Bishopthorpe Pageant
Pageant type
Performances
Place: Grounds of Bishopthorpe Palace (Bishopthorpe) (Bishopthorpe, Yorkshire, North Riding, England)
Year: 1930
Indoors/outdoors: Outdoors
Number of performances: 4
Notes
24–28 June 1930
[24–26 June at 7pm; 28 June at 3pm
Dress rehearsal 21 June at 3pm]
Name of pageant master and other named staff
- Producer [Pageant Master]: Perkins,
Canon F.L.
- Producer [Pageant Master]: Hughes, Rev.
T.A.
Notes
Perkins was the Vicar of Bishopthorp and Hughes was warden of the York Educational settlement.
Names of executive committee or equivalent
n/a
Names of script-writer(s) and other credited author(s)
- Perkins, F.L.
Names of composers
n/a
Numbers of performers
200The Pageant Raised funds to recondition the school
Financial information
n/a
Object of any funds raised
n/a
Linked occasion
n/a
Audience information
- Grandstand: Yes
- Grandstand capacity: n/a
- Total audience: n/a
Notes
Prices of admission and seats: highest–lowest
5s 9d–1s 3d.
[Dress rehearsal 2s–1s.]
Associated events
n/a
Pageant outline
Foundation of the Roman Fortress of Ad Castra, 211 AD
The Village in Saxon Times
The Thirteenth Century Game Laws
Cardinal Wolsey Under Arrest at Cawood Castle
Visit of King Charles I
Agricultural Rioters at the Time of the Reform Bill of 1832
A Speech by Queen Victoria on her Visit in 1835
Epilogue
Key historical figures mentioned
- Wolsey, Thomas (1470/71–1530) royal
minister, archbishop of York, and cardinal
- Charles I (1600–1649) king of
England, Scotland, and Ireland
- Victoria (1819–1901) queen of the
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and empress of India
Musical production
n/a
Newspaper coverage of pageant
Manchester
Guardian
The
Times
Leeds
Mercury
Yorkshire
Post and Leeds Intelligencer
Yorkshire
Evening Post
Sheffield
Independent
Hull
Daily Mail
Book of words
n/a
Other primary published materials
n/a
References in secondary literature
n/a
Archival holdings connected to pageant
n/a
Sources used in preparation of pageant
n/a
Summary
The Bishopthorpe Pageant was one of a number of pageants held in North Yorkshire over the summer of 1930, including at Pickering and Nun Monckton. The pageant was written by F.L. Perkins, local vicar and amateur archaeologist. Perkins also acted as producer (de facto pageant master), alongside the Rev. T.A. Hughes of the York Educational Settlement. Great attention to historical detail was rendered, with the Victorian scene using original gowns and the altar in the first scene being one excavated some sixty years previously.1
The Pageant told the story of Bishopthorpe and its relationship to the Archbishops of York whose palace gave the place its name. The epilogue was spoken by the present Archbishop, William Temple, who entertained a number of Colonial prelates and their wives (visiting York on their way to the Lambeth Conference held in July).2 The Leeds Mercury noted that the pageant was not wholly favourable to past Ebors, with one scene in particular relating the agricultural riots of 1832 when villagers, provoked by their landlords’ policies of enclosure and exploitation were seen ‘burning an effigy of an archbishop’ and attacking the palace as Temple looked on.3 The sanguine Temple, who in later years made a name for himself as an outspoken supporter of the working man, by all accounts took this well.
The newspapers lauded the performances, with the Yorkshire Post declaring that
It is a pageant of Englishry—of solid English character keeping the same sturdy front to circumstance, whether the circumstance be the game laws of the thirteenth century, the enclosure of the common lands in the eighteenth, or the rejection of the Reform Bill in the nineteenth. And the charm of it is that each time reveals itself it comes flashing out spontaneously in the Yorkshire dialect.4
The newspaper went on to praise the ‘enormous vigour and enjoyment which have obviously gone to the contriving of the whole of this admirable village enterprise.’5 The Post’s sister paper, the Yorkshire Evening Post, was in accord, declaring that ‘It is more than Bishopthorpe, however. It is the entire history of England, picturesquely related within the space of three hours. It is, in its way, our own national Obermmergau’, referencing the German tradition of passion plays dating back to 1643 held in the village of that name (and which had been, incidentally, something of an influence on Louis Napoleon Parker, originator of the modern British pageant movement).
The Pageant, which had first been presented in 1928, was part of a long line of pageants in Bishopthorpe held subsequently in 1954, 1956, 1965, 1970 and 2000.6
Footnotes
1. ^ The Times, 27 June 1930, 11.
2. ^ Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer, 23 June 1930, 8.
3. ^ Leeds Mercury, 23 June 1930, 3.
4. ^ Yorkshire Post, 23 June 1930, 14.
5. ^ Ibid.
6. ^ ‘Community Archive’, Bishopthorpe.net, accessed 21 March 2017, http://www.bishopthorpe.net/bishnet/local-history/community-archive/
How to cite this entry
Angela Bartie, Linda Fleming, Mark Freeman, Tom Hulme, Alex Hutton, Paul Readman, ‘Bishopthorpe Pageant’, The Redress of the Past, http://www.historicalpageants.ac.uk/pageants/1517/