Inside The State Rooms Of Windsor Castle With Dan Snow

ever since william the conqueror came here almost a thousand years ago windsor on the banks of the river thames has been home to a castle windsor castle isn't just one of the queen's favorite palaces it is absolutely central to the monarchy it has been a royal palace for longer than any other building in europe the story begins around a thousand years ago the normans arrived here they conquered england 1066 and they chose this spot next to a strategic river crossing over the thames and dominating london to the west as a place for a stronghold they built this artificial mound they put a tower on top of it and since then kings and queens have enlarged and invested on a gigantic scale edward iii turned this into one of the great royal residences spending more money on this than any other secular project of the time and as a result today it is magnificent [Music] to get an exclusive tour i'm meeting curator kate hurd hello kate how are you hello thanks for having me in your castle now we i always think of windsor as a sort of medieval fortress but actually it's like a palatial stately home isn't it whose sport is that well it's a medieval castle but the castle you see today is largely the work of george iv who was king from 1820. and he turned it into a sort of a modern house he did he inherited a castle which had been changed from the medieval castle in the 17th century his parents have made some changes and for him it didn't work as a as a modern royal residence so he set about this huge program of rebuilding and reconstructing and redesigning this this is beautiful here this is just wonderful this is his original entrance hall so he opened it up so his visitors would come through that door and would be able to walk into this magnificent space but this feels a little bit to me like a 19th century gothic which we think of being later in the century do we it is absolutely it's um it was always the entrance to the castle but it was a smaller entrance george iii had had a staircase coming up but george iv opens it up but he's so aware of the medieval history of the castle he does it in that gothic that gothic style so for people who don't talk about this like kind of fake really it's re reimagined gothic fake in a sense but reimagined they were very consciously looking back to particularly the reign of edward iii who was another great builder at the castle creates this amazing vaulting system it's stunning isn't it and yet and so i guess visitors come here and think oh medieval in fact it's only 150 under 200 years absolutely george iv have been wanting to get his hands on windsor for so long and he really goes to town with this medieval history when he does you say that is that because windsor is in some ways the sort of spiritual core of the of the english and british monarchy it's the medieval fortress he's very interested in medieval history um it's it's possibly the most imposing residence remember buckingham palace which is now really grand when he inherited it was quite a small townhouse his mother had lived in so this is the grandest and most imposing of the royal residences and i guess it's the one associated with a third that all they all love absolutely absolutely um charles the second was very fond of it here as well he'd also lived here as a as a boy i mean remember it's his family home as a as prince of wales so he has a great fondness for the place so this is their are they allowed to say but is this their sort of premier residence i think for george the fourth it is the one that he is becomes most interested in as the one that he really we know that he spends hours pouring over the redesigns he becomes really occupied by it so i think for him it is the castle that he will castle the residents that he spends the most time on and what about the subsequence we've got what about victoria his his niece what did she make of it well queen victoria inherited it and she also made great changes to the castle so and the space that we're in you can hear it echoing you can hear the the size of it she breaks it off because she changes the staircase again she breaks it off she doesn't want those grand entrance and it's only now that it's been opened up again and we can appreciate that great vision of of george the fourth he wanted his guests to come up that wonderful approach the long walk and through those through those doors stephanie why did every time break it off i think she just again it's a different time the castle has different needs you know each each generation needs something different from it amazing right where are we off to next i think let's go to the state department let's do it [Music] at least the grandest deck has ever seen in my life isn't it wonderful it's the entrance to the state apartments with george the fourth looking over it looking at all the visitors to his new rooms absolutely yes and a huge amount of uh weapons arms and armor yes all from the royal collection that historic collection that goes right the way back but george iv is a big collector of arms and armor as well well he's obsessed with the military wasn't he absolutely everything he can do he's not allowed to fight but he forms this incredible collection and even more muskets and swords here absolutely this in the medieval castle this space would have formed a a guard chamber it could have protected the state apartments