvet and a gown of the same suit, and a little gown called ‘curtyl’. And they are delivered to the Keeper of the Vestry.

Furring. Also a furring of ermine from the mantle containing (blank) and two furrings of minever from gowns containing within 57 ‘tymberys’ and 12 ‘wombys’. And they are delivered to the Keeper of the Vestry.

Ornaments of gold and silver upon the image "de Curbyl". Also received a crown of silver and gilt with divers stones and perlys weighing 50 ounces a half. Also a long sceptre of silver and gilt weighing 20 ounces. Also a little sceptre with a ball and cross of silver and gilt weighing 53 ounces. Also two armils of silver and gilt with ‘perlys’ and stones weighing 17; ounces. Also a ring with a precious stone weighing — And all delivered to the Keeper of the Vestry.

Lastly, the sacrist accounts for the receipt of the two loads of timber already mentioned derived from the barriers made for the keeping of the herse, and for four score and three yards of black cloth hanging about the herse.'

The sacrist himself kept the timber, but the cloth was divided between the subsacrist, who had four yards, the keepers of the church, who received ten yards, and the rest among poor people and servants.

Some additional information may likewise be gleaned from the foreign receipts on Roger Cretton’s roll. First he has

Also from a fine made with the exccutors of the lord King Henry the fifth for the herse and two hundred torches being in the church at the time of the said King’s funeral. £453 6s. 8d,

but he adds, ‘Nothing so far because it has not yet been paid.’ This amount may be compared with the £59 16s 8d which was the cost of King Edward III’s herse, and the £66 13s 4d which the Abbey had received in place of the herse for Queen Anne of Bohemia.

The second item in the receipts deals with the redemption already noted by Queen Joan of the cloths offered by her.

third item accounts for £9 received for four hundred and a half pounds of wax sold for the keeping of four tapers continually burning for 297 days about the king’s tomb; and a fourth item for 40s received for twenty-four torches lent, and for waste of the same, burning on the anniversary of the lord king both at dirige and high mass this year; 10s were also received by the subsacrist for twenty pounds of wax sold by him at 5d a Ib.

Now reference to the great inventory of the jewels and ornaments of the Abbey which was taken at its suppression² reveals these items:

A cope a chezabull ij tunycles without stolles and phanams of blewe velvett enbrotheryd with anteloppes and mylles of gold the orpherys of grene velvett of the gyfte of Kyng Henry the IV^th.

Another cope and chezabull ij tunycles of grene velvett with the orpherys of blewe velvett wyth anteloppys and mylls and with a stoll and a phanam of grene velvett with rossis and slyppys and an albe to the same belongyng of the gyfte of Kynge Henry the V^th,

The ascriptions of the donors are not very exact, but there cannot be any doubt that these vestments were made from two of the trappers of the horses which brought King Henry’s body into the Abbey, as stated in Peter le Neve’s MS.

There is nothing in the inventory that can be identified with the black trapper with ostrich feathers or the red and black one with white swans. This is not, however, an important matter, since there can be no question that King Henry used as a badge the white swan of his mother, Mary de Bohun, nor is there any difficulty as to the ostrich feathers.

Note 1. M. E.C. Walcott, ‘The Inventories of Westminster Abbey at the Dissolution,’ Transactions of the London and Middlesex Archaeological Soctety, iv, 313.

But the use of the antelope under two differing aspects is matter for discussion. That the king actually did so 1s confirmed by the account given by Hall of the meeting of Henry with the French king at Melans in 1419, where

The King of Englande had a large tent of blewe velvet and grene, richly embrodered with two devices, the one was an Antlop drawing in an horse mill, the other was an Antlop sitting in an high stage wyth a braunche of Olife in his mouthe. And the tente was replenyshed and decked with this poyse:

After busie laboure commeth victorious reste,

and on the top and heygth of the same was set a greate Egle of gold, whose iyes were of suche orient Diamondes that they glystered and shone over the whole felde¹.

Note 1. Edward Hall, The Union of the two noble and illustre famelies of Lancastre and Yorke, etc. (London, 1548). The Victorious Actes of Kyng Henry the fifth, fol. xxxiu, dors. See Hall's Chronicle.

The king’s ‘poyse’ here evidently has reference to his badges: the antelope drawing in a horse-mill representing the ‘busie laboure’, while the same beast sitting in a high stage signifies the ‘victorious reste’. It likewise seems probable that under the guise of an antelope is King Henry himself. There is, however, this curious fact, that whenever the king’s badges are enumerated elsewhere, they usually include a beacon, and as often omit the horse-mill. For the meaning of this beacon various fanciful reasons have been invented, but the point we have to consider is its actual origin.

Now on the king’s chantry chapel (see post) both the swan and the antelope, with crowns about their necks to which chains are attached, occur many times. In the cornice over the altar, and on the north side of the chapel, both creatures are secured by their chains to what are undoubtedly beacons, in the form of a blazing tar-barrel fixed on a pole, with cross-pieces to steady it, and a ladder up to the barrel. On the south side of the chapel the creatures are not fastened to a beacon, but to a bush or tree. We have here, therefore, the antelope again under two differing aspects: chained to a beacon, and chained to a tree, but how can this be reconciled with his drawing in a mill and resting from his labour? ‘The question is complicated by the further fact that when attached to the beacon the antelope is resting on the ground, and when chained to the tree he is sitting on his haunches.

Since we can hardly assume that King Henry V 1s here given an entirely new badge, I venture to suggest that the carver has blundered, first by substituting a beacon for the horse-mill, which is quite intelligible, and then in the pose of the antelope, a mistake that would naturally follow the other, especially in view of limitations of space. The carver probably worked from a rough sketch or ‘plat’ which had been supplied to him, and since the chapel was not begun to be set up until nearly thirty years after King Henry’s death, it is easy to believe that the meaning of his antelope badge had by then been forgotten, and the horse-mill corrupted into a beacon.

There is another treatment of the king’s antelope badge which seems also to have escaped notice. It is to be found in the panels of the vault that carries the chantry chapel over his tomb, and represents an antelope lying down upon the ground, with a towel or napkin about his neck and flung upwards (see fig. 3). The napkin is shown as embroidered with fleurs-de-lis of France and the leopards of England. I know of no other instance of this curious device, but it may be compared with the boar with an armorial mantle attached to his collar, which occurs on the seal of the mayoralty of Calais, and with the lion with a similar mantle of the royal arms to be seen on coins of Edward III.