Members of the public will be able to visit the final resting place of Queen Elizabeth II in St George’s Chapel from Thursday 29 September.
For centuries, Westminster Abbey was the prime resting place for kings and queens (with Edward the Confessor becoming the first sovereign to be buried there in 1066) until the 15th century, after which British monarchs have also been buried at St George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle. Queen Victoria is buried elsewhere; she now rests at the Royal Mausoleum at Frogmore, alongside her husband, Prince Albert, who died almost 40 years before her. The Duke and Duchess of Windsor are also buried at Frogmore, although their bodies lie in the Royal Burial Ground.
St George’s also holds a number of happy memories, with the Royal Family regularly using it as a location for weddings and christenings. King Charles III and the Queen Consort wed at the chapel in 2005, whilst the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank both married there in 2018.
Her Majesty’s final resting place is set alongside her parents, George VI (who died in 1952) and Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, (who died in 2002), and the ashes of her sister, Princess Margaret (who also died in 2002), in a small chapel set apart from the main royal vault. The coffin of the late Duke of Edinburgh is set to be relocated from the vault to the chapel, to lie beside his wife.
Built in the late-medieval Perpendicular Gothic style, the chapel’s origins date to 1348, when Edward III founded the Order of the Garter and the College of St George at Windsor Castle. Beneath its black and white tiles lie the bodies of nine other English and British sovereigns, including King Henry VIII.
King Henry VI, King George III, King George IV, King William IV, King Edward VII and King George V lie in the royal vault. King Charles I was also buried there after his beheading in 1649, although his tomb remained unmarked until 1837.
Source: Tatler.com