BOOKS Great Usurper

Cromwell: The Lord Protector By Antonia Fraser Knopf, 774 pp., $12.50 The skull of Oliver Cromwell came, quite recently, after many strange vicissitudes, into the keeping of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. Beside the chapel entrance there is now an oval plaque, which reads: “Near to this place was buried on 25 March 1960 the head of Oliver Cromwell Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Fellow Commoner of this College 1616-17.” The operative word is “near.” The College authorities prudently decided that, if the exact spot were known, Cromwell’s unquiet remains might again be desecrated, either by lighthearted undergraduates or by serious Royalists.

So strong are the feelings which, after three hundred years, the name of Cromwell still provokes. On the anniversary of the execution—or, as Royalists would say, the martyrdom—of Charles I, the King’s statue in London is always adorned with bunches of flowers and touching messages of loyalty. There are keen Cromwellians too, though not as many.

AL

About the Author

Anthony Lejeune

Featured Tags

Cromwell: The Lord Protector By Antonia Fraser Knopf, 774 pp., $12.50 The skull of Oliver Cromwell came, quite recently, after many strange vicissitudes, into the keeping of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. Beside the chapel entrance there is now an oval plaque, which reads: “Near to this place was buried on 25 March 1960 the head of Oliver Cromwell Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Fellow Commoner of this College 1616-17.” The operative word is “near.” The College authorities prudently decided that, if the exact spot were known, Cromwell’s unquiet remains might again be desecrated, either by lighthearted undergraduates or by serious Royalists.

So strong are the feelings which, after three hundred years, the name of Cromwell still provokes. On the anniversary of the execution—or, as Royalists would say, the martyrdom—of Charles I, the King’s statue in London is always adorned with bunches of flowers and touching messages of loyalty. There are keen Cromwellians too, though not as many.