King David – The Biscuit Bestiary

Posted on May 5, 2023August 5, 2023 by Elizabeth Evershed

Coronation Biscuits

Each time there is a royal celebration of some kind there are special tins with special biscuits. I bought such a tin for the late Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, and either bought – or was given – them to celebrate the births of Princes George and Louis, and Princess Charlotte. So as this is the first time in seventy years that Britain has had a coronation I decided to purchase a Carolean one, although it still feels odd talking about the King instead of the Queen, and no longer being a noveau Elizabethan. I teetered a bit between one of Cartwright and Butler’s solemnly splendid evergreen tins and this gorgeous purple and gold affair from Marks and Spencer’s, which was twice as sumptuous at half the price:

I’ve learned over the years that you can’t judge a biscuit by its tin, but I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the shortbread inside. I’ve written about this quintessentially Scottish biscuit before so won’t go into the history of it again but where I was expecting some standard rounds or wheels the M&S bakers went with a regal theme, a kind of regalia in biscuit form if you will…

I’ll leave the crowns and palaces and flags to speak for themselves, but linger a moment on the symbol of the orb and cross. A distinctly medieval image, the orb alone was a Roman symbol of imperial power but for the Christian monarchs and emperors of Europe the addition of the cross over it refocused attention on Christ as the eternal sovereign of the world and the King to whom all earthly kings must be subject as holders of temporal and limited power.

This medieval view is biblical in so far as scripture talks of all earthly powers and authorities owing their positions to God, but the bible as a whole does not offer us unqualified support for monarchy as a system either. When the Israelites petition Samuel for a king so that they can be be like the other nations, God makes it clear that if they go ahead with their plans to adopt a monarchy it will place many burdens and obligations on them and that their asking itself is a symptom of their having rejected Him as the only king they need. However, once the decision in favour of a monarchy has been made and their first king, Saul, fails several crucial tests of character, God chooses his own king for his people, the shepherd boy David, and blesses his socks off, telling him he will never fail to have a descendant on the throne of Israel. All of which suggests that God is not so much pro- or anti-monarchy as he is willing to work in whatever flawed-but-capable-of-good governmental systems we find ourselves in to help bring about the coming of his own – everlasting – kingdom.

The Books of Kings and Chronicles record the deeds and characters of the kings of Israel and later of the Northern and Southern kingdoms after Solomon’s time. Some kings were outstandingly good, some were outstandingly evil, and some were fairly good or fairly evil, but for each the crucial question was whether they would worship the God of their ancestors and worship him exclusively; their success and prosperity was determined in a large part by the spiritual choices they made and on who, or what, they had set their hearts. The damage done to a nation by a weak-willed or corrupt king and conversely the good done by a virtuous one could be so great that the moral and political education of a future monarch was of the utmost importance to their subjects in medieval Europe and led to a whole genre of literature on the topic called Mirrors for Princes. Here’s an illustration of the London poet and scribe Thomas Hoccleve handing his Regement of Princes (c.1411) to the future Henry V:

Hoccleve and Prince Hal / the future Henry V

The powers of a king these days are more constrained thanks to the checks and balances of constitutional monarchy but he still possesses extraordinary influence. Pace Dieu et mon droit, less emphasis is given to his divine rights than his divine responsibilities; it is the Christian ideal of servant-hearted kingship that informs the ceremony of the Coronation in the liturgy used in Westminster Abbey this weekend, where a young person (one of the choristers of the Chapel Royal) will welcome King Charles with these words:

Your Majesty,
as children of the Kingdom of God we welcome you
in the name of
the King of Kings

And he replies:

In his name, and after his example, I come not to be served
but to serve...

Just as the best earthly marriages offer our imaginations a little glimpse of the marriage of Christ and his people, so the best earthly coronations offer our imaginations a glimpse of the glory and majesty of the King of Kings and the immense dignity and significance that he gives to us as his sons and daughters. And it’s characteristic of the best earthly monarchs that they have always understood themselves as human actors in a spiritual drama, never mistaking the shadow for the eternal reality. A perspective evident in the old Wesleyan hymn sung at the funeral of the late Queen:

Finish, then, thy new creation;
pure and spotless let us be:
let us see thy great salvation
perfectly restored in thee;
changed from glory into glory,
’til in heav’n we take our place,
’til we cast our crowns before thee,
lost in wonder, love, and praise.

