Edward and Eleanor (oh, and Jules!)

                                      

I was up and out on my bike in the morning sunshine today, venturing round the lanes of North Cumbria. I decided to head towards the coast, cycling towards Burgh by Sands, just outside Carlisle, a village with a royal link.

I quite fancied heading out to see the monument to Edward I. Located on Burgh marsh next to the Solway Firth, just outside the village, I had to walk the last little bit to the monument. Remote as it is, it must have been a bleak day in July 1307 when the King died. The monument, built in 1885, is said to mark the actual spot where he died of dysentry. Edward was on his way to Scotland to sort out Robert the Bruce.

I am part of a facebook group that has been campaigning to save the Northampton Queen Eleanor Cross, located on the edge of the town. One of the few remaining original crosses that Edward commissioned, there were originally twelve, each marking the location where his wife's funeral procession rested on its way to Westminster Abbey. The connection between the two memorials, one plain and austere in the bleak landscape, and the other recently restored to its former glory on the edge of a major East Midlands town, was not lost on me.

It is interesting that Edward I, known as both 'Longshanks' due to his height, and 'the Hammer of the Scots' due to his repeated attacks on Scotland, ended his days in this remote part of the Cumbrian countryside not far from the Scottish border. Meanwhile his french wife, who bore him sixteen children, died in a small Nottinghamshire village, was then embalmed and lovingly transported back to the capital, resting in these twelve locations as it headed to the Abbey. Of the original twelve crosses only three remain - Geddington near Kettering, Hardingstone near Northampton and Waltham Cross. The Cross outside Charing Cross station is a replica but the original gave the area its name.

It's funny how things connect, and this morning I realised that the connection to these two historical figures at that moment in time was me. I was standing next to the Burgh memorial on the marsh taking photographs, and in the past had taken photographs of the Queen Eleanor cross for a Museum-led school project. Yet it was only this morning that I pieced together the connection - the two people who were being commemorated were man and wife, King and Queen, separated by many miles - and here I was, today, linking them both together.

So my Sunday morning bike ride turned into a mini connecting history lesson. Sometimes, life can be quite fascinating...