Horse Armory
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The Horse Armory was a building in the fortress of the Tower of London . The one-story building adjoined the White Tower to the south and thus stood in the innermost fortress ring of the tower. It was best known for its exhibition, the Line of Kings . The Board of Ordnance had the Horse Armory built as an exhibition building in 1825. In the course of the "medieval" redesign of the tower, the Horse Armory was torn down in 1877.
layout
The Horse Armory was 150 feet (about 50 meters) long and 33 feet (about 10 meters) wide and consisted of a single room. In front of it were three turrets south of the building. The floor was made of brick. The wax figures of 22 English kings and nobles were displayed in the Horse Armory. They sat on horseback and were adorned with armor and weapons. The Horse Amoury, along with the Tower Menagerie , the Jewel House with the British Crown Jewels and the Spanish Armories, was one of the visitor attractions in the Tower of the 19th century. In addition to the Line of Kings, various other exhibits were housed in the Horse Armory.
A long, wide corridor ran through the middle of the building. To the north of this was the line of kings. To the south of the corridor by the windows and between the figures were the other exhibits. The entrance to the Horse Armory was at the front at the east end of the building. Light fell into the room through four large windows adorned with figures and weapons.
To build the Horse Armory, a garage for carriages that had been on this site since 1717 had to be demolished. The builder of the building can no longer be clearly identified today, but it was probably the secretary for work on the tower, Wright. While the building was apparently designed to match the White Tower in style, contemporary commentators didn't think it succeeded. Contemporary reviews called it banal and recommended that the builder be dismissed from the royal service.
After the demolition, the construction workers found an original medieval wall that had connected the Wardrobe Tower to the White Tower.
Line of Kings
The basic concept of the Line of Kings is older than the Horse Armory. It was built in the 17th century and was housed together with the Spanish Armory in warehouses north of the White Tower. After these warehouses were demolished in the 1680s in favor of building the Grand Storehouse , the Line of Kings moved to the White Tower for the time being.
The figures displayed represent either English kings or nobles. While the kings date from the entire period of English history, the selection of nobles is limited to the time of the Tudors. Here are mainly favorites of Henry VIII, Elizabeth - who has no figure herself - and Jacob I. In particular, these are:
- Edward I. in his own armor
- Henry VI. in historical armor that did not belong to him
- Edward IV in historical tournament armor
- Henry VII in historical armor
- Henry VIII in his own armor
- Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk in his own armor
- Edward Clinton, 1st Earl of Lincoln in period armor
- Edward VI. in historical armor
- Francis Hastings, 2nd Earl of Huntingdon in historical armor
- Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester in his own armor
- Henry Lee of Ditchley
- Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex
- Jacob I.
- Horace Vere, 1st Baron Vere of Tilbury
- Thomas Howard, 21st Earl of Arundel
- Henry Frederick Stuart, Prince of Wales
- George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham
- Charles I at the age of 12 in his own uniform
- Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford
- Karl I as a grown man
- Jacob II
A banner was placed above the figures of the kings in a Gothic-inspired arch. On this was the name, rank and life data of the respective person in gold letters.
The exhibition in the Horse Armory was designed by armaments expert Samuel Meyrick , who, to his great annoyance, was not consulted on the construction and design of the building.
Remarks
- ^ Edward Impey and Geoffrey Parnell: The Tower of London. The official illustrated history, London: Merrell 2000, 128 pp., ISBN 1-85894-106-7 , p. 70
literature
- Edward Impey and Geoffrey Parnell: The Tower of London. The official illustrated history, London: Merrell 2000, 128 pp., ISBN 1-85894-106-7
- Hodgson: A Short History of the Tower of London, including a Particular Detail of its Interesting Curiosities; with a Brief Account of many of the most celebrated Kings of England, Noblemen, and others, whose Figures in Armor, and sitting on Horseback, are exhibited in the Horse Armory. J. Macrone: The London and Westminster review, Volume 31 , 1838, pp. 28ff.
