Museums

Museums

Introduction

Art plays an important role in the life of a man and sometimes it is

next to impossible to live without it. It is natural that the first thing

that comes to my mind at the mention of the word ‘art’ is museums.

A museum is a stock of the world’s masterpieces, it is the place, where

you can enrich knowledge, you can look at the achievements of mankind, you

can satisfy your aesthetic taste. Museums give the possibility to be always

in touch with the past and every time discover something new for yourself.

Besides, museums play an important role in the life of any nation. A museum

is just the right place to find out lots of interesting things about

history, traditions and habits of different peoples. One may find in

museums papers, photos, books, scripts, works of art, personal things of

famous people etc. All this helps us to better understand historical

events, scientific discoveries, character and deeds of well-known

personalities.

I think museums somehow effect the formation of personality, his

outlook. Every educated person is sure to understand the great significance

of museums in our life, especially nowadays, when after the humdrum of

everyday life you may go to your favourite museum, relax there with your

body and soul and acquire inner harmony and balance.

I am a regular museum-goer. In fact I visited no less than 20 museums.

Among them: the Louver, the National Gallery, the Shakespeare House in

Stratford-on Avon, the Oxford story exhibition, Museum of Reading, Madam

Tussaud’s Exhibition ,the Tretyakov Gallery and others. We can hardly find

a town in our country without its «Fine Arts» Museum. I’ve been in

Voronezh, Kislovodsk, Essentuky and some other regional museums.

Now I want to write about the Tretyakov Gallery, Windsor Castle,

Westminster Abbey, Buckinngham Palace and Hermitage, about their history

and their collections.

The Hermitage

The State Hermitage in St. Petersburg ranks among the world’s most

outstanding art museums. It is the largest museum in Russia: nowadays its

vast and varied collections take up four buildings; its rooms if stretched

in one line would measure many miles in total length, while they cover an

area of 94240 square meters. Over 300 rooms are open to the public and

contain a rich selection from the museum’s collections numbering about

2500000 items. The earliest exhibits Date from 500000-300000B.C., the

latest are modern works.

The collections possessed by the museum are distributed among its seven

departments and form over forty permanent exhibitions. A common feature,

characterising these exhibitions is the arrangement of items (all of them

originals) according to countries and schools in a strictly chronological

order, with a view to illustrating almost every stage of human culture and

every great art epoch from the prehistoric times to the 20th century.

Fabulous treasures are gathered in the Museum. It contains a rare

collection of specimens of Soythian culture and art; objects of great

aesthetic and historical value found in the burial mounds of the Altai; a

most complete representation of exhibits characterising Russian culture and

art. The Oriental collections of the Museum, ranking among the richest in

the world, give an idea of the culture and art of the people of the Near

and the Far East; India, China, Byzantium and Iran, are best represented;

remarkable materials illustrative of the culture and art of the peoples

inhabiting the Caucasus and Central Asia, also from part of the collections

of the Department. The Museum numbers among its treasures monuments of

ancient Greece and Rome and those from the Greek settlements on the North

coast of the Black Sea.

World famous is the collection of West-European paintings, covering a

span of about seven hundred years, from the 13th to the 20th century, and

comprising works by Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Titian, El Greco,

Velazquez, Murillo; outstanding paintings by Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Rubens; a

remarkable group of French eighteenth century canvases, and Impressionist

and Post Impressionist paintings. The collection illustrates the art of

Italy, Spain, Holland, Belgium, Germany, France, Britain, Sweden, Denmark,

Finland and some other countries. The West European Department of the

Museum also includes a fine collection of European sculpture, containing

works by Michelangelo, Canova, Falkonet, Houdon, Rodin and many other

eminent masters; a marvellous collection of prints and drawings, numbering

about 600 000 items; arms and armour; one of the world most outstanding

collections of applied art, rich in tapestries, furniture, lace, ivories,

porcelain metalwork, bronzes, silver, jewellery and enamels. An important

part among the museum possessions is taken by the numismatic collection,

which numbers over 1 000 000 items and is regarded as one of the largest in

the world. A permanent exhibition of coins, orders and medals is open on

the 2nd floor, rooms 398-400. There are auxiliary displays of coins forming

part of exhibitions in other departments as well. A temporary exhibition of

West-European medals is on view in the Raphael Loggias (1st floor, room

227).

