WITH just six months to King Charles’ Coronation, the event is already caught up in controversy – over Camilla’s crown.
Charles will be crowned King next May in a slimmed-down ceremony to reflect a Britain in hard times.
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We can expect the length of the historic ceremony to be cut by half and number of VIP guests at Westminster Abbey slashed.
But the event will still be packed with pomp and pageant and cost the country around £100MILLION.
Here Mike Ridley looks at how the Coronation of King Charles will compare to his mother’s ceremony nearly 70 years ago.
What’s this row on Camilla’s crown?
CAMILLA was expected to wear the same crown that Charles’s grandmother, the Queen Mum, wore at George VI’s coronation in 1937.
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Among the 2,800 jewels in the Queen Consort’s crown is the controversial Koh-i-Noor diamond which once belonged to an Indian maharaja.
The priceless jewel was given to Queen Victoria 170 years ago by the mega-rich East India Company but how they came to have it is a mystery.
The Queen Mum received the 150-carat diamond as a gift from her mother-in-law, Queen Mary, and had it set into the crown that Camilla was due to wear at next year’s coronation.
But India would like the incredible diamond back, and there are fears that if Camilla wears it in her coronation crown it could scupper a post-Brexit trade deal between the two countries.
However, a source told The Sun: “I don’t see the coronation planners being deflected from using the 1937 Queen Consort’s crown.
“Also, the provenance of the Koh-i-Noor is always being debated. Many scholars claim that it was illegally acquired from a king who ruled in what is now Afghanistan.
“So even if there was a serious discussion about repatriating it, there would have to be considerable research into who originally owned it.”
If the Operation Golden Orb committee, who plan the coronation, decide not to let Camilla use the Queen Consort’s crown there are alternatives in the royal collection – such as the crown that Queen Mary wore at her husband George V’s coronation in 1911.
But it would need to be modified, because Camilla has a larger head than Queen Mary’s.
Meanwhile, King Charles will wear two crowns during the service.
During the coronation, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby will place St Edward’s crown – made for Charles II in 1661 – on the head of King Charles III.
The solid-gold crown, decorated with 444 precious and semi-precious stones, weighs 5lb.
Royal author Brian Hoey said: “The late Queen practised for her coronation by wearing two-pound bags of sugar on her head and walking around Buckingham Palace to get used to wearing St Edward’s crown.
“Charles doesn’t need to do that. For the rest of the coronation service he will wear the much lighter Imperial State crown, which the Queen always described as her ‘going away hat’.”
Can I go and watch it?
IN 1953 an estimated three million people lined the specially- extended route to see the new Queen’s procession.
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Her journey was five miles long and it took 45 minutes for the procession to pass by, flanked by military personnel.
The 2023 route will be shorter, but it is expected that the procession will still take 40 minutes to pass.
TV viewing figures are expected to match the extraordinary 37million in the UK who watched the Queen’s funeral coverage.
What? It’ll cost £100m?
THE Royal Family pay for weddings but the Government picks up the tab for coronations.
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The Operation Golden Orb committee, which plans the ceremony, estimates that even a slimmed-down coronation could cost around £100million.
In 1953, Britain was recovering from paying for World War Two and there was still food rationing but Winston Churchill’s government spent £1.5million on the Queen’s coronation.
A source said: “In today’s money the 1953 coronation cost around £50million but estimates for King Charles’s are twice that because of things like security, which weren’t such a big issue back then.
“But worldwide TV rights will more than cover the cost and it will be a massive boost to tourism. Hotels are already being booked out for the coronation weekend.”
Will ancient ceremony change?
PLANNING for King Charles’s coronation has been going on for ten years and many of the changes we will see were approved by the late Queen.
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Her coronation went on for well over three hours – but her son’s is expected to be much shorter, lasting between 90 minutes and two hours.
The Queen wore a stunning coronation gown with a 27ft train, which was so heavy she needed a push from one of her ladies-in-waiting to get going. King Charles would like to break with tradition and wear a military uniform.
