Terror and treason at the Tower

9:17am Wednesday 24th August 2005

Blades have flashed and heads have rolled in bloody executions here. Necks have been stretched in hangings and the screams of torture have echoed around its walls for centuries. The dark shadow of England's blood thirsty history at the Tower of London sends a shiver down your spine.

Standing on Tower Green in the courtyard you can picture all the queens who have been executed under cloudy skies, before a baying audience, eager to glimpse such a gory spectacle. Beats watching Big Brother, I suppose.

There is the haunted chapel where most of the traitors of England have been buried, where saints met sinners, the innocent met the guilty and where nowadays, the ravens are out-squawked by American tourists.

Legend has it that Charles II was told that if the ravens left the Tower, the kingdom and the fortress would fall. I suppose that if American tourists didn't visit the same would happen.

As well as horror there are also delights on Tower Green, such as a perfectly preserved Tudor residence, a medieval palace with elegant stained glass windows.

You can walk along the ramparts of the Tower of London and see a great view of London Bridge or watch the traffic chug past on the Thames, while munching your lunch.

Around the grounds of the Tower you will see various people in period costume recounting historic tales.

At times it almost feels like you're in a live theatre which is great because it makes historical stories come alive and the actors' antics with passing vistors are also quite amusing.

The Royal Palace otherwise known as the White Tower has seen over 500 years of this country's kings and queens come and go. It is where they lived and breathed, ate and slept and more often than not met their bloody end.

As I enter the White Tower, a monument to British history ironically built by a Frenchman, there is a long queue of tourists. I join them to see what the fascination is. It turns out to be the Norman garderobe, well known today as a toilet.

The treasures of the Royal Tudor Armoury include suits of armour worn by kings from William I to Charles II. You wouldn't believe you could put this stuff on and successfully move around, let alone fight battles in it.

The artillery room has enough cannons, cannonballs and mortar weighing several tons to destroy the world several times over. It displays pistols knives, swords, muskets and bayonets which seem both fearsome and dangerously cumbersome.

These are a must for those especially interested in the history of weaponry and war.

On the way to see the crown jewels, your mind will boggle at the number of wooden seats reserved for every English monarch in history. If you're feeling nostalgic you can watch a film of the Queen's Coronation in 1953.

You'll feel like royalty yourself as you don't even have to walk past the crown jewels. Instead there's a slow escalator that runs past them so you can drop your jaw as wide as you like at their sparkling splendour and not have to worry about tripping over it.

The jewels are well worth seeing. the State Crowns, 1661 St Edward's Crown, sovereign orbs and sceptres which all sit proudly on red velvet cushions with tassles.

One of the simplest but greatest pleasures of a visit here is being able to wander around the Tower of London's cobbled courtyards admiring the architecture. It's a real step back in time.

A visit here wouldn't be complete without a tour with one of the yeoman warders also known as Beefeaters who make informative guides and recount Britain's shockingly violent history with a Blackadder sort of irreverence which may occasionally cause you to split your sides with laughter. Severed heads though, are reserved for royalty.

Information

Tel: 0870 756 6060. Opening hours: Tuesday to Saturday 9am to 6pm Sunday to Monday Sunday to Monday 10am to 5pm. Tube: Circle/District lines to Tower Hill.

Audio guide: Prisoners of the Tower gives first-hand accounts of some of the Tower's famous guests as it guides you through the fortress. Cost £3.

The Tower of London runs a daily programme of events for visitors. Special presentations, guided tours, holiday activities and family trails are all included in the ticket price.

For further information visit www.hrp.org.uk

Gunpowder Plot Exhibition
Tower Of London

Fear, suspicion, explosions, religious fanaticism, terrorism. Hearing these words makes you think about the recent terror bombs in London.

But as far back as November 1605, Guy Fawkes plotted to wipe out the monarchy, bishops and nobility of this country with 36 barrels of gunpowder and attempted to launch a revolution with the biggest terrorist attack this country had ever seen.

Of course the attack never happened but had it done so it would have changed the course of British history, in the same way as September 11 in New York and the recent events in London.

This exhibition currently on show at the Tower of London is given greater resonance because of the recent terrorist attacks.

Just as it is today, religious fanaticism was rife at a time when Catholics and Protestants were divided in a climate of fear and suspicion. Catholic priests were persecuted and catholics were driven underground This is a detailed exhibition concentrating on how the plot was carried out and it also reveals how they used disaffected nobles such as Sir Walter Ralegh to assist their cause.

You can learn more about the 13 conspirators involved in the plot and the parts they all played, including Guy Fawkes the gunpowder expert, Robert Catesby the mastermind and Thomas Percy, the insider.

It details how they tortured a confession out of Guy Fawkes so he was broken in body and mind and how they were all punished when found guilty. Some were hung, drawn and quartered, others were shot or died and those that were imprisoned in the tower.

Theres plenty of food for thought here. If you ever need reminding just how traditional and stuck in our past we British are consider the following; The 1780 London Riots saw popular protests against the repeal of anti Catholic legislation, Catholic chapels were burnt. After the 1829 emancipation Catholics were finally given the right to take part in Government. Today the British monarch is still not allowed to be or marry a Catholic.

There are also some interesting quotes on terrorism too. "As I see it terrorism is a direct attack on human rights and the rule of law." Kofi Annan 2005. "Terrorism is nothing but justice, prompt severe and inflexible," Maximilien Robespierre 1794.

Was Guy Fawkes a terrorist or a freedom fighter?