Thomas More’s head may be exhumed 500 years after it was put on a pike

https://www.yahoo.com ^ | July 11, 2025 | Jacob Freedland

[BipolarBob]

Me too. Talented guy took too soon.

[Night Hides Not]

Don’t know, but didn’t Roland sell his Thompson gun to Patty Hearst?

[Night Hides Not]

My favorite Zevon song is “Lawyers, Guns and Money.”

I was dating a waitress in Germany in 1979, luckily she wasn’t with the Russians. That was a summer for the ages.

[TigersEye]

Hopefully he has learned his lesson and is ready to recant his evil ways.

[bigbob]

Thomas Cromwell’s head was displayed on a spike on London Bridge but after the birds tired of it, it was buried in the Henry VIII’s Revenge Wing in the Tower, along with that of More and Ann Boleyn (one of the King’s ex’s).

[Campion]

Closer to plain old theft. Anglicans should give us our martyrs’ relics back!

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

I thought his daughter kept the head and carried it with her everywhere she went.

[fruser1]

Done correctly, I guess the Protestant’s Paperweight was a better way to go than the Bishop’s Barbecue.

[AnAmericanMother]

*Oliver* Cromwell's head was cut off after the Restoration (he and several others were exhumed for that purpose) and displayed on a spike at Westminster Hall (where Charles I was tried).

It eventually fell off during a violent storm, was picked up by a sentry, and passed from hand to hand (and put on exhibition several times) until the 1960s, when it was buried in an undisclosed location at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge (Cromwell's alma mater).

His own mother wouldn't know him, but tests have confirmed "to a moral certainty" that the head is in fact that of the late Lord Protector.

[jocon307]

Let me see if I understand this. They dug up their bodies to chop their heads off?

That seems entirely pointless. But perhaps it’s a good example of how all governments waste the hard earned money of their constituents.

[rfp1234]

Yes. And Thomas Cromwell was also beheaded more than a century earlier. Quite a large and influential family for a long time.

[rfp1234]

IIRC, Islamic rulers often behead convicts, but have the head and body sewn back together before burial, in order to comply with Koranic tradition.

[Rocco DiPippo]

Thanks for the heads up!

[AnAmericanMother]

They chopped Charles I ‘s head off, so his son was going to serve him and the others the same, willy-nilly.

Takes a lot to get the English mad, but if you do, watch out!

[bert]

The Church must justify it’s existence as a force in English governance

[larrytown]

Nice!

😂

[Fledermaus]

I got confused. I read it as Dennis More.