To shorten the service, some of the rituals will be abandoned, including the moment when the Monarch is presented with a gold ingot weighing exactly 1lb.
In 1953 the Queen made history by allowing TV cameras into the Abbey, but the moment she was anointed by the Archbishop was hidden from view by a cloth screen.
It is still being decided whether this time viewers will be able to see this sacred religious ritual, when the King shows his “humility” by covering his clothes in a plain white tunic.
What will stay the same?
LIKE his ancestors, at his coronation King Charles will sit in King Edward’s Chair, which is more than 700 years old, and he will be anointed with oil from a 900-year-old spoon.
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The chair is named after Edward I, who had it made to hold the Stone of Destiny, the coronation stone which he took from the Scots in battle in 1296. The stone, also known as the Stone of Scone, sat in Westminster Abbey until 1996 when it was returned to Edinburgh. It will be sent back to London for the coronation.
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The oil with which King Charles and Queen Camilla will be anointed is made with musk from African civet cats, and welfare campaigners claim the animals are traumatised when the musk is collected from their glands and want the process stopped.
After he is anointed, King Charles will be dressed in the colobium sindonis – a white linen shift, plus the supertunica – a gold brocade robe, and the girdle.
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He will then be given a set of spurs, a sword and the instruments of state – the sceptre and the orb which were carried on the Queen’s coffin at her funeral last month.
The King’s ring will be placed on the fourth finger of his right hand and he will also wear two armills – golden wrist bands.
Will we see the gold coach?
CHARLES and Camilla will travel to and from Westminster Abbey in the gold state coach that the Queen used for her own ceremony in 1953.
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The four-ton coach, pulled by eight Windsor grey horses, also took part in the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations this year.
Author Brian Hoey said: “At the Queen’s funeral the world saw that nobody does ceremony better than us. They are expecting Britain to do the same again for the King’s coronation.”
Who will be there?
Westminster Abbey was closed for six months ahead of the Queen’s Coronation.
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It was to allow workmen to build tiers of temporary seats for 8,000 people to attend.
Members of the Armed Forces spent hours sitting down and standing up to make sure the seating was safe.
This time only 2,500 guests will be invited into the Abbey – including The Sun’s Arthur Edwards who has been promised a seat after 40 years photographing the royal family.
In 1953 hundreds of hereditary peers, who wore ermine gowns, which they used to hide snacks, attended.
Seventy years later most of the 730 members of the House of Lords are life peers – they will go into a ballot to attend.
Just like at the Queen’s funeral last month royals from around the world – the children and grandchildren of those who were there in 1953 – are expected to attend.
Commonwealth leaders and heads of state, including US President Joe Biden, will also be invited.
What will Wills and Harry do?
Charles was just four when he watched his mother’s Coronation from a gallery inside Westminster Abbey.
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Age 40, his son Prince William will play a major part in the Coronation.
It is understood he will be the King’s liege man and pledge allegiance to the monarch just like his grandfather the Duke of Edinburgh did in 1953.
A source says: “As the son of the sovereign a place and a role has to be found for Prince Harry. What it will be nobody knows and they are still working it out. But Harry, Megan and their children have got to be there.”
Traditionally the children of the sovereign are earls. Will Camilla’s son Tom Parker Bowles and daughter Laura Lopez be given titles?
Will we get a bank holiday?
KING Charles III will break with tradition. Coronations are not normally held at the weekend.
The Queen’s Coronation in June 1953 was a Tuesday and her father George VI was crowned on Wednesday, May 12, 1937.
But Saturday May 6, 2023, was chosen because the date does not clash with the FA Cup Final or the Derby.
Also long range forecasters have predicted the weather will be better next May than in June.
Government, not the royal family select Bank Holidays. Talks are going on in Whitehall on whether to move the May Bank Holiday –currently Monday, May 1 to either Friday May 5 or Monday May 8.
