What's the provenance for the locket of Edward IV's hair at the Society of Antiquaries of London

So, Anooshka the Society of Antiquaries has got in its collection some of Edward IV's hair. So where did it come from?

Well, the lovely thing about the Society is that we can link objects from our museum collection to documents in our library collection. One of the best sources that we have is the meticulous notes that were taken, the minutes taken during Society meetings. We know that Edward's tomb was opened on Friday the 13th, in 1789, and the superintendent of works, who was Henry Evelyn took really detailed drawings of what he saw.

It's also highly likely that the Dean of Windsor was present, and he was a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and on the 4th of March 1790 he communicated to the Society further information about the discovery.

So, if we go to the section of the minutes that relate this, we can see that a letter was read from the Lord Bishop of Carlisle, who was also the Dean of Windsor, to the president as follows, and he outlines Mr Evelyn's discovery.

What he also notes is, your Lordship will also receive a paper in which you will find some of King Edward's hair and a few small bits of the Queen's wooden coffin.

Excellent.

So, we know that the hair was sent to the Society direct from the Bishop of Carlisle, who was also the Dean of Windsor. He was likely to have been present when Edward's tomb was opened.

That’s excellent.

And the nice thing as well is that the Bishop of Carlisle, who's communicating this to the president was also a Fellow of the Society. So, he would have understood the importance and significance of ensuring that material culture, so physical objects, had a context and a backstory and this is what he's providing here, he's providing the detailed accounts, by Evelyn, of the discovery. So, that's the really important link.

[cenedra]

Would love for a few royal tombs to be opened today.. so many questions. I know the permission will never be given but it's good to dream.. side note, Edward IV has got to be the most underrated monarch, barely anything is known about his achievements ☀️☀️☀️

[peteg]

I find it fascinating that there was this "fad" in the late 18th century to open all these high-status tombs and poke around - basically for the sake of curiousity and nothing else. Crazy.

[JB-fvvx]

send some to Ed Green! (Or collaborate w Ed Green etc.)