I realize that some library requests are meant to settle inmate debates and bets, recently the reference desk has received numerous requests about Royal Crowns. One inmate said it was discussion about Lebron James and him wearing a symbolic crown that actually got the men talking about the significance of a Crowns meaning. Many of the men felt that when a king passes the crown is completely destroyed. That no one else will ever touch it. They also felt that the King wears his crown daily. We did look into several books we had in our collection about royalty as well as encyclopedias it was fun to try to get to the bottom of the CROWN. We of course were able to answer some things in 45 minutes but many questions remain.
From Wikipedia we learned that historically:
Three distinct categories of crowns exist in those monarchies that use crowns or state regalia.
- Coronation: worn by monarchs when being crowned.
- State: worn by monarchs on other state occasions. (Note that similar headgear, worn by nobility and other high-ranking people below the ruler, is in English called a coronet, however in many languages the same word is used, e.g., French couronne, German Krone, Dutch kroon.)
- Consort crowns: worn by queens consort, signifying rank granted as a constitutional courtesy protocol.
The coronation crowns were reused for the ceremony each time, they weren’t destroyed when a King passed according to most of our research. However, the jewels were at times sold, or in general many of these ancient crowns no longer exist at all. The men have decided that they are going to research this further and they want the same from me. They want me to go well beyond Wikipedia and there is some hope that we may even get a comment or two on this blog. So stay tuned for our first in depth RESEARCH question.
Today, only the British Monarchy and Tongan Monarchy continue this tradition as the only remaining anointed and crowned monarchs, though many monarchies retain a crown as a national symbol in heraldry. The French Crown Jewels were sold in 1885 on the orders of the Third French Republic, with only a token number, with their precious stones replaced by glass, held on to for historic reasons and displayed by the Louvre. The Spanish Crown Jewels were destroyed in a major fire in the eighteenth century while the Irish Crown Jewels (actually merely the Sovereign’s insignia of the Most Illustrious Order of St Patrick) were stolen from Dublin Castle in 1907.
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