arguably the most important castle in England. Most of the outer walls, towers and chambers are the work of England’s thirteenth-century kings. The building at the heart of the complex, however, which has given its name to the whole, was constructed earlier still. The White Tower was the work of William the Conqueror, and it was the first keep in England.
If motte-and-bailey castles came as a shock to the Anglo-Saxons, then the new castle that William started to build beside the Thames in the 1070s must have knocked them for six. The Anglo-Saxons had seen stone buildings before (many churches were built in stone), but they were not internationally renowned for their masonry skills. Before the Norman Conquest, the kings of England were accustomed to living in wooden halls, much as their distant Germanic ancestors had done. In fact, when the Anglo-Saxons talked about ‘building’, they used the word
timbrian
; if an Englishman told you he was going to build something, you took it for granted he was talking about woodwork.
In France, of course, building a stone residence would not have raised nearly as many eyebrows. But even the most sophisticated French mason would have been surprised and impressed by the scale of the building project that William had embarked upon in London. Nothing on the Continent could compare in size and grandeur with the Tower. It has recently been suggested that the smaller tower of Ivry-la-Bataille in Normandy, now in ruins, might have provided the inspiration for the basic shape, but the scale of William’s new building was entirely novel.
So what prompted William the Conqueror and his engineers to build on such a scale, and to build in stone? Even today, the Tower is a hugely impressive building, and impressing people was without doubt one of William’s intentions: this was a building project which said that the Normans were here to stay.
Monumental pride, however, might be only half the story. The other way of understanding the Tower is to imagine how nervous and edgy the Normans were in the 1070s – it was, after all, still only a few years after the Conquest, and the English continued to be obstinate and rebellious. In more peaceful circumstances, if a king wanted a palace complex, he might have preferred to distribute the buildings – the hall, the chapel, the bedrooms – over a wider area. Instead, what William and his architect decided to do was to stack all these rooms one on top of the other, and encase the whole structure in immensely thick stone walls. A great tower like this might be first and foremost a monument to vanity, but it also betrays a crucial element of fear.
Whatever the actual inspiration, the final result was an astounding building. Measuring 107 by 118 feet at its base, and standing 90 feet high, William and his sons created a giant among castles. Construction on this scale had not been witnessed in Britain since the time of the Romans. The Normans were well aware of this, and seem to have been deliberately styling themselves as new Romans, come a-conquering in imperial style. William of Poitiers, the Conqueror’s sycophantic biographer, regularly compares his royal master to Julius Caesar (William was better, naturally), and suggests that the king’s leading men were equivalent in wisdom and power to the Roman senate. It is possible to see this attitude reflected wherever William built in stone. At the Tower of London, parts of the old Roman city wall were incorporated into the wall of the castle’s bailey. At Colchester, the former Roman capital, William built another great tower, very similar in design to the Tower of London and probably created by the same architect. Although it now stands only two storeys high (and, thanks to misguided restoration in the eighteenth century, looks faintly ridiculous), it was once even bigger than its London counterpart. The new building was constructed on the ruins of the old Roman Temple of Claudius. This, of course,
If motte-and-bailey castles came as a shock to the Anglo-Saxons, then the new castle that William started to build beside the Thames in the 1070s must have knocked them for six. The Anglo-Saxons had seen stone buildings before (many churches were built in stone), but they were not internationally renowned for their masonry skills. Before the Norman Conquest, the kings of England were accustomed to living in wooden halls, much as their distant Germanic ancestors had done. In fact, when the Anglo-Saxons talked about ‘building’, they used the word
timbrian
; if an Englishman told you he was going to build something, you took it for granted he was talking about woodwork.
In France, of course, building a stone residence would not have raised nearly as many eyebrows. But even the most sophisticated French mason would have been surprised and impressed by the scale of the building project that William had embarked upon in London. Nothing on the Continent could compare in size and grandeur with the Tower. It has recently been suggested that the smaller tower of Ivry-la-Bataille in Normandy, now in ruins, might have provided the inspiration for the basic shape, but the scale of William’s new building was entirely novel.
So what prompted William the Conqueror and his engineers to build on such a scale, and to build in stone? Even today, the Tower is a hugely impressive building, and impressing people was without doubt one of William’s intentions: this was a building project which said that the Normans were here to stay.
Monumental pride, however, might be only half the story. The other way of understanding the Tower is to imagine how nervous and edgy the Normans were in the 1070s – it was, after all, still only a few years after the Conquest, and the English continued to be obstinate and rebellious. In more peaceful circumstances, if a king wanted a palace complex, he might have preferred to distribute the buildings – the hall, the chapel, the bedrooms – over a wider area. Instead, what William and his architect decided to do was to stack all these rooms one on top of the other, and encase the whole structure in immensely thick stone walls. A great tower like this might be first and foremost a monument to vanity, but it also betrays a crucial element of fear.
Whatever the actual inspiration, the final result was an astounding building. Measuring 107 by 118 feet at its base, and standing 90 feet high, William and his sons created a giant among castles. Construction on this scale had not been witnessed in Britain since the time of the Romans. The Normans were well aware of this, and seem to have been deliberately styling themselves as new Romans, come a-conquering in imperial style. William of Poitiers, the Conqueror’s sycophantic biographer, regularly compares his royal master to Julius Caesar (William was better, naturally), and suggests that the king’s leading men were equivalent in wisdom and power to the Roman senate. It is possible to see this attitude reflected wherever William built in stone. At the Tower of London, parts of the old Roman city wall were incorporated into the wall of the castle’s bailey. At Colchester, the former Roman capital, William built another great tower, very similar in design to the Tower of London and probably created by the same architect. Although it now stands only two storeys high (and, thanks to misguided restoration in the eighteenth century, looks faintly ridiculous), it was once even bigger than its London counterpart. The new building was constructed on the ruins of the old Roman Temple of Claudius. This, of course,
Similar Books
