Majestie: The King Behind the King James Bible by David Teems

Author:David Teems [Teems, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Published: 2010-10-19T06:00:00+00:00

Once the king was in town, he was forced to turn around and leave again, and at the presence of yet another bully. It wasn’t the Kirk this time, or a pack of growling nobles. It wasn’t some raging pulpiteer, or another ambitious gamesman with his eye on the crown. It was a much bigger threat than any of these, and more deadly. It fed where it wanted, and did not discriminate between noble or commoner, royal or anyone else.

The early reign of James I of England was plagued with, well, the plague. It would come and go but not without leaving a trail of dead in its wake. Its feeding habits varied, but between 1563 and 1603 there were five major outbreaks,31 the worst year being 1603, the year of our king. From April to December that same year there were more than thirty thousand deaths in London due to plague. The numbers were staggering, and its presence upset everything, all the wheels and pulleys that make a kingdom run.

And run they did. Nobles fled to country estates. Acting troupes went on tour. Even the preachers, the men of God who railed about the plague being the scourge of an angry God, who preached that the righteous need not fear; they, too, fled the city, or some did. For some good pastors stayed with their troubled flocks, and some died of the disease themselves. Their names were not recorded, nor were they given any just tribute.

If you had the means, you could flee. If you did not, you went nowhere. You took your chances. Of course flee, is an interesting choice of words. For the thing rode into town on the grizzly pelt of a rat, and there were lots of rats. Still, in spite of the whimsical mood of the Bubonic Plague (Yersinia pestis), James and Anne were crowned 25 July 1603 in a “sadly empty”32 Westminster Abbey. It was not unlike his first coronation in Scotland thirty-five years earlier, only this time he didn’t sleep through it. The death toll was around twenty a day by that time, so the usual traffic was forbidden. It took almost another year for the plague to recede, but it did.

Elizabeth did have her funeral. It took place a little more than a month after she died. Custom dictated the delay.

The coffin was taken at night, on a barge lit by torches, to Whitehall, where it lay in state in a withdrawing chamber, attended round the clock by many lords and ladies. It was then moved to Westminster Hall, where it lay “all hung with mourning; and so, in accordance with ancient custom, it will remain, until the King gives the order for her funeral.”33

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