The seven departments of the museum, i.e. the Department of Russian

Culture, Primitive culture, Culture and Art of the peoples of the Soviet

East, Culture and Art of the Foreign Countries of the East, Culture and Art

of the Antique World, West-European Art, Numismatics, together with the

Education Department, the Conservation Department and the Library determine

the administrative and academic structure of the museum.

Within the past few decades the Hermitage has become one of the

country’s most important centres of art study with a research staff of

about 200 historians carrying out a vast program of research on art

problems, and responsible for the preservation of the museum treasures,

their conservation and restoration, and also for the scientific

popularisation of art. The results of this varied work are published in the

form of books, articles, periodicals, pamphlets, etc.

Since 1949 a post-graduate school has been functioning at the

Hermitage, specialists in art working here at their theses.

An important aspect of the Museum’s research activities is the work of

the annual archaeological expeditions organised by the Museum either

independently or in co-operation with other Soviet scientific

institutions. The most notable among them are: the Kazmir-Blur expedition

making excavations of the city of Taishebaini dating from the 7th century

B.C and situated on the Kazmir-Blur hill near Erevan; the Chersonese and

Nymphaeum expeditions working on the sites of the ancient Greek towns

in the Crimea, the Tadjik, Altai, Pskov and some other expeditions.The

material discovered by them is of exceptional value, for not only does it

throw fresh light on the problems of the history of the art and

culture, but it also serves to enrich the Hermitage collections.

Most helpful in the Museum’s research work is the Hermitage Library

which contains about 400 000 books, pamphlets, periodicals, and is one

of the largest among the art libraries in Russia. It was started in the

18th century and contains works on all branches of fine and applied arts.

In addition to the Central Library each Department has at its disposal

a subsidiary library of special literature. Of these, the library of the

Hermitage exchanges books with a number of Russian and foreign

museums. It is open to every student of art.

All these are but a few aspects of the varied work carried out by the

Museum and constantly achieving still greater scope and a few forms,

meeting the growing cultural demands of the Russian people.

THE MAKING OF THE COLLECTION

Although visited now by thousands of people the Museum

traditionally retains the old name of the Hermitage attached to it in the

1760’s and meaning «a hermit’s dwelling», or «a solitary place». The name

is due to the fact that the Hermitage was founded as a palace museum

accessible only to the nearest of the near to the court.

A number of objects of which but a small part was later incorporated in the

museum’s collections were acquired in different countries by Peter I. These

were antique statues Marine landscapes, land a collection of Siberian

ancient gold buckles. However, the foundation of the Hermitage is usually

dated to the year 1764 when a collection of 225 pictures was bought by

Catherine II from the Prussian merchant Gotzkowsky.

A feature characteristic of the 18th century accusations was the purchase

of large groups of paintings, sometimes of complete galleries, bought

en blok at the sales in Western Europe.Count Bruhl’s collection

acquired in Dresden in 1769, the Gallery of Crozat, bought in Paris in

1772 and the gallery of Lord Walpole acquired in London in 1779 were

the most prominent among the acquisitions made in the 18th century.

Together with numerous purchases of individual pictures, they supplied

the museum with most outstanding canvases of the European school

,including those by Rembraandt,Rubens,Van Dyck and other eminent

artists, and made the Hermitage rank among the finest art galleries of

Europe. Works , commissioned by the Russian court from European painters

also enriched the Picture gallery.By 1785 the Museum numbered 2658

paintings. Prints and drawings, cameos, coins and medals were likewise

represented at the Hermitage.

The acquisition of complete collections and of individual works of

art was continued in the 19th century but on a more modest scale than

during the previous period. Among the most notable acquisitions of the

19th century were: Mathew Malmaison Gallery of the Empress Josephine

bought in 1814; the collection of the English banker Coesvelt consisting

mainly of Spanish paintings, purchased in Amsterdam the same year; as well

as the paintings from the Barrbarigo Palace inVenice which gave the Museum

its best Titians.

