#saint thomas becket

[illustratus]

The Canterbury Pilgrims by Paul Hardy

[angevinyaoiz]

I'd be appalled if I saw you ever try to be a saint / Couldn't fall for someone I thought couldn't misbehave / I want you to know that I've had no love like your love

[alaskanbby]

No one out here doing it like the people writing either fanfic about the movie Becket or straight up writing rpf about my Roman Empire: Thomas Becket

[juliehowlin]

St Thomas Becket

Today is the feast day of St Thomas Becket of Canterbury, venerated as a saint and martyr by both the Catholic and Anglican Churches. His conflict with Henry II, King of England, over the rights and privileges of the Church led to his murder by followers of the king in Canterbury Cathedral. T.S. Eliot's play Murder in the Cathedral, tells his story.

10 facts about him:

[portraitsofsaints]

Saint Thomas Becket 1118 - 1170 Feast day: December 29 Patronage: secular clergy; Portsmouth, England; Exeter College, Oxford, England

Thomas Becket, also known as Saint Thomas of Canterbury, was Archbishop of Canterbury, from 1162 until his murder in 1170. He is venerated as a saint and martyr by both the Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion. He engaged in conflict with Henry II of England over the rights and privileges of the Church and was murdered by followers of the king who split his skull with their swords as he knelt before the altar at Canterbury Cathedral. {website}

[zurich-snows]

Part of a pilgrim badge from the shrine of St Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral. This badge depicts part of the scene of Thomas Becket returning from exile in France and refers to his journey from Sandwich to Canterbury on horseback. All that remains of this badge is Becket’s dappled horse and the lower part of Becket’s body. Becket’s cloak hangs in folds across the saddle and his right leg is stretched out straight ahead. He wears pointed shoes. 

Thomas Becket was born in London in 1118. He became a royal official and a great friend of King Henry II. He was made Archbishop of Canterbury in 1162. He argued with King Henry II, and fled to France in 1164. Thomas Becket returned to Canterbury in 1170 and was killed in the cathedral by four knights who thought this would please the king. People were outraged at the murder of an archbishop on holy ground and Becket was made a saint. He became one of the patron saints of London. Many Londoners travelled to Canterbury to pray at the shrine there and bought badges and ampullae (small bottles for holy water) as souvenirs of their pilgrimage.

Late Medieval; late 14th century

[catholic-saint-tournament]

Vote for St. Thomas a Beckett! Anyone who could still piss off Oliver Cromwell 350 years after his death at least deserves a chance!

YASS YESS YISSSS THOMAS BECKET!!!!! send more propaganda for him!!!

another vote recorded :)

[thepastisalreadywritten]

SAINT OF THE DAY (December 29)

St. Thomas was born around the year 1117 in London, England.

He was the son of pious parents. His mother converted to Christianity through the example and teachings of his father.

From his early youth, Thomas was educated in religion and holiness.

After his childhood, Thomas was taught at a monastery, and later, at a school in London.

After the death of both his parents, Thomas decided to finish his schooling by studying canon law.

He was successful in his studies and was made secretary to one of the courts of London.

After working for a while at law, Thomas decided to dedicate the rest of his life to God and began to work towards ordination.

In all that he did, Thomas diligently applied himself and became well known as a holy and honest worker.

His work came under the scrutiny of his friend, King Henry II.

In 1157, Thomas was asked to serve as Lord Chancellor to the king. After the bishop of Canterbury died, Henry sought to elect Thomas to the position.

In 1162, this suggestion was accepted by a synod. Thomas warned the king that it might cause friction and conflict of interests, but nevertheless accepted the position.

Thomas served as bishop by seeking to help the people and develop his own holiness.

He practiced many penances and was very generous to the poor with both his time and his money.

As Henry's reign continued, he began more and more to exercise his hand in Church affairs.

This caused many disagreements with Thomas, and after one especially trying affair, he retired for a while to France.

When Thomas returned to England, he again became involved in a dispute with the king.

Some of the king's knights saw this as treason, and as a result, they killed Thomas in his own Church.

From St. Thomas, the modern Catholic can find inspiration to be courageous in their steadfastness with what they know to be right and holy.

[catholicsaintquotes33ad]

St. Thomas Becket Ora Pro Nobis

[cruger2984]

THE DESCRIPTION OF SAINT THOMAS BECKET Feast Day: December 29

"Wait the end with joy. It is the end which characterizes everything and which tests a man's expectations."

Pictured above is from the 1964 film starring the late Richard Burton.

