10 NORTH SHORE BREEZE 
HE coronation of George, and his Queen Mary, a 
few weeks hence will be one of the notable 
events of the century, and in spite of our dem- 
ocratic notions, the people of the United States 
are intensely interested in the coming ceremony. Al- 
though many of the feudal rites and usages have been 
swept away, the coronation will smack of much that is 
old and superstitious. When George the V comes to the 
Collegiate Church of St. Peter in Westminster—which 
we know as Westminster Abbey—to be crowned King 
and Emperor, he will be seated on a curious old stone 
which is firmly fixed in the seat of the coronation chair, 
and which has been used in royal crownings for many 
centuries. ‘The sovereigns of England have been crowned 
in this same old Abbey, usually by the Archbishops of 
Canterbury, and on this same old 
stone since the days of Edward I. 
Indeed the coronation would be 
incomplete, if not illegal, were the 
ceremony of sitting on the stone 
omitted. Just where the stone 
originally came from may never 
be known but Celtic historians 
claim to have memories of it for 
two thousand years or more. 
Dean Stanley says, “It is the one 
primeval monument which binds 
together the whole empire. The 
iron rings, the battered surface, 
the crack which has all but rent its 
solid mass asunder, bear witness to 
its long migrations.” 
Its early history is largely one 
of tradition and romance, and the 
Irish and Scotch have many curi- 
ous legends concerning it. Jacob 
is said to have used the stone as a 
pillow when he lay down to sleep 
on the plain that memorable night 
as he was on his way from Beer- 
sheba to Padanoran in search of a 
wife. After his remarkable dream 
and great promise he set the stone 
up as a pillar, “poured oil upon 
the top of it, and called the place 
Beth-el.” ‘Tradition asserts that 
this “stone of the testimony” was 
carefully preserved by the Jewish 
people and was used in the coronation ceremonies of their 
kings. When Jerusalem became the prey of Babylon, 
it was concealed and taken to Egypt by Jeremiah the 
prophet, and deposited in the palace of ‘Taphanes, from 
whence it was conveyed to Ireland. ‘The legend has it 
that Jeremiah was accompanied by Circa, the young sister 
of Zedekiah, who married Heremon the son of King 
Milesius, from which union the Scotch kings traced their 
descent. 
During the reign of Heremon, who had been crowned 
cu the royal stone, a colony of Irish Scoti, or Scots, 
crossed over to Alban, which centuries later became known 
as Scotland, and established themselves in Argyleshire. In 
the fourth century these Irish gaels invited Earca, the 
Che Coronation Stone at Westminster 
BY JAMES M. CHUTE 
CORONATION CHAIR 
PHOTO DRAWING 
King of Ireland, to send them his son Fergus to rule over 
them. Irish historians tell us that Fergus, bearing with 
him the Liah-fail or stone of destiny, set sail from the 
biack cliff-walls of Antrim and landed at the sacred isle 
of Icolmkill, ‘The stone was set up in the monastery and 
upon it he was crowned the first king of Scotland. 
W yntoun, in his old chronicle says: ‘Fergus broucht this 
stane wythin Scotland fyrst quhen he come and wane that 
land, and first it set in Ikkolmkill.” ‘The old historian, 
Kolinshed, in speaking of the stone says that Gathelus, a 
Greek, the son of Cecrops, came into possession of it 
through having married Scota the daughter of Pharaoh. 
He resided some time in Egypt but was induced to move 
into the west by the judgments pronounced by Moses 
against the country. Assembling a great fleet and a 
multitude of followers, he passed 
out of the Nile and shaped his 
course westward. Passing the pil- 
lars of Hercules, he ‘landed in 
Iberia and built a city called 
Brigantia (compostella). Here he 
was crowned upon the consecrated 
stone “gave lawes and ministered 
justice unto his people. And 
hereof it came to passe, that first 
in Spaine, after in Ireland, and 
then in Scotland, the kings which 
ruled over the Scottishmen  re- 
ceived the crowne sittinge upon 
that stone untill the time of Robert 
the First, King of Scotland.” 
King Simon Breck, a descendant 
of Gathelus, carried the stone from 
Spain to Scotia—later to be known 
as Ireland—and set it up in the 
great palace of Tara. Here, so 
runs the legend, the Kings of 
Scotia clothed in royal robes of 
purple and yellow silk and sur- 
rounded by hundreds of retainers 
gorgeous with jewels and em- 
blazonry, were crowned on_ the 
stone of fate with the greatest 
splendor. After the fall of Tara 
the stone was removed to the 
monastery at Cashel, and was long 
used in the coronation of Munster 
kings. 
Fergus carried it to Scotland as an omen of good 
fcrtune and after his coronation at lona, deposited it in 
the great castle at Dunstaffuage. 
Some Irish historians claim that the stone was 
biought into their country by a colony of Scythians, and 
that it had the property of giving forth sounds whenever 
any of the monarchs of that race seated themselves upon 
it ‘The learned ‘Toland says: “the stone was used in 
the coronation of Irish kings at Tara inclosed in a wooden 
chair, and emitted a sound under the rightful candidate 
but was mute under a man of bad title. It is the an- 
cientest respected monument in the world.” Apart from 
legendary history the story of the old coronation stone 
is full of interest. It is to be traced, on the best author- 