so that this displays reflect that function and i'm trying i think windsor castle i think it was threatened when during the civil war at king john when prince louis came over i can't or was it besieged other times no other sieges as it were henry viii i know during the pilgrimage of grace was here and there was a worry that it would be besieged but it wasn't it wasn't so now which which are this room isn't it isn't it stunning wow this is the waterloo chamber which um holds this incredible series of portraits largely by sir thomas lawrence of the men who were responsible for the defeat of napoleon in the early 19th century we got wellington up there absolutely commander at waterloo bluka his key ally at waterloo yeah wow it's it's a it's an incredible series of portraits emperor of austria yes so george the fall is very kind to let his dad go above the mantle piece george iii is the monarch who is ruling the country so at that point are george's prince regent so he acknowledges his father's his father's role but he he puts himself in in very clear second place i love this because this is basically all the crowned heads and the leading aristocratic military manager all who for whom napoleon represented an existential threat so this is a giant celebration yes and this commission starts before the battle of waterloo it's dates from 1814 when they thought that napoleon had been defeated and george sends thomas lawrence out to make these incredible paintings and the half lengths of the statesman as well he's acknowledging the role of statesmanship in that creating that piece after waterloo after the fall of napoleon was this room always a banqueting hall no in the medieval castle you're standing in the open air so you're in one of edward iii's courtyard in the middle of a run of apartments and george iv had commissioned these incredible paintings he wants a waterloo gallery and this space is earmarked for it but it's not really finished until after his death so it's roofed over and then these wonderful lights are added and it's not really finished until the reign of queen victoria how funny i always think of a very modern idea which you take your big atrium your big courtyards and turn them into an atrium but actually we're doing it in the 19th century absolutely it's a it's a wonderful use of the space and the space also looks back to the earlier castle to the 17th century castle you see these wonderful pieces of wood carving and they're taken from charles ii's chapel thereby grindling gibbons reused in this space and they work wonderfully here wow this isn't george's hall which is world famous fantastic and has always had the function of a a great hall um for meetings for feastings for great occasions and this was a medieval hall originally this space was edward iii um we still have edward the thirds under croft beneath um which is just recently opened up for the first time it becomes under charles ii very baroque space it looks very different with wall paintings under george iv it's turned again into a medieval looking space a gothic space and he lengthens the hall by essentially knocking the chapel in the hall together but it's not entirely successful his his ceiling his gothic ceiling is quite low and everything is plaster essentially a plaster fake for a medieval building now the 1992 fire affected this space very badly so what you see again is the reconstruction in 1992 um of this great sort of gothic space this amazing hammer beam ceiling roof designed by giles downs it's in green oak it's a it's a masterpiece of craftsmanship which the hall has always been all that way back it's amazing it's so something so british about this that it's uh it's a reconstruction of a reimagining of a and yet so it's both very historic and and very long but also ever-changing but always grounded in history and the it reflects the importance of the castle as the seat of the order of the garter which is the oldest order of chivalry founded again by edward iii in 1348 and so the shields you can see decorating the space are the shields of the knights of the garter all the way back really yes that's a remarkable continuity isn't it it's stunning a lot of arms and armor on the walls again i'm noticing a theme here yes and what's that that's a very fine one up there that's wonderful that is the champion's armor which was last used at the coronation of george iv what's that that is um traditionally going all the way back to the middle ages um a champion defends the king's honor after he's been crowned and issues a challenge to anyone who may want to challenge the new kings and throws down his gauntlet and that is the armor that's worn by the champion it's a it's a hereditary office oh really yes whoever that was and his father and his grandfather would ride through the coronation it's the dimmick family absolutely and george the fourth is the last person to have had the champion appear at his coronation and so where he what he rides a horse through the party and throws down the gauntlet he does indeed through the coronation banquet for george iv in westminster hall um the horse rides in as part of the part of the ceremony what happens if you know grandson dimmick was a bit of a softy he still gets to do it and they have still have functions still used as a space that is for for feasting for state occasions it's still used in the way that edward iii would have been familiar with and