Born in London in 1118, Thomas was of Norman stock. He was initiated into an ecclesiastical career at a young age. Trained in the abbey of Merton, he later studied in France and at the University of Bologna and soon distinguished himself for his intellectual qualities. In 1154 he became archdeacon of the diocese of Canterbury and the following year, the new king of England, Henry II, appointed him chancellor of the realm. Thomas was the king's most trusted man. He lived a comfortable life, and did not disdain the symbols and privileges of power. However, the future Saint did not fail in generosity towards the poor, and showed an inner freedom even in the face of the sovereign, to whom he was not only a counselor, but also a trusted friend.

The turning point in the life of Thomas Becket took place in 1161 when he accepted election as Archbishop of Canterbury. That appointment was strongly advocated by King Henry, who would never have thought of finding a proud adversary in the man, who was once his closest collaborator. Thomas, however, was from then, on, a servant first of a man far greater than the king of an earthly state. The contrast intensified when Henry II sought to limit the freedom and independence of the Catholic Church in England, through the Clarendon Constitutions.

The king asked Thomas to sign the Charter to limit the prerogatives of the Church, but found an insurmountable bulwark in the new Archbishop of Canterbury. Thomas refused decisively: 'In the name of God Almighty, I will not put my seal.' The old friend thus becomes, in the eyes of the king, a bitter enemy.

Thomas would know the bitterness of exile: after a trial, he fled to France and was first the guest of a Cistercian monastery in Pontigny, for two years. He would spend six years away from his homeland, all told. When he returned to Canterbury he met the joyful reception of the faithful, but an even deeper aversion from the Crown.

It is said that one day Henry II exclaimed in exasperation, words to the effect of, 'Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest!' - an exhortation taken literally by four knights who left London for Canterbury.

Thomas Becket was barbarously killed by stabbing inside his Cathedral. It was December 29, 1170.

It is said that the question of the murderers: 'Where is Thomas the traitor?' was answered with: 'I am here, though I am not a traitor, but a bishop and priest of God.'

The commotion aroused by this killing was immense, reaching far beyond the borders of England, so much so that only three years later, on 21 February 1173, Pope Alexander III recognized his martyrdom, elevating him to the honor of the altars.

Source: Vatican News

[janusfranc15]

We made a Model depicting the Murder of Thomas a Becket in School. Using Eggs. The broken one was Becket.

(To elaborate a bit, Becket was a Catholic Medieval Archbishop who was given the role by his friend, The King. With the idea that this would smooth over the reforms King Henry wanted to do. This did not. Becket took the job. A lot more seriously than expected. No Corruption. No Favours.

Eventually things boiled over and a group of Knights marched into Canterbury Cathedral and sliced off the top of his skull. Brains everywhere. He became venerated so quickly after that the church kind of had to canonise him due to his popularity.

Henry went on a lengthy penance as a consequence of this, voluntarily. His side of the story was that the assassination was the result of his Knights hearing him yell ‘who will rid me of this Turbulent Priest’ and.. deciding to do something about it.

It’s a shame we didn’t do Eggs And Soldiers though. That would have been funny.

what

[illustratus]

The Murder of St Thomas à Becket by Albert Pierre Dawant

[incomingalbatross]

Traditional feast days within the Twelve Days of Christmas:

December 25: Christmas Day, the Nativity!

December 26: St. Stephen the first martyr

December 27: St. John the Evangelist

December 28: The Holy Innocents, murdered by Herod

December 29: St. Thomas a Becket and David

December 30: The Feast of the Holy Family (traditionally celebrated on the Sunday within the Octave, but on this day if there is no such Sunday)

December 31: St. Sylvester I, pope during the reign of Constantine and the Council of Nicaea

January 1: Octave-Day of the Nativity, traditionally the Feast of the Circumcision (and now of Mary, Mother of God)

January 2: Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus

January 3: Traditionally no particular saint (that I can find)

January 4: Traditionally no particular saint (now St. Elizabeth Ann Seton)

January 5: St. Telesphorus (second-century pope and martyr) and St. Edward the Confessor (King of England 1042-1066)

January 6: Epiphany! Feast of the Coming of the Magi, the Baptism of Our Lord, and the Wedding at Cana

(An eagle-eyed observer may note that there are thirteen days on this list. Opinions differ slightly as to whether the Twelve Days begin on the 26th or end on the 5th, but I don't think it matters terribly.)

(Also I probably missed some feast days.)

[transdimensional-void]

If I ask nicely will you yap about the plantagenets? Maybe some rec'd reading? :D

red! yes, yes i will yap about the plantagenets with only minimal prodding!

i'll start off with the disclaimer that i'm no historian and have not read a ton of books about this topic. a lot of what i've learned has been through documentaries rather than books, but i'll give my few recs at the end.