Tomorrow feels like more of a solemn than a celebratory moment in the life of the nation if I’m honest but one I’ll be watching with a cup of tea and a coronation biscuit.

Further Delectation

A round-up of Coronation Biscuit Tins… Good Housekeeping have produced a feature on the best ones to buy!

Following the ceremony tomorrow with your choice of coronation biscuit? Here’s a link to the service guide with all the liturgy they will be using with the bible readings and songs.

Not such a fan of thrice-gorgeous ceremony? Neither was one of Shakespeare’s best loved medieval kings. ‘Tis not the balm the sceptre and the ball... A superb rendition of one of Henry V’s monologues by Sam West.

And here’s the wonderful Porter’s Gate declaring the greater glory of the King over all:

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Posted on September 8, 2021September 15, 2021 by Elizabeth Evershed

Shepherd’s Welsh Biscuits

Dych chi’n hoffi bisgedi? After a little break over the summer I’m delighted to introduce these Bisgedi Ceirch (Oaty Biscuits) and Bisgedi Picau ar y Maen (Welsh Cake Biscuits) from Llanwrst in Denbighshire. Together they comprise Shepherd’s Welsh Biscuits, a range of biscuits developed by James and Natasha Shepherd and inspired by the history, character and flavours of Wales:

As you can see, I was rather taken by the dragons on the packaging and while there were only eight biscuits per box they are handcrafted, chunky specimens so a two biscuit serving fills you up. On first acquaintance I prefer the Bisgedi Ceirch which are surprisingly soft in texture with an oatiness that’s chewy rather than scratchy like a hobnob. The taste reminds me of shortbread, and they certainly live up to the Shepherds’ description of them as rugged, oaty biscuits with a warming vanilla flavour. Good to eat all year round, but they’d be perfect in winter with a strong cup of char.

By contrast the Bisgedi Picau ar y Maen (Welsh Cake Biscuits) feel a lot denser with a fruity hit that really captures the taste of a Welsh Cake – a round griddle-cooked cake with dried fruit resembling a flat scone topped off with a fine dusting of sugar. These bisgedi remind me of the Easter Biscuits I made earlier this year. There’s a definite crossover in the mingling of butter, fruit, spice and sugar flavours.

Oaty biscuit (upper left) and Welsh Cake biscuit (lower right)

The Welsh biscuits are a follow on from the Shepherds’ success at reviving the Aberffraw Biscuit and while they just happen to have Shepherd as their surname, the choice to use the name and crook motif for this brand feels appropriate given how famous Wales is for its sheep and pastures. From the sixth-century monasticism and missional zeal of Dewi Sant to the Welsh Revival a little over a century ago, the country’s spiritual heritage is unusually rich and still reflects something of the Celtic Christian mindset with its rootedness in the life of the land and rhythms of nature.

Gerald of Wales. Apparently. Notes on the source of this MS pic welcome.

The Celtic Christian tradition is one that embraces art and poetry too. The twelfth-century cleric and travel writer Gerald of Wales (c.1146 – c.1223) drew attention to Welsh skill in this respect in his descriptions of the country and its people; in every household, he says guests ‘who arrive in the morning are entertained till evening with the conversation of young women and the music of the harp; for each house has its young women and harps allotted to this purpose’, and harp-playing is ‘held preferable to any other learning’ (Descriptio Cambriae 1: 10). He also commends his compatriots for not being materialistic or jealous, and for their skill at martial as well as musical arts. All this makes me think of King David, who shares his name with Wales’ patron; both the harp and shepherd’s crook are symbols of the man who “shepherded his people with integrity of heart, and led them with skilful hands.” (Ps. 78)

It was David who wrote the Psalm that begins The Lord is My Shepherd. To those of us used to church environments the words are so familiar we can rattle them off without thinking, but they repay dwelling on, especially in a world unpractised in the art of slowing down:

“The Lord is my shepherd
I shall not want.
He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside still waters.
He restores my soul…

God knows slowing down enough to listen to the music of our souls can be painful when we don’t know how to restore them, or find ourselves hungry, restless or exhausted in ways we don’t fully understand. But perhaps there’s a clue in the psalm if we’re willing to stop and graze there. I am the Good Shepherd, declared David’s most famous descendant: a man who had compassion on the crowds that came to him because they were harassed and helpless like sheep without anyone to care for them (Matt 9:36). Not only did Jesus’s words assure them that his concern for them was deep and genuine, they were also rooted in his ancestor’s beautiful vision of a life lived close to God and subject to his leading. While it might seem counter-intuitive to spend time pondering those words just when the world of work and school is speeding up again, grazing on the Welsh biscuits reminded me that his invitation to be our shepherd still stands.

