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3 Playing with the Guards
A guard at the Tower of London wears a new uniform featuring the royal cypher of King Charles III.
The Tower of London Guards, with their elaborate red coats and ridiculously large black fur hats, are an international symbol of the Tower of London. But formally known as the London Guards, their red coats are only worn on formal occasions – the Guards you see wear the less fancy ‘plain dress’ blue uniforms.
The Tower of London is guarded by 32 guardsmen, all of whom have distinguished military careers. They also regularly organise free guided tours that are informative, insightful and full of unexpected information, and they live in the Tower with their families.
4. Tracking the flow of money at the Mint
Visit an exhibition on 500 years of coinage history. Credit: Getty Images
Part of the London Guards Quarters is located in the former Royal Mint, where all coins from the British Empire until 1810 were minted.
There is also a surprisingly fascinating exhibition covering over 500 years of coinage. The Elizabeth I shilling on display isn’t particularly fascinating, but the story behind it is fascinating. During the reign of her father Henry VIII, the purity of the coins declined and she ordered all the coins in the country to be melted down and re-minted in the Tower of London.
The same thing happened with the Great Coinage Reform of 1696, directed by Sir Isaac Newton, who served as Master of the Mint for 28 years.
5. Meet the Crow
Ravens at the Tower of London with Royal Guards in the background.Credit: Getty Images/iStockphoto
Besides the guards, the most famous residents of the Tower of London are the ravens. Legend has it that if the ravens leave, the White Tower will fall and the kingdom will fall.
So the tower’s crow master would effortlessly clip the bird’s wings on one side, causing them to lose balance when they tried to fly.
Instead they move around, often on the Tower Green near the Bloody Tower. One of them likes to lie on the ground and play dead if it feels it is not getting enough attention.
6 Hunting the Wireframe Zoo
A model of a polar bear in the Tower of London.
Historically, ravens weren’t the only animals in the Tower of London. The Royal Menagerie lived there from the 1200s until the opening of London Zoo in 1835. The often ridiculous wild animals were partly gifts from foreign kings and included a polar bear that was tied to the end of a rope and allowed to swim in the Thames.
Today, the zoo is represented by a series of striking life-size wireframe sculptures by artist Kendra Haste. Look out for the polar bears next to Wakefield Tower and the elephants by the Elizabeth II Arch.
7 Make up your mind in the bloody tower
Sir Walter Raleigh’s study below Bloody Tower.
Did Richard III kill his nephew in order to seize the English throne? The Bloody Tower – where the two princes lived before they disappeared – shows both sides of the argument through video projections on the wall.
Bloody Tower was also the prison where Sir Walter Raleigh, inventor of the potato, was held for 13 years. Raleigh’s spacious study is on the first floor, and his gardens (where he experimented with medicinal plants) have been recreated outside.
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