Death and Burial
Sophia Dorothea became ill in August 1726 and had to stay in bed, which she never left again. Before dying, Sophia wrote a letter to her husband, cursing him from beyond the grave. Her cause of death was liver failure and gall bladder occlusion due to 60 stones. Sophia Dorothea was 60 years old and had spent 33 of these years imprisoned.
George would not allow mourning in Hanover or London. He was furious when he heard that his daughter's court in Berlin wore black. Sophie Dorothea's body was put into a casket and was deposited in the castle's cellar. It was quietly moved to Celle in May 1727 to be buried beside her parents in the Stadtkirche. George I died 4 weeks later, presumably shortly after receiving his deceased wife's final letter.
Read more about this topic: Sophia Dorothea Of Celle
Famous quotes containing the words death and/or burial:
“For in the word death
There is nothing to grasp; nothing to catch or claim;
Nothing to adapt the skill of the heart to, skill
In surviving, for death it cannot survive,
Only resign the irrecoverable keys.
The wave falters and drowns. The coulter of joy
Breaks. The harrow of death
Depends. And there are thrown up waves.”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1986)
“On the beach at night,
Stands a child with her father,
Watching the east, the autumn sky.
Up through the darkness,
While ravening clouds, the burial clouds, in black masses spreading,
Lower sullen and fast athwart and down the sky,”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)