Medieval Secrets of the Byward Tower
Historic Royal Palaces Podcast
Historic Royal Palaces
4.7 • 701 Ratings
🗓️ 11 September 2025
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Byward Tower at the Tower of London holds some of the oldest surviving treasures of the fortress, including a unique medieval masterpiece – the wall painting known as the Byward Angel.
In this episode of A Space I Love, enter past the Tower's formidable defenses, and follow Curator Alfred Hawkins on an exclusive tour of this remarkable space, which is usually closed to visitors.
Find out more about the Tower of London's Story
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello listeners and welcome back to the new series of a space I love on the Historic Royal Pallises podcast, where we immerse you in history where it happened. |
| 0:14.0 | We're visiting the Tower of London today, so get ready to venture behind closed doors and experience something truly unique. |
| 0:31.0 | So you joined me today looking up at the Bywood Tower, which is one of the most important buildings at the Tower of London |
| 0:41.8 | and forms part of our impenetrable outer curtain wall built by Edward I in the 13th century. |
| 0:50.8 | And for those of you who have visited the tower, you will know the Bywood Tower as it forms part of the main entrance. |
| 0:59.0 | It is the second tower that you walk through in order to get into this wonderful palace and fortress in the centre of London. |
| 1:09.0 | I'm stood outside and we're in the middle of the day, so there are many visitors, lots of |
| 1:15.6 | contractors working on conservation projects to ensure the preservation of this amazing space. |
| 1:22.6 | And so don't worry if you hear strange noises, drills, ravens, visitors asking where the toilet is. |
| 1:30.3 | All of this is part of the day-to-day functioning of the tower and we're working very hard to give it a future as bright as it's past. |
| 1:39.3 | I am Alfred Hawkins and I am curator of historic buildings here at the Tower of London |
| 1:46.0 | and it's part of my job to advise on and look after these amazing buildings and towers, |
| 1:55.0 | one of which is of course the Bywood Tower. |
| 1:59.0 | We should start with the name of the Bywood because there are many reasons why people believe that it is called the Bywood Tower. We should start with the name of the Bywood, |
| 2:01.6 | because there are many reasons why people believe that it is called the Bywood Tower. |
| 2:05.6 | Some people will tell you that in order to gain access to the tower, |
| 2:09.6 | you would need to give someone the Byword, |
| 2:13.6 | and that evolved into the Byward Tower tower but we think more likely it is by |
| 2:21.9 | meaning the second and the ward which is a guarded gate or entrance so if you're |
| 2:29.5 | looking up at the byward tower as you walk into the fortress, you can see that it's formed of two |
| 2:37.0 | large stone towers with a bit that connects the two in the middle. And this is because |
| 2:45.0 | the Byward Tower forms a gatehouse. You have two drum towers on either side, the circular towers which are built out of |
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