Seven hundred years beneath a throne
Westminster Abbey was consecrated on 28 December 1065, just days before the death of its founder, Edward the Confessor. It would become the coronation church of English — and later British — monarchs, and for 700 years it housed one of Scotland's most sacred objects: the Stone of Destiny, sitting beneath the Coronation Chair as a symbol of English dominion over Scotland.
The Stone of Destiny — also known as the Stone of Scone — was the ancient coronation stone of Scottish kings. Monarchs had been crowned upon it at Scone Abbey in Perthshire for centuries. When Edward I conquered Scotland in 1296, he seized the stone and carried it south to Westminster as a trophy of conquest. It was installed beneath a specially built oak chair — the Coronation Chair, crafted by Master Walter of Durham in 1300-1301 — and every English and British monarch from Edward II onward was crowned sitting above it.
The symbolism was deliberate and brutal. By placing the Scottish coronation stone beneath the English throne, Edward was asserting that Scotland was a conquered territory, its sovereignty literally crushed under the weight of the English crown. Scottish resentment never faded. The stone was the subject of failed retrieval attempts over the centuries, and its presence in Westminster was a permanent reminder of the unfinished business of Scottish independence.
The stone's dramatic theft by four Glasgow students on Christmas Day 1950 temporarily returned it to Scotland and captured the public imagination. It was recovered and returned to Westminster in 1951. But in 1996, the British Government officially returned the Stone of Destiny to Scotland. It crossed the border on St Andrew's Day, 30 November 1996, accompanied by a ceremonial escort, and was installed in Edinburgh Castle alongside the Scottish Crown Jewels. The agreement stipulates that the stone will be temporarily returned to Westminster for coronations — a compromise that acknowledges both its Scottish heritage and its place in British constitutional tradition. Seven hundred years of exile had ended, and Scotland's ancient stone had come home.