Individual Details
Richard II "Copped Hat" FITZALAN
(5 Feb 1306 - 24 Jan 1375)
An Arundel Tomb BY PHILIP LARKIN
Side by side, their faces blurred, The earl and countess lie in stone, Their proper habits vaguely shown As jointed armour, stiffened pleat, And that faint hint of the absurd— The little dogs under their feet.
Such plainness of the pre-baroque Hardly involves the eye, untilIt meets his left-hand gauntlet, still Clasped empty in the other; and One sees, with a sharp tender shock, His hand withdrawn, holding her hand.
They would not think to lie so long. Such faithfulness in effigyWas just a detail friends would see:A sculptor’s sweet commissioned grace Thrown off in helping to prolong The Latin names around the base.
They would not guess how early inTheir supine stationary voyageThe air would change to soundless damage, Turn the old tenantry away;How soon succeeding eyes beginTo look, not read. Rigidly they
Persisted, linked, through lengths and breadths Of time. Snow fell, undated. LightEach summer thronged the glass. A bright Litter of birdcalls strewed the sameBone-riddled ground. And up the paths The endless altered people came,
Washing at their identity. Now, helpless in the hollow of An unarmorial age, a troughOf smoke in slow suspended skeins Above their scrap of history, Only an attitude remains:
Time has transfigured them into Untruth. The stone fidelityThey hardly meant has come to be Their final blazon, and to prove Our almost-instinct almost true: What will survive of us is love.
Side by side, their faces blurred, The earl and countess lie in stone, Their proper habits vaguely shown As jointed armour, stiffened pleat, And that faint hint of the absurd— The little dogs under their feet.
Such plainness of the pre-baroque Hardly involves the eye, untilIt meets his left-hand gauntlet, still Clasped empty in the other; and One sees, with a sharp tender shock, His hand withdrawn, holding her hand.
They would not think to lie so long. Such faithfulness in effigyWas just a detail friends would see:A sculptor’s sweet commissioned grace Thrown off in helping to prolong The Latin names around the base.
They would not guess how early inTheir supine stationary voyageThe air would change to soundless damage, Turn the old tenantry away;How soon succeeding eyes beginTo look, not read. Rigidly they
Persisted, linked, through lengths and breadths Of time. Snow fell, undated. LightEach summer thronged the glass. A bright Litter of birdcalls strewed the sameBone-riddled ground. And up the paths The endless altered people came,
Washing at their identity. Now, helpless in the hollow of An unarmorial age, a troughOf smoke in slow suspended skeins Above their scrap of history, Only an attitude remains:
Time has transfigured them into Untruth. The stone fidelityThey hardly meant has come to be Their final blazon, and to prove Our almost-instinct almost true: What will survive of us is love.
Events
| Birth | 5 Feb 1306 | Arundel, Sussex, England |  | ||
| Marriage | 5 Feb 1344 | Ditton, England - Eleanor "Van Lancaster" PLANTAGENET | | ||
| Death | 24 Jan 1375 | Arundel Castle, Rochford, Sussex, England, Great Britain | | ||
| Burial | Chichester, Chichester District, West Sussex, England | |
Families
| Spouse | Eleanor "Van Lancaster" PLANTAGENET (1318 - 1372) |
| Child | Sir John Beaumont FITZALAN 1st Baron Arundel (1348 - 1379) |
| Father | Edmund FITZALAN (1285 - 1326) |
| Mother | Alice DE WARREN (1286 - 1338) |
Endnotes
1. Ancestry.com, UK and Ireland, Find A Grave Index, 1300s-Current (Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012).
2. Ancestry.com, Web: Netherlands, GenealogieOnline Trees Index, 1000-2015 (Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014).
3. Ancestry.com, UK and Ireland, Find A Grave Index, 1300s-Current (Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012).
4. Heritage Consulting, Millennium File (Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2003).