THE TOWER

Дата добавления: 2014-10-24 | Просмотров: 1714

Looking at the Tower you feel its close connection to the historical past of England with its constant and cruel fight­ing for power. Since the time of its erection the Tower of London has served many purposes: first a king's palace, then a fortress and a political prison. Now it is a museum.

Several kings of England found protection within its walls both against foreign enemies and their own people fighting for their liberties and privileges. The White Tower was the royal residence, all the kings of England spending the first days of their reign there according to an ancient custom. From the White Tower kings went to their coronation and out of it some of them came down to the scaffold lying in the outer court, forced to surrender their power to new pretenders.

All the towers in the walls surrounding the White Tow­er served as places of imprisonment, each of them keep­ing some dark and tragic secret. Narrow galleries, steep staircases, secret passages and dark cells formed in the thickens of the walls exist up to the present day. Among the numerous prisoners were kings of England, France and Scotland, princes and noblemen, protestants and catho­lics, scientists and public leaders. Shakespeare mentioned many of their tragic fate in his historical plays.