there's as we leave there's georgia there's our george looking down on what he's built it's a nice little room isn't it fantastic looking back again to the medieval precedent places like ely cathedral would be the octagon there who's this this is this henry the eighth is henry that's so cool you get that sense of the figure don't you really imposing presence just amazing they must have had to let that out slightly is he yes well i think it was probably yeah made for him in his mature years and then we've got all the silver and the some of that wonderful yeah silver and gilts and royal collection really stunning pieces i suppose this just accumulated over hundreds of years absolutely just added to by each generation it's amazing that's unique the continuity of the of the british state and it's in its royal tradition means that you must just have centuries and centuries of all this these treasures absolutely yes all all each each monarch is also aware of the history so you get george the fourth looking back to the middle ages and looking back to the baroque period and building on that when he's building his own collection so you get those that awareness of the layers too where next this way [Applause] [Music] so this is the really wonderful crimson drawing room wow this is the this is peak george the fourth it's just so opulent and gorgeous it is it was one of his private apartments it was one of his one of his his major reception rooms so he would have private guests here but it's it's one of his i think we're getting close to his tastes and his i think we're right in the middle of his taste here it's very different from the rest of the castle it's it's in this french neoclassical taste that he loved all his life it's it's a it's a stunning space and it's this french you know these objects that he purchased that are now so famous at buckingham palace and everywhere else because he just hoovered this stuff up absolutely i mean all this wonderful furniture was commissioned by him to furnish obviously he's he's got a small residence as prince and then he gains buckingham palace he gains wins the castle he needs all this furniture to to to to to fill it up so he commissions these wonderful suites of furniture just stunning i just love the guild of details yes some of the gilding on the doors was brought from carlton house again and so he brings quite a bit of material from carlton house the fireplace is actually dates from 1807 before this room was established and is is from carlton house and was brought here when carlton house's london residence was demolished and does this room um survive the great fire no very sadly this room was very badly damaged but it was reconstructed using the original documents from george's fourth's reign and when george the force is planning this room a set of really magnificent watercolours are made for him to show what the room might look like and that archive he uses in planning his spaces is then reused in the 1990s for planning this space and it it's beautiful he would have felt very at home in this room even though it is largely reconstructed so in the center of this gigantic royal palace administrative headquarters medieval we you think this is kind of george the fourth personal space i think this is where we we meet him most of all his his the place where he would have relaxed he would he's got his portraits of his sisters on the wall i think he you know he would have enjoyed this space and he had he was a sad man in many ways he was extraordinarily infirm with a variety of illnesses towards the end of his life it's strange to think of him sitting here in those declarings when he was almost a recluse wasn't he he was a recluse he didn't like people looking at him he was he he'd been tortured by satirists he'd been he he really did withdraw during during his reign that 10-year reign but he surrounded himself with these incredible objects he'd collected and he clearly takes such pleasure and craftsmanship and beauty and this beautiful sort of skill in creating things in textures and colors so you can imagine him very happy in these rooms isn't it funny that he probably felt insecure because compared to say george ii or the cumberland you know his martial relatives yes he he he never fought on the battlefield yes and yet actually what the modern world looks for now is a collector an interiors like yeah so his reputation is probably higher than ever we can appreciate him now for these amazing things he left us this incredible collection he formed [Music] thanks for watching this video on the history hit youtube channel you can subscribe right here to make sure you don't miss any of our great films that are coming out or if you are a true history fan check out our special dedicated history channel history hit dot tv you're gonna love it

Channel: History Hit

Views: 905,954

Keywords: windsor castle, queen elizabeth, visit windsor castle, dan snow, history hit, windsor castle tour, windsor castle england, history videos, the history of, what happened at, royal family, windsor castle london, inside of windsor castle, round tower, windsor castle history, windsor castle documentary, windsor castle inside, windsor castle tour inside, windsor castle soldiers, dan snow documentary, dan snow history hit, dan snow history, history hit youtube

Id: AkPVESvTB4k

Length: 16min 19sec (979 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 27 2022