A Space I Love - Tracy Borman in Jane Seymour’s bedroom

Historic Royal Palaces Podcast

Historic Royal Palaces

London, Palace, Tower, Historic, Conservation, Royal, Lecture, Learning, Kensington, Hampton, Kew, Banqueting, History, Court, Of, House, Palaces

4.6 • 635 Ratings

🗓️ 26 January 2023

⏱️ 18 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week we’re back with the final episode from our mini-series on spaces we love in our palaces and what a way to end!

Chief Curator Tracy Borman has chosen to take us into a room that isn’t open to visitors, but that witnessed two momentous moments in Tudor history; the birth of Henry VIII’s long-awaited heir, and the death of his beloved wife Jane Seymour. Tracy explains how this room is a place of escape for her to connect with the history she loves so much.

To find out more about the life of Jane Seymour go to:

https://www.hrp.org.uk/hampton-court-palace/history-and-stories/jane-seymour

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello listeners, welcome to this new mini-series on the Historic Royal Palaces podcast.
0:06.0	I'm Lucy Worsley, Chief Curator, and in this six-part series, our curator's team will be venturing into some of our favourite spaces in the palaces.
0:15.0	Now, my colleagues and I have chosen these spaces especially in the hope that we can transport you to some of our favourite moments in history.
0:22.6	So please get ready to escape to the past with us.
0:29.6	Well I'm at Hampton Court today and the sun is shining. It's a beautiful warm day and because we're quite early, it's very quiet here and I have to
0:42.2	admit I rather like it when it's quiet and I can just wander around the palace and these sort of
0:47.9	maze of corridors uninterrupted and you just get a real sense of the Tudor atmosphere here. So it's always a joy. And
0:57.3	do you know what? It still feels like a novelty because I know we're well out of lockdown,
1:02.9	but it's made me re-appreciate being at Hampton Court all over again the fact that I am now here
1:10.3	on a regular basis once more. But yeah, it's made me open
1:13.9	my eyes a bit more and look around me. And so it's a joy to be back. I've just realized I should
1:18.8	probably say who I am. I'm Tracy. I'm the joint chief curator at Historic Royal Palaces. And I'm having a good
1:26.2	morning so far because I am about to explore
1:31.2	what I think has to be my favorite space in the whole palace.
1:39.8	I'm now in the great watching chamber and as the name suggests, this impressive room is where
1:50.0	Henry the 8th's courtiers would have waited and watched for the king to appear.
1:56.0	So you can see if you come to this room now that we've represented that sense of courtiers waiting
2:03.3	about and passing the time by having little board games from the time, by having cushions
2:08.6	on the floor, and a real sense of anticipation, I think.
2:13.2	You still get it in this room.
2:14.5	It's just off from the Great Hall, much smaller than the Great
2:17.9	Hall, but still, you know, it's an impressive space. It's got, you know, beautiful badges all over
	...

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