OKAY, so i think the plantagenet dynasty was the main family grrm had in mind when he created the targaryens. the dynasty's founding had its origins in a period of english history known as the anarchy, which was the inspiration for the dance of the dragons, and the dynasty ended with the end of the wars of the roses, which was a major inspiration for the events of asoiaf.

the dynasty ruled england for over 300 years (from 1154 to 1485), and there was like sooooo much war, both internally and externally during that time period. the plantagenets obviously had a massive influence on the political, economic, and cultural development of england, considering how long they ruled.

so here's some of my favorite plantagenets to yap about:

henry ii - he was the first ruler of the dynasty, and nowadays is best known for maybe possibly ordering the murder of his best friend/archbishop of canterbury, thomas becket. the guys murdered him literally INSIDE the cathedral while he was performing mass. so then the king had to be like "oopsie. i'll just do a quick penance, shall i?" and thomas becket was made a saint as like an apology.

edward ii - was he a disaster bi or were those guys really just his good friends? we don't know! but we DO know that he liked his really good friends so much that he did not care about anything else and was such a terrible king that everyone attempted to depose him from his nobles to his own cousin to, eventually, his own wife and son! in which they succeeded! and then his wife had him discreetly murdered in prison and served as regent for their son until he came of age.

isabella of france, the she-wolf of france - the aforementioned wife! she was forced to marry this guy when she was 12, made the best of a bad situation and even had uneasy alliances with her husband's "good friends" until the second one purged her household and kidnapped her children to reduce her power. and THEN she recruited her brother (the king of france) her husband's exiled number 1 enemy (who became her lover), her 12-year-old son (the heir to her husband's throne), and a mere 700 mercenaries to depose her husband. and succeeded! what a woman.

edward iii - aforementioned 12-year-old son, who went on to be remembered as one of england's most effective kings. he made peace with scotland for a while (after killing a lot of scottish people and trying to put his own puppet monarch on their throne), made peace with france for a while (um while also kicking off the 100 years war lol), handled the black plague (then fixed laborers' wages to pre-plague levels lol), had one of the most harmonious and loving marriages the english monarchy has ever seen, and fought a shit-ton of battles. oh, he also made english the official language of government, since it had been french before!

john of gaunt - edward's third son (to survive to adulthood) who eventually became the wealthiest and most influential noble in all of england, the duke of lancaster, through his marriage to his beloved first wife, blanche of lancaster. he was patron to geoffrey chaucer (he of the "canterbury tales," which were about a bunch of pilgrims on their way to the shrine of saint thomas, that guy maybe killed by henry ii!), who eventually became his brother-in-law! after blanche's death, john began a decades-long love affair with his daughters' nanny, katherine swynford, who gave birth to four illegitimate children for him, who took the surname beaufort. eventually, he married katherine as his third wife and had the pope legitimize their children. AND IT WAS THROUGH THOSE CHILDREN THAT THE TUDORS GOT THEIR CLAIM TO THE THRONE A CENTURY LATER!!

henry iv - john of gaunt's eldest son and heir to the title of duke of lancaster. as a child, henry was friend to his cousin, richard, who was second in line to the throne. then richard's father and grandfather both died, and richard became king at only 10 years old. he ended up being a pretty terrible king (and might have had some sort of personality disorder), which led henry to eventually oppose him along with a bunch of other nobles, including one of their uncles. so richard banished him, and when john of gaunt died, richard refused to let henry inherit. but the thing was, pretty much everybody hated richard, and lots of people liked henry. so henry waited until richard had popped over to conquer ireland and quietly sailed to england and was like, "ha ha, i'm only here to claim my inheritance uwu," and then he gathered an army and took the throne with pretty much zero resistance. and when richard returned, he arrested him, forced him to publicly accept henry as king, imprisoned him in a castle being overseen by his stepbrother (katherine swynford's son!), and then richard ~mysteriously died~ in prison. oops. but the funniest thing was that HENRY WASN'T EVEN NEXT IN LINE TO THE THRONE SINCE HIS DAD WAS ONLY THE THIRD SON!! i smell a succession dispute brewing... (there was. this is what sowed the seeds for the wars of the roses that raged throughout the 15th century.) oh, also, henry's legitimized bastard siblings, the beauforts, helped him gain the throne, but then henry was like, "hmm actually i'm going to unilaterally decree you all excluded from the line of succession. who needs parliament's approval to change the succession? not me!" so lots of people claim that the beaufort line was ineligible to inherit the throne, but it's not really clear that henry even had the authority to exclude them since he did it without parliament's approval. oh, also he was the first king of england who spoke english as his primary language! (edit: should have said the first english king *post-norman invasion to speak english as his primary language. and he definitely was the first to speak MIDDLE english as his primary language).

