After this the Mass proceeds, and there is a special Preface. It is
noticeable that all the variable Mass prayers are Roman.
At the end of the rite there is appended a short charge on the three
chief duties of a king, _Rectitudo regis est noviter ordinati ... haec
tria praecepta populo Christiano sibi subdito praecipere_, namely to
secure the peace of Church and people, to repress violence and rapine,
and to be just and merciful. Probably in such words as these the king’s
oath ran. The oath in the next recension is in almost the same words, and
most of the prayers reappear later in other rites. There is no provision
made for the coronation of a Queen consort, just as in the Eastern rite
there is no provision made for the ceremonial crowning of the Empress.
But there seems to have been some prejudice among the Anglo-Saxons
against any very close association of the king’s consort with him on the
throne[70], apparently on account of the matrimonial irregularities of
which Saxon kings were guilty in common with most other Teutonic monarchs.
It is to be noticed that the crown is called the Galeus, a word which
recalls the περικεφάλαιον Καισαρίκιον of the Eastern Emperor. The Saxon
kings of later date called themselves βασιλεῖς. And in the charter of
Burgred and Aethelswyth, to which reference has already been made, one
of the regular Greek terms for the imperial crown is actually used ‘Ego
Burgred rex necnon ego Aethelswytha pari coronata stemma regali Anglorum
regina.’ These facts may possibly indicate the influence of the Eastern
Empire on the courts of the West, though they may simply illustrate the
Latin of the period.
II
The order that marks the second recension of the English rite, and which
is called the Order of King Ethelred, was in all probability that used at
the coronation of Edgar in 973.
In this second recension of the English rite every portion of the older
is represented but there is more solemnity. In the delivery of the
insignia there is a greater formality; and whereas the rite in ‘Egbert’s’
book is simply called _Benedictiones super regem_, in this order it is
called _Consecratio Regis_. Alternative forms are provided, and whereas
in ‘Egbert’ the rite is inserted into the Mass, in later recensions the
whole rite precedes the Mass.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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