As to the individual works of art, the acquisition in 1865 of

Leonardo da Vince’s «Madonna Litta»fromthe Duce of Litta collection and

the purchase of Raphael’s «Virgin and Child» from the Conestebite family

in 1870, were important landmarks in the growth of the treasures of the

Hermitage.

In 1885 the Hermitage received an important collection of objects

of applied art of the 12th – 26th centuries, gathered by Basilevsky; ,

together with the Armoury transferred from Tsarskoe Selo, notably

enriched the Museum with a new type of material

The first decade of the 20th century witnessed the acquisition

of a magnificent collection including 730 canvases by the Dutch and

Flemish artists, which had been in the possession of the eminent Russian

scientist Semenov-Tienshansky. Another most important acquisition was

Leonardo da Vinci’s «Madonna and Child» purchased in 1914 from the family

of the architect L.Benois.

The Great October Revolution created highly favourable conditions

for the further growth of the Museum collections and their systematic

study. Since October 1917, due to the care taken by Soviet Government for

the preservation of art treasures, the Museum was enriched with a great

number of first-class works of art. Among these were the best pictures

chosen by the Hermitage the nationalised private collections such as

those formerly owned by the Yussupovs, the Shuvalovs, the Stroganovs;

paintings transferred from the imperial palaces; art treasures, acquired

by exchange from other museums within the country.

The policy of planned distribution of art treasures among the

museums carried out by the state, enabled the Hermitage not only to fill

up many gaps and deficiencies by adding to its picture gallery Italian

paintings of the 13th-15th centuries, works of the Netherlandish school,

and of the French school of the 19th and 20th centuries but to form a

museum free from private taste , and made it possible to arrange the

collections systematically. The accumulation of materials which had not

been represented in the museum in the pre-Revolutionary period ,led to the

formation of new departments: the department of the history of culture and

art of the primitive society, of the culture and art of the peoples of the

East, and that of the history of Russian culture.

He immense growth of the collections made it necessary to extend

the exhibition

space This is why the building of the Winter Palace was placed at the

disposal of the Hermitage, the name «The State Hermitage» being now

applied to the whole great museum thus formed.

BRITISH SCHOOL

The Hermitage is one of the very few on the Continent which contains

a special section for English pictures.

Portraiture, landscape painting and satire art in which England

excelled , are represented by a number of first-class paintings and

prints executed by the most outstanding artists of British School, mainly

of the 18th century. A number of 17th-19th century works are on show too.

There are also some notable specimens of applied art, among which is a fine

group of objects in silver and Wedgwood potteryware . English paintings of

the 17th century are extremely rare outside England.The Hermitage

possesses several works of this period. These are: the Portrait of Oliver

Cromwell by Robert Walker, two portraits by Peter Lely, of which the

«Portrait of a Woman» reveals the artist’s sense of colour to great

advantage; also the «Portrait of Grinling Gibbons» by Godfrey Kneller, to

name only the most outstanding canvases.

The collection has no paintings by William Hogarth, but some of his

prints selected from a large and representative collection possessed by

the Museum are usually on show.

Joshua Reynolds is represented by four canvases all painted in

the 1780-s.

An interesting example of his late work is the «Infant Hercules strangling

the Serpents», which is an allegory of the youthful Russia vanquishing her

enemies. The picture was commissioned from Reynolds by Catherine II, and

was brought to Russia

in 1789. In 1891 two other canvases were sent by Reynolds to Russia. One

was the «Continence of Scepic Africanus» , which , as well as the

«Infant Hercules», reveals Reynolds’s conception of the grand style in

art. The other was «Venus and Cupid»; presumably representing Lady

Hamilton .This is one of the versions of the piсture entitled «The Snake

in the Grass», owned by the National Gallery, London

Reynolds’s «Girl at a window» is a copy with slight modifications,

from Rembrandt’s canvas bearing the same title, and owned by the Dulwich

Gallery. It may be regarded as an example of Reynolds’s study of the «old

masters’» works.

A fair idea of the British artists’ achievements in the field of

portrait painting can be gained from the canvases by George Romney Thomas

Gainsborough, John Opie, Henry Rdeburn, John Hoppner and John Russell, all

marked by a vividness of expression and brilliance of execution typical of

the British School of portrait painting in the days when it had achieved a

national tradition. Highly important is Gainsborough’s superb «Portrait of

the Duchess of Beaufort» painted in a loose and most effective manner

characteristic of his art in the late 1770’s. For charm of expression and

brilliance of execution, it ranks among the masterpieces of the Museum.The

«Tron Forge» by Joseph Wright of Derby is an interesting example of a new

subject in English18th century art: the theme of labour and industry, which

merged in the days of the Industrial Revolution.

The few paintings of importance belonging to the British school of the

19th century include a landscape ascribed to John Constable; the «Boats at

a shore» by Richard Parkers Bonington; the «Portrait of an old woman» by

David Wilki, three portraits by Thomas Lawrence and portraits by George

Daive, of which the unfinished «Portrait of the Admiral Shishkov» is the

most impressive.

The collection was largely formed at the beginning of the 20th

century, a great part of it deriving from the Khitrovo collection

bequeathed to the Museum in 1916.

THE TRETYAKOV GALLERY

The Tretyakov Gallery , founded by Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov (1832-

1989), a Moscow merchant and art patron, is a national treasury of Russian

pre-revolutionary and Russian art.

The Gallery’s centenary was widely celebrated throughout Russia in

May 1956. Tretyakov spent his life collecting the works of Russian painters

which reflected the spirit and ideas of all progressive intellectual of

his day. He began his collection in 1856 with the purchase of

«Temptation» (1856) by N.Shilder and «Finnish Smugglers» (1853) by

V.Khudyakov. These paintings are on permanent exhibition. In order that

his collection better reflect the centuries-old traditions of Russian art

he acquired works of various epochs and also began a collection of antique

icons. Tretyakov was one of the few people of his time who realised the

great intrinsic value of ancient Russian art. He was on friendly terms

with many progressive , democratic Russian painters, frequenting their

studious, taking an active interest in their work, often suggesting themes

for new paintings, and helping them financially. His collection grew

rapidly; by 1872 a special building was erected to house it.

Tretyakov was aware of the national importance of his vast collection

of Russian art and presented it to the city of Moscow in 1892, thus

establishing the first museum in Russia. An excerpt from his will reads:

« Desirous of facilitating the establishment in my beloved city of useful

institutions aimed at promoting the development of art in Russia, and in

order to hand down to succeeding generations the collection I have amassed

I hereby bequeath my entire picture gallery and the works of art contained

therein, as well as my half of the house, to the Moscow City Duma. By

special decree of the Soviet Government, Issued on June 3 1918 and signed

by V.I. Lenin, the Gallery was designated one of the most important

educational establishments of the country. It was also decreed that the

name of its founder be retained in honour of Tretyakov’s great services to

Russian culture.

The Gallerie’s collection has grown considerably in the years since

the Revolution. In 1893 it consisted of 1805 works of art, but by 1956 the

number had increased to 35276.The early Russian Art department and the

collections of sculpture and drawings were considerably enlarged, and an

entirely new department- Soviet Art- was created. By a Government decision

of 1956, a new house is to be built for the Gallery within the next few

years.

At present, the more interesting and distinctive works, tracing the

development of Russian art through nearly ten centuries, are exhibit in

the Gallery’s 54 halls.

BUCKINGHAM PALACE

Buckingham palace is the official London residence of Her Majesty The

Queen and as such is one of the best known and most potent symbols of the

British monarchy. Yet it has been a royal residence for only just over two

hundred and thirty years and a palace for much less; and its name, known

the world over, is owed not to a monarch but to an English Duke.

Buckingham House was built for John, first Duke of Buckingham, between

1702 and 1705. It was sold to the Crown in 1762. Surprisingly, since it was

a large house in a commanding position, it was never intended to be the

principal residence of the monarch.

Although King George III modernised and enlarged the house considerably

in the 1760s and 17770s, the transformations that give the building its

present palatial character were carried out for King George IY by Nash in

the 1820s, by Edward Blore for King William IY and Queen Victoria in

the 1830s and 40s, and by James Pennethoooorne in the 1850s.

In the reign of King Edward YII, much of the present white and gold

decoration was substituted for the richly coloured 19th century schemes of

Nash and Blore; and in the 1920s, Queen Mary used the firm of White Allom

to redecorate a number of rooms.

The rooms open to visitors are used principally for official

entertainment .These include Receptions and State Banquets, and it is on

such occasions, when the rooms are filled with flowers and thronged with

formally dressed guests and liveried servants, that the Palace is seen

at its most splendid and imposing. But of course the Palace is also far

more than just the London home of the Royal Family and a place of lavish

entertainment. It has become the administrative centre of the monarchy

where, among a multitude of engagements, Her Majesty receives foreign

Heads of State, Commonwealth leaders and representatives of the Diplomatic

Corps and conducts Investitures, and where the majority of the Royal

Houshold, consisting of six main Departments and a staff of about three

hundred people, have their offices.

THE QUEEN’S HOUSE

The Duke of Buckingham’s house, which George III purchased in 1762,

was designed by the architect William Winde, possibly with the advice of

John Talman, in 1702.

The new house, a handsome brick and stone mansion crowned with

statuary and joined by colonnades to outlying wings, looked eastward

down the Mall and westwards over the splendid canal and formal gardens,

laid out for the Duke by Henry Wise partly on the site of the royal

Mulberry Garden. This garden had been part of an ill-fated attempt by

James I to introduce a silk industry to rival that of France by planting

thousands of mulberry trees.

The building and its setting were well suited to the dignity of the

Duke, a former Lord Chamberlain and suitor of Princess Anne, and of his

wife, an illegitimate daughter of James II, whose eccentricity and

delusions of grandeur earned her the nickname of «Princess Buckingham».

The principal rooms, then as now, were on the first floor. They were

reached by a magnificent staircase with ironwork by Jean Tijou and

walls painted by Louis Laguerre with the story of Dido and Aeneas.

Under the architectural direction of Sir William Chambers and over

the following twelve years The Queen’s House was gradually modernised

and enlarged to provide accommodation for the King and Queen and their

children, as well as their growing collection of books, pictures and

works of art.

QUEEN VICTORIA’S PALACE

At the age of eighteen, Queen Victoria became the first Sovereign to

live at Buckingham Palace.

John Nash had rightly predicted that the Palace would prove too

small, but this was a fault capable of remedy. The absence of a chapel was

made good after the Queen’s marriage to Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and

Gotha, when the south conservatory was converted in 1843.

In 1847 the architect Edward Blore added the new East Front. Along the

first floor Blore placed the Principal Corridor, a gallery 240 feet long

overlooking the Quadrangle and divided into three sections by folding

doors of mirror glass. It links the Royal Corridor on the south, and opens

into suites of semi-state rooms facing the Mall and St James’s Park. Blore

introduced into the East Front some of the finest fittings from George

IY’s Royal Pavilion at Brighton, which Queen Victoria ceased to use after

the purchase of Osborn House in 1845.

The new building rendered the Marble Arch both functionally and

ornamentally dispensable, and it was removed in 1850 to its present site

at the north-east corner of Hyde Park.

THE STATE ROOMS

Most of the principal State Rooms are located on to first floor of

Bughingham Palace. They are approached from Nash’s Grand Hall which in

its unusual low proportions echoes the original hall of Bughingham House.

The coupled columns which surround the Hall are each composed of a single

block of veined Carrara marble enriched with Corinthian capitals of gilt

bronze made by Samuel Parker.

The Grand Staircase, built by Nash on site of the original stairs,

divides theatrically into three flights at the first landing, two flights

curving upwards to the Guard room. The gilded balustrade was made by

Samuel Parker in 1828-30. The walls are set with full-length portraits

which include George III and Queen Charlotte by Beechey,William IY by

Lawrence and Queen Adelaide by Archer Shee. The sculptured wall panels were

designed by Thomas Stothard and the etched glass dome was made by

Wainwright and Brothers.

GALLERY

The picture Gallery, the largest room in the Palace, was formed by

Nash in the area of Queen Charlotte’s old apartments. Nash’s ceiling,

modified by Blore in the 1830s, was altered by Sir Aston Webb in 1914.

As there are many loans to exhibitions, the arrangement is subject to

periodic change. However the Gallery normally contains works by Van Dyck,

Rubens, Cuyp and Rembrandt among others. The chimneypieces are carved with

heads of artists and the marble group at the end, by Chantrey, represents

Mrs Jordan, mistress of William.

From the Suilk Tapestry Room the route leads via the East Gallery,

Cross and West Galleries to the State Dining Room. This room is used on

formal occasions and is hung with portraits of GeorgeIY, his parents,

grandparents and great-grandparents.

THE PALACE AT WORK

BUCKINNGHAM Palace is certainly one of the most famous buildings in

the world, known to millions as Queen’s home. Yet it is very much a

working building and centre of the large office complex that is required

for the administration of the modern monarchy.

Although foreign ambassadors are officially accredited to the Court of

St James’s

and some ceremonies, such as the Proclamation of a new Sovereign, still

take place at St James’s Palace, all official business now effectively

takes place at Buckingham Palace.

In some ways the Palace resembles a small town. For the 300 people who

work there, there is a Post office and a police station, staff canteens

and dinning rooms. There is a special three-man security team equipped with

a fluoroscope, which examines every piece of mail that arrives at the

Palace.

There is also a soldier who is responsible for making sure the Royal

Standard is flying whenever The Queen is in residence, and to make sure it

is taken down when she leaves. It is his job to watch for the moment when

the Royal limousine turns into the Palace gates - at the very second The

Queen enters her Palace, the Royal Standard is hoisted.

Buckingham Palace is not only the name of the Royal Family but also the

workplace of an army of secretaries, clerks and typists, telephonists,

carpenters and plumbers etc.

The business of monarchy never stops and the light is often shining

from the window of the Queen’s study late at night as she works on the

famous «boxes», the red and blue leather cases in which are delivered the

State papers, official letters and reports which follow her whenever she

is in the world.

There can hardly be a single one of 600 or so rooms in the Palace that

is not in more or less constant use.

The senior member of the Royal Household is the Lord Chamberlain. In

addition to the role of overseeing all the departments of the Household, he

has a wide variety of responsibilities, including all ceremonial duties

relating to the Sovereign, apart from the wedding, coronation and funeral

of the monarch. .These remain the responsibility of the Earl Marshal, the

Duke of Norfolk. The Lord Chamberlain’s Office has the greatest variety of

responsibilities. It looks after all incoming visits by overseas Heads of

State and the administration of the Chapels Royal. It also supervises the

appointment of Pages of Honour , the Sergeants of Arms, the Marshal of the

Diplomatic Corps, the Master of the Queen’s Music, and the Keeper of the

Queen’s Swans.

The director of the Royal Collection is responsible for one of the

finest collections of works of art in the world. The Royal Collection is a

vast assemblage of works of art of all kinds, comprising some 10,000

pictures, enamels and miniatures, 20,000 drawings, 10,000 watercolours

and 500,000 prints, and many thousands of pieces of furniture, sculpture,

glass, porcelain, arms and armour, textiles, silver, gold and jewellery.

It has largely been formed by succeeding sovereigns, consorts and

other members of the Royal Family in the three hundred years since the

Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660.

The Collection is presently housed in twelve principal locations open

to the public, which include Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace, Hampton

Court Palace, Windsor Castle, The Palace of Holyroodhouse and Osborne

House.

In addition a substantial number of objects are on indefinite loan to

the British Museum, National Gallery, Victoria and Albert Museum and

Museum of London.

Additional access to the Royal Collection is provided by means of

exhibitions, notably at The Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace, opened in

1962.

WINDSOR CASTLE

Windsor Castle is the oldest royal residence to have remained in

continuous use by the monarchs of Britain and is in many ways an

architectural epitome of the history of the nation. Its skyline of

battlements, turrets and the great Round Tower is instantly recognised

throughout the world. The Castle covers an area of nearly thirteen acres

and contains, as well as a royal palace, a magnificent collegiate church

and the homes or workplaces of a large number of people ,including the

Constable and Governor of the Castle, the Military Knights of Windsor and

their families, etc.

The Castle was founded by William the Conqueror c. 1080 and was

conceived as one of a chain of fortifications built as a defensive ring

round London.

Norman castles were built to a standard