History's Youngest Heroes: The Brief Reign of Lady Jane

History's Heroes

BBC

Documentary, History, Society & Culture

4.8 • 704 Ratings

🗓️ 16 December 2024

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Stripped of her crown and trapped In the Tower of London will Lady Jane Grey give up her faith or face the executioner’s axe?

Nicola Coughlan shines a light on extraordinary young people from across history. Join her for 12 stories of rebellion, risk and the radical power of youth.

A BBC Studios Audio production for BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds.

Producer: Suniti Somaiya Assistant Producer: Lorna Reader Executive Producer: Paul Smith Written by Alex von Tunzelmann Commissioning editor for Radio 4: Rhian Roberts

Transcript

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0:00.0	Did you know that you can listen to many of your favourite podcasts first on BBC Sounds?
0:06.6	Like Desert Island Discs, where you can hear castaways like Cher, Gareth Southgate and Nick Cave,
0:12.7	and enjoy longer versions of the music they've picked.
0:15.7	Good things come to those who don't wait.
0:18.7	Listen to your favourite podcasts first on BBC Sounds.
0:23.9	BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.
0:28.5	There's a 19th century painting by Paul Del Arosh, which when it was first unveiled in Paris,
0:34.5	caused a sensation.
0:36.5	In the beginning of the 20th century, it was bequeathed to the
0:39.9	National Gallery in London. It caused a sensation again. The public absolutely adored this painting.
0:47.6	They were mesmerised by it. This is Franie Moyle, an art historian. And I think it's because
0:54.0	people are drawn to horror.
0:56.9	And he presents it in an era before cinema in an incredibly cinematic way.
1:04.3	The subject of this painting is Lady Jane Grey, the young woman sometimes referred to as the nine-day queen.
1:10.3	She's clad in a sort of shimmering white gown,
1:14.2	and she is blindfolded, also in white.
1:20.9	She has this beautiful, shiny, orb and her hair cascading down over her white shoulders,
1:31.9	and she's reaching forward blindly towards the wooden block that she kneels before, on which she's soon to place her head. And of course,
1:40.2	she is about to be decapitated. On the 12th of February 1554, Lady Jane Grey was led from her bedchamber in the Tower of London
1:50.0	to be beheaded. She was 16 years old. The moment of her execution has been depicted by artists,
1:58.0	writers, playwrights and filmmakers over the years, but perhaps most famously by this painting.
2:03.6	It's a very, very, very odd picture.
	...

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