Eleanor Crosses
Les sept Montjoies réparties le long de la route de Notre Dame de Paris à la Basilique de Saint-Denis, sont des croix, édicules hexagonaux, élevés le long de l’Estrée, aux endroits où Philippe III le Hardi, portant le corps de son père saint Louis, le 12 mai 1271, arrête le convoi pour se reposer. Par la suite, tous les cortèges funèbres royaux s’arrêtent aux Montjoies de Saint-Denis. Ces édicules hexagonaux portaient sur trois côtés, trois niches contenant trois statues de rois, tournées vers la route et trois niches aveugles vers les champs. Ils seront détruits sous la révolution. On peut savoir à quoi ils pouvaient ressembler, en se reportant aux croix édifiées par Edouard 1er d’Angleterre, sur le modèle même des Montjoies parisiennes, à la même époque, pour rendre hommage à sa femme Eléonore, morte à Lincoln: Il transporta le cercueil d’Eléonore, en procession, à la manière de celle de saint-Louis, de Lincoln à la cathédrale de Westminster à Londres, avec 12 arrêts, sur les lieux de certains desquels se dressent encore ces croix-montjoies dont les statues représentent Eléonore.
Le trajet et les douze arrêts.
The Eleanor crosses were built by Edward I to mark the places where the embalmed body of Queen Eleanor (of Castile) lay each night on its journey to London. She died on 28 November 1290 in Nottinghamshire having had 16 children. Her heart was buried in a Dominican Friary in London and her entrails at Lincoln. The locations of the 12 crosses were as follows: Lincoln, Grantham, Stamford, Geddington, Northampton, Stony Stratford, Woburn, Dunstable, St. Albans, Waltham, Westcheap, and Charing. Extensive details survive for the construction of the crosses between 1291 and 1294.
Today only the crosses at Waltham Cross (Hertfordshire), Geddington, and Hardingstone (both Northamptonshire) remain.
1.2.3. Geddington Cross (Northamptonshire)
The Eleanor Cross, Hardingstone (Northamptonshire)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/66929259@N00/2268632935/
The one at Charing Cross is a reconstruction. It was destroyed in 1647, during the Civil War, and the modern cross of 1863 stands in the forecourt of Charing Cross Railway Station.
http://reference.findtarget.com/search/Charing%20Cross/
After the restoration of the English monarchy in 1666, several regicides were executed on the spot where the old cross stood, and the site is marked by an equestrian statue (1672) in memory of Charles I, who was executed in 1649.
During the 19th and early 20th centuries several replica Eleanor Crosses were erected including those at Ilam in Staffordshire, Walkden (Lancashire), Sledmere (Yorkshire), and Queensbury. The one at Ilam was built in 1840 by Jesse Watts Russell of Ilam Hall to commemorate his wife.
Sources: The Buildings of England, Staffordshire, by Nikolaus Pevsner, Penguin, 1974, ISBN 0 14 071046 9; The Old Parish Churches of Staffordshire, by Mike Salter, Folly Publications, 1996, ISBN 1871731 25 8; The King’s England, Staffordshire, by Arthur Mee, Hodder and Stoughton, London, first published in 1937; Stafford Borough Council Website; Britain Express Web-Site
