A Pageant of St. Ethelreda
Pageant type
Performances
Place: Grounds of the Bishop's Palace (Ely) (Ely, Cambridgeshire, England)
Year: 1951
Indoors/outdoors: Outdoors
Number of performances: 2
Notes
4 August 1951
At 3.30pm and 6.30pm.
Name of pageant master and other named staff
Notes
- Produced by [Pageant Master]: Diver, Dorothy
E.
- Producer: Rose H. Churchyard
- Costumes Designed by: Margaret Drake
- Costumes Executed by: Millicent Morriss
and Geoffrey Legge
- Properties: Patricia Meadows, Marguerite
Coleridge
Names of executive committee or equivalent
n/a
Names of script-writer(s) and other credited author(s)
- Pritchard, G.
- Diver, Dorothy E.
Names of composers
n/a
Numbers of performers
n/a
Financial information
n/a
Object of any funds raised
n/a
Linked occasion
In conjunction with the Festival of Britain
Audience information
Prices of admission and seats: highest–lowest
2s-1s.
Associated events
Garden Party with Stalls, Teas and Competitions
Pageant outline
Episode I. ‘The Inspiration’ at the Court of Anna, King of East Anglia, Exning, 648 AD
Episode II. The Taking of the Veil, 670 AD
Episode III. Flight from Coldingham to Ely, 672 AD
Episode V. Medieval Pilgrimage to the Shrine of Etheldreda at Ely, AD 1340.
Key historical figures mentioned
- Æthelthryth [St Æthelthryth, Etheldreda,
Audrey] (d. 679) queen in Northumbria, consort of King Ecgfrith, and abbess
of Ely
Musical production
Music provided by Ron Mays and His Accordion Band
Newspaper coverage of pageant
n/a
Book of words
- None known.
Other primary published materials
- A Pageant of St. Ethelreda: Souvenir Programme. Ely, 1951.
References in secondary literature
n/a
Archival holdings connected to pageant
- Copy of Programme in Cambridgeshire Local Studies Collection, Cambridge, Reference C.76
Sources used in preparation of pageant
n/a
Summary
This was one of many historical pageants held in association with the 1951 Festival of Britain. Unlike many other such pageants, that staged at Ely focused solely on the medieval period, and in particular the life and legacy of Æthelthryth, or St Ethelreda, abbess of Ely. The town held a subsequent Pageant in the Cathedral in 2000.
Footnotes
How to cite this entry
Angela Bartie, Linda Fleming, Mark Freeman, Tom Hulme, Alex Hutton, Paul Readman, ‘A Pageant of St. Ethelreda’, The Redress of the Past, http://www.historicalpageants.ac.uk/pageants/1418/