Will of Richard-sans-Peur
This brave Duke of Normandy had prepared his tomb, many years before his death, in the Abbey of Fécamp, and ordered that his burial should be conducted with the utmost simplicity. So great was his humility that he expressed his wishes as follows: “Je veulx estre enseveli devant l’huys de l’église, afin d’être coneulqué (trodden under foot) de tous les entrans dans l’église.” These, his last wishes, were executed; but some years after an Abbot of Fécamp, considering that “à si digne personnage plus décente sépulture appartenait,” had his body exhumed and buried in front of the altar.
Fifteen Maidens with Torches
François de la Palu Varembon, Seigneur de Beaumont sur Vingeanne, in Burgundy, made, in 1456, a will by which he testifies his objection to lugubrious colors at his interment; desiring that fifteen maidens of the very poorest of his vassals, clothed in white cloth at the expense of his estate, each wearing a scarlet hood and carrying a torch of three pounds’ weight, should walk in procession before the body, and that his heirs shall also wear white at his funeral and at every successive anniversary of his death. He further orders that four wax candles, of twenty-five pounds’ weight each, shall be placed at the corners of his coffin.
Body carried to a Café
One September afternoon, in 1874, an empty hearse was seen standing at about four o’clock at the entrance of the salons of the Café Riche, Rue Le Peletier. On inquiry it was found that a frequenter of this famous establishment had inserted in his will a clause to this effect:
“I desire that on the day of my burial I may be carried round by the Rue Le Peletier, to visit once more the table where I have spent so many of the pleasantest hours of my life.”
As we have seen, this singular wish was respected by the survivors of the testator.
Barber not wanted
The will, dated January 9th, 1873, of Mr. Richard Christopher Carrington, late of Churt, near Farnham, Surrey, England, astronomer, who died on the previous November 27th, was proved by Mrs. Esther Clarke Carrington, the mother of the deceased, the personal estate being sworn under £20,000. The testator desired to be buried at a depth of between ten and twelve feet in the grounds surrounding his own freehold house at Churt, at an expense not exceeding £5, without any service being read over his grave, and without any memorial being erected to his memory; and he directed that after his death neither his chin be shaved nor his shirt changed. He bequeathed to the Royal Society and the Royal Astronomical Society £2000 Three Per Cent. Consolidated Bank Annuities each, both free of legacy duty.