joan beaufort - okay, so joan was one of the beaufort children of john of gaunt and katherine swynford, and her second marriage was to ralph de neville. at the time she married him, ralph already had EIGHT children from his first marriage, and then she gave birth to at least an additional NINE children for him. NINE. guess which family in asoiaf these two inspired? if you guessed the freys, you were right! joan was the half-sister of the KING, so you can imagine she had some serious connections and influence. and she used them to get REALLY REALLY advantageous marriages for her children. they all married heirs and heiresses who were wards of the crown. and then oopsie daisy her husband's older children from his first marriage got overlooked as his heirs and her son became the heir over his elder brother. this kicked off what became known as the neville-neville dispute, which, due to joan's children all being married into major noble houses, drew a ton of other families into the conflict... which eventually widened into the wars of the roses. well done, joan!

margaret beaufort - margaret was descended from both joan and joan's older brother, john beaufort. toward the end of the wars of the roses, pretty much all of the male claimants from the beauforts' side of the conflict (the lancastrian side) had been killed off. thus, margaret's descent from john of gaunt made her important to the lancastrian side. so, she was married off several times, starting at the age of 1 year old! dear god! the marriage that became her most important, though, was to edmund tudor. she was married to him at the age of 12 and gave birth to his son, her only ever child, at only 13, after which her husband promptly died in battle. that son was henry tudor, who inherited his mother's claim to the throne and thus became the final heir around whom the lancastrian side rallied in the final battle of the wars of the roses... which he won, largely thanks to his mother's tireless efforts to make her son king. which, honestly, if i'd been married off at the age of 1, forced to give birth at 13 almost killing me and permanently damaging my body, i'd want something to show for it too! well done, margaret!

oh no, i just scrolled up and realized just how much i yapped. feel free to ignore all of this if it's too much for you XD.

anyway, i've enjoyed the documentaries on this channel a lot: https://www.youtube.com/@PeopleProfiles

also, dan jones' four-part series called "britain's bloodiest dynasty," also available on youtube.

my main platagenet blorbo is katherine swynford, so a lot of what i know is from biographies i've read of her, including:

"mistress of the monarchy" by alison weir

"katherine swynford: the history of a medieval mistress" by jeannette lucraft

i also have a book on the wars of the roses that i read years ago, but it's in storage right now, and i don't remember the author's name. the title was just "the wars of the roses."

(sorry again for yapping so much XD. maybe you'll find something interesting or enjoyable here. i hope. thanks for the ask!!)

[apenitentialprayer]

Some major takeaways: First, the coronation ceremony includes aspects that reflect the act of being invested a knight, the act of being married, and the act of being ordained a bishop. Second, and I think this is pretty cool, while the basic structure of the ceremony has been the same for at least a thousand years, we can trace the inclusion of specific elements included in or artifacts used for the ceremony, including:

the investing of knights by the monarch on the eve of their coronation, first started by Henry IV in 1399.

the use of anointing oil, including at one point miraculous oil purported to have been given to Saint Thomas Becket by the Virgin Mary, first used by Henry IV in 1399 and sporadically used since (though I found an article here that says the oil was used actually used in 1318, 1399, and at least once more in 1413)

the playing of Frederick Handel's Zadok the Priest, performed at each coronation since George II's in 1727.

the bestowing of a Sovereign's Orb, "representing the Christian monarch's domination over the secular world," with the orb currently in use being made for the coronation of Charles II in 1661.

the bestowing of a ring on the wedding finger, with the current ring (containing a relic of Saint George) being made for the coronation of William IV in 1831.

the bestowing of a scepter as a symbol of power and justice, the current one being made in 1685 for the coronation of James II in 1685.

the coronation itself, made with a crown. The two most important modern crowns are the Imperial State Crown, created for the coronation of Victoria in 1838 which includes a sapphire taken from a ring of King Saint Edward the Confessor (d. 1066). The other crown was created for Charles II in 1661, incorporating the remnants of a crown destroyed in 1649, a crown that had been made in 1216 for the coronation of Henry III but in turn likely incorporated parts of an earlier Anglo-Saxon crown.

King Charles III will be crowned today. Here's the historical background on the coronation ceremony, and what to expect!

[portraitsofsaints]

Happy Feast Day

Saint Edward the Confessor

1003-1066

Feast Day: October 13

Patronage: difficult marriages, separated spouses, English royal family. Kings.

Saint Edward the Confessor was England’s first Anglo-Saxon and only King to be canonized. This beloved King regained his throne at 40 in which during his reign there was almost an unbroken peace. He repulsed invasions, helped restore the King of Scotland’s throne, was generous to the poor, had a deep piety, purity, and love for God. His touch had the power to heal. St. Peter’s Church at Westminster Abby was built during his reign. He’s represented holding a ring he once offered to St. John disguised as a beggar. In 1163, St. Thomas Becket interred his incorrupt body to Westminster Abbey.

Prints, plaques & holy cards available for purchase. (website)