Further Delectation

Reflections from a 72-year-old farmer in Wales’s Teifi Valley: a simple but profound piece that is also worth grazing on.

‘Gwnewch y pethau bychain.‘ Ten facts about Saint David, the narrative of whose life is a typically medieval tapestry of history and legend notable for the lives and communities it inspired even if he didn’t eat many biscuits. You can also read this rather good anonymously authored article on Gerald of Wales as part of a Wiki-history of Chester with a particularly wry put-down of Geoffrey of Monmouth.

‘Your rod and your staff are a strange mercy, in a world where I’m not yet home…’ Audrey Assad’s meditation on Psalm 23 is a musical favourite of mine (or there’s Howard Goodall’s choral gem, also used for the opening credits of The Vicar of Dibley if you prefer a more traditional version!)

Posted on July 31, 2019September 30, 2023 by Elizabeth Evershed

Grisbi Extreme Chocolate Cookies

Biscuits can be a lot like buses – after a dearth of specimens to sample I suddenly got three through at once. The first is from a new friend of mine called Dāvis, a fan of the bestiary in Latvia. I posted him some biscuits a few months ago to help him through his medical exams and he kindly returned the favour with these Grisbi Extreme Chocolate cookies from Matilde Vicenzi. These chunky flat Italian creations certainly live up to their name as they really are very chocolatey. The weather was so hot when I opened the packet I opted to try them out on the terrace with tea and ice cream…

While I don’t like ranking biscuits any more than people, I have to say this is chocolate of a high order and so rich it makes for the perfect dessert biscuit (more on that elusive genre at a later date). The gooeyness of the centre was an unexpected surprise, especially for an Italian biscuit as these tend to be dryer than the British sort. Anyone eyeing it from the outside could be forgiven for imagining it was the same texture all the way through and I must say I’m intrigued by the combination of outer crumbliness and inner creaminess its makers have managed to pull off.

For the moral I couldn’t help but think of the prophet Samuel’s words when choosing a new king for Israel: ‘People judge by outward appearances but the Lord looks at the heart.’ Leaving aside the fact that the Lord’s choice, David, was apparently good-looking as well as goodhearted (some kings get all the luck), Samuel’s words are a sober reminder that what impresses on the surface does not necessarily make the best criteria for judging an individual’s worthiness or fitness for office.

I expect it’s almost as rare for a people to find a true leader as it is for God to find a man after his own heart, yet that is the astonishing epithet applied to David in the Bible. And as far as we can tell the forging of this extraordinary heart came about long before anyone but God knew who David was, in the long conversations they had together with no-one but the sheep to overhear them. We can eavesdrop a little on some of those conversations in the Book of Psalms, many of which are believed to have been written by the king over the course of his lifetime. Here’s an image of him in the throes of composition from an early 15th century Italian manuscript:

hb_28.225.65.jpg — Image from New York’s Met Museum

What’s refreshing about the David of the Psalms is his no-holds-barred abandon in expressing himself to God: every joy and confidence, every doubt and fear and angry thought let out into the wild and starry open. ‘Slap all my enemies in the face!’ he prays in Psalm 3, something we don’t sing in churches very much. We can admire a great soul like Gandhi for his commitment to non-violence, but David’s radical honesty about the state of his soul shows us something of what it means to have a great heart. Despite all his faults and failures, it’s hard not to love the David who mourned and the David who danced, the David who argued and pleaded and repented without caring what anybody thought of him. The David, above all, whose heart God saw and loved, and the David to whom he gave an everlasting kingdom.

Further Delectation

A lovely setting of one of David’s Psalms by John Michael Talbot.

Some beautiful medieval Psalters from the collection of the Fitzwilliam Museum.

If you would like to see more entries more regularly and help keep this bestiary free of ads, you are welcome to contribute to the Biscuit Jar.