King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria attended throughout the trial proceedings, but the King did not sit on the throne as both Houses of Parliament objected to his official presence. Instead the King and Queen were seated in a royal box or ‘curtained alcove’, as Hollar’s engraving (WoA 1354) shows, this was constructed to the side of the chair of state. In Woolnoth’s painting the Royal couple appear as shadowy figures below the ornate tapestry hanging, which was presumably intended to disguise some of the hastily erected woodwork. Charles himself was put to trial in Westminster Hall on 9 January 1649.