Coronation Stone

Coordinates: 51°24′29″N 0°18′22″W / 51.40806°N 0.30611°W / 51.40806; -0.30611

For Scotland's Coronation Stone, see Stone of Scone. For the Irish Coronation Stone, see Lia Fáil. For the Swedish Coronation Stones, see Stones of Mora.

Coronation Stone, Kingston-upon-Thames

The Coronation Stone is an ancient stone block, located next to the Guildhall in Kingston upon Thames, England. Kingston is now a suburb of London and was once the county town of Surrey.

In Old English, tun, ton or don meant farmstead or settlement, so the name Kingston appears to mean farmstead of the kings. Early sources claim that at least seven of the old Saxon kings of England were crowned at Kingston as they stood or sat on the stone. A local legend that these Saxon coronations gave Kingston its name is contradicted by the records of the 838 council.^[1]

The names of the seven kings are now inscribed around the Stone's plinth. These were:

• Edward the Elder
• Athelstan
• Edmund I of England
• Eadred of England
• Eadwig of England
• Edward the Martyr
• Æthelred the Unready

Notes

1. ^ Dickens, Charles, Jr (1994) [1887, 1879]. Dickens's Dictionary of the Thames, 1887 (facsimile ed.). Devon: Old House Books. ISBN 1-873590-12-1. 

External links

• Kingston.gov's website on the Coronation stone and its history