The next monument eastward of the Black Prince's is Archbishop
Courtenay's (1396); and beyond this a mean brick mound without
inscription but not without a history. Here lies Odet de Coligny,
brother of the great admiral. Though a prince, a cardinal, an
inquisitor, and a bishop, his sympathies were with the Huguenots, and
he undertook a mission on their behalf to Queen Elizabeth. In the
canonical house, formerly known as Master Omer's, at the southeast
corner of the Precincts, he was poisoned by his servants, whether or
not by foreign instigation is not known. Those were days when the
murderer's hand reached far and freely, especially in causes political
and religious. He was laid here and rudely bricked over, in
expectation of his removal to France; but the French wars of religion
left men no leisure to care for their dead. Against the south wall is
a tomb without inscription and long unidentified. When opened in 1889
there was found, in full pomp of episcopal vestments, pastoral staff,
chalice and paten, wearing a ring graven with strange Egyptian
symbols, Hubert Walter, acclaimed archbishop on the field of Acre and
afterwards the faithful chancellor who kept the kingdom and raised the
ransom for Coeur de Lion. Beside him was a collecting box, perhaps
for Peter's Pence, or for the King's ransom. These relics are kept
under glass in Henry IV's chantry.
East of Trinity Chapel is the circular space called the Corona, or
Becket's Crown, either as the head or crown of Becket's church, or, as
Dr. Cox thinks, because here by the altar to the Trinity was a silver
bust of Becket containing the fragment of his skull cut off by Richard
the Breton's sword. The three most famous objects in the Cathedral are
the site of the shrine, the Black Prince's monument, and the chair of
St. Augustine; and here is the last of the three. In this seat of
Purbeck or Bethersden marble have been enthroned from time immemorial
the Archbishops of Canterbury. If some critics say that it is no older
than the thirteenth century, others say that it was in existence in
the sixth century, when Augustine arrived, and that Kentish kings were
crowned on it. It has always a place in the triple enthronement of an
Archbishop of Canterbury. He is seated on the throne in the choir as
Diocesan Bishop, in the chapter house as titular Abbot, and in St.
Augustine's chair as Primate of All England.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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