Austen Saunders

William Rowley and the death of Prince Henry – poetry

‘To the Grave’

Unclasp thy womb, thou mortuary shrine,
And take the worst part of the best we had.
Thou hast no harbourage for things divine,
That thou had’st any part was yet too bad.
Graves, for the grave, are fit, unfit for thee
Was our sweet branch of youthful royalty.




Thou must restore each atom back again
When that day comes that stands beyond all night.
His fame (meanwhile) shall here on earth remain,
Lo thus we have divided our delight:
Heaven keeps his spirit stalled amongst the just,
We keep his memory, and thou his dust.




Prince Henry was the eldest son of James I and VI (that’s first of England, sixth of Scotland). In 1612 he died at the age of eighteen. An extraordinary period of spontaneous popular mourning followed. Henry had been a notably pious Protestant and the relationship between him and his father had become strained. Indeed, his circle of followers had emerged as something as a counterweight to the power of the king. All this encouraged people who hoped that England would one day become a more aggressive champion of Protestantism in Europe. With his unexpected death those hopes seemed suddenly destroyed. Henry’s younger brother became heir to the throne and eventually Charles I. He was much less popular than his brother – perhaps history has proved the English people’s instincts right.

After Henry’s death booksellers knew that there were plenty of customers who’d be interested in buying something on such a sensational subject. Rowley’s poem was printed in one of several commercial offerings, a collection called Great Britaine, all in blacke for the incomparable losse of Henry, our late worthy Prince. It was printed with a striking title-page which is almost entirely black. It would have stood out in the bookshop like a ‘souvenir edition’ of a newspaper today after some notable calamity or death.

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