Imperial Crown

An Imperial Crown is a crown used for the coronation of emperors.

Crowns in Europe during the medieval period varied in design:

An open crown is one which consists basically of a golden circlet elaborately worked and decorated with precious stones or enamels. ... The medieval French crown was of this type. ... the closed crown, which had bands of metal crossing usually from one side to the other and from back to front so that they met in the middle, at the top of the head. ... These arches are in part utilitarian, since they serve to strengthen the crown,in part decorative, since they are normally made to serve as supports for a central cross or jewel, and in part traditional, since a contributing element to the evolution of many medieval crowns was the structure of the early Germanic helmet, which had metal bands crossing at the top of the head to protect the skull from injury.

During the medieval era the crowns worn by English kings had been described as both closed (or arched) and open designs. This was in contrast with kings of France who always wore an open crown. However, there is academic debate on how often closed crowns were used in England during this period, as the first unequivocal use of the closed crown was by Henry IV at his coronation on 13 October 1399. However his effigy on his tomb in Westminster Abbey wears an open crown so the link in England between the style of the crown and its representation as that worn by a king and an emperor was not established. The use of a closed crown may have been adopted by the English as a way of distinguishing the English crown from the French crown, but it also had other meanings to some. For example, Henry V wore helmet-crown of the arched type at the Battle of Agincourt which the French knight St. Remy commented was "like the imperial crown".

The association of the closed crown with imperial crowns was already established in Continental Europe the late 14th century for example the florins minted for Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor) sometimes show him with an closed crown (though on the commoner variety, the crown is open). A miniature picture in the Chronica Aulae Regiae written in the great abbey outside Prague depicts his mother Elizabeth a queen of Bohemian wearing an open crown, while his two wives, who had imperial titles, have closed ones.

During the machinations that surrounded the introduction of the imperial crown under Henry VIII (see the section below Legal usage), the closed crown, became associated as a symbolic representation of the English Crown as an imperial crown, and has remained so until this day.

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