Returned since 1996 to Scotland, the Stone of Destiny – Lia Fáil in Gaelic – or Stone of Scone, will soon return for a few days, on the occasion of the coronation of Charles III, to Westminster Abbey where it has been kept for seven centuries. The complex saga of a singular emblem.
It is a block of yellow sandstone, quite ordinary, a straight cobblestone 66 cm by 42, 28 cm thick, weighing regarding 152 kg. A Latin cross is roughly incised there and two iron rings are sealed to its upper part. Nevertheless, despite its innocuous appearance, the “Stone of Destiny” has been part of the history of the British Isles since time immemorial.
the coronation stone of the rulers of Alba
According to one of the fables surrounding it, it is one of five talismans from the “Northern Isles”, brought to Ireland by the Tuatha Dé Danann, gods, heroes and magicians of Celtic mythology. Christianity will invent a biblical origin for it. The Stone of Destiny is said to have served as a pillow for Jacob, the ancestor of the people of Israel, during his night spent in the plain of Louz. The holy object would then have passed through Egypt.
If some stories are to be believed, the daughter of a pharaoh would have taken him to the mists of the north. This Scota would have given its name to Scotland – Scotland. For others, the Stone would have stayed in Sicily and Spain, before arriving in Ireland, around 700 BC. AD, to be planted on the Hill of Tara, where the High Kings of Erin were acclaimed. A Lia Fáil is still in Tara, but it is an imposing menhir. Is the “Stone of Scone” a fragment of it?
Either way, at the dawn of the 6th century, Fergus Mor, the legendary founder of the Scot kingdom of Dai Riada, is said to have moved it to the Isle of Iona, off Argyll. Finally, Kenneth MacAlpin, around 843, following his victory over the Picts, fixed it at Scone, in Perthshire. An abbey was built there by his descendant, Alexander I, at the beginning of the 12th century. From now on, the sovereigns of Alba – the primitive name of Scotland – will receive the investiture there. The last of them will be Jean Balliol, on November 30, 1292. Four years later, he will be defeated by the troops of Edward I of England, and the Stone of Scone confiscated as war booty. From now on, she will not leave Westminster Abbey.
The Stone of Scone was stolen in 1950
Enshrined under the “chair of Edward the Confessor” on which the English monarchs have been crowned since 1308, it will be used for the coronations of the kings of England and then of the United Kingdom. On Christmas Day 1950, four nationalist students will seize it, but the larceny, deposited in the ruins of Arbroath Abbey – it is here that the Scottish nobles signed the Declaration of Arbroath by which they sworn their independence from England in April 1320 – was discreetly returned a few months later, on April 11, 1951. The stone was replaced in the coronation chair and would serve two years later on June 2 1953, during the coronation of Queen Elizabeth.
It was not until November 30, 1996 that the Stone of Destiny was officially returned to Scotland, to be exhibited in a room in Edinburgh Castle. As she prepares to return to Westminster for the coronation of Charles III on May 6, 2023 – given her history and significance, exact details of when and how she will be carried remain a secret well-kept – resigning Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced in November 2020 her intention to move the stone to the future Perth Town Hall Museum.
