Illustration by: Joe Cummings. Images: © Getty Images (ravens)
For more than 900 years, the Tower of London has guarded the north bank of the River Thames. At various times a royal palace, menagerie, public record office, mint, arsenal, bank vault and prison, it has played a central role in England’s history. Indeed, it has come to symbolise large parts of it. More than three million people visit the Tower yearly, eager to explore a site that has famously held traitors, heretics, and even royalty. Not to mention the Crown Jewels.
When he took London in late 1066, William the Conqueror commissioned the original building to adjoin the southeast corner of Alfred the Great’s rebuilt Roman walls “as a defence against the inconstancy of the numerous and hostile inhabitants,” wrote William of Poitiers. Within 12 years, the temporary structure had made way for something more permanent, whose iconic shape still casts a foreboding shadow over the local skyline.