Royal Maundy recent years, approximately 1,600–1,900 sets have been minted. Additional sets have been struck for inclusion in special silver proof sets marketed by the Royal Mint in 1996, 2000 and 2006, with a special issue in gold as part of a gold proof set in 2002. Individual Maundy recipients have realised as much as £100 per set of four pieces by selling them on eBay. Royal Maundy Royal Maundy is a religious service in the Church of England held on Maundy Thursday, the day before Good Friday. At the service, the British monarch or a royal official ceremonially distributes small silver
Holy Thursday (Songs of Innocence) Holy Thursday (Songs of Innocence) Holy Thursday is a poem by William Blake, from his 1789 book of poems "Songs of Innocence". (There is also a Holy Thursday poem in "Songs of Experience", which contrasts with this song.) The poem depicts a ceremony held on Ascension Day, which in England was then called Holy Thursday, a name now generally applied to what is also called Maundy Thursday: six thousand orphans of London's charity schools, scrubbed clean and dressed in the coats of distinctive colours, are marched two by two to Saint Paul's Cathedral, under the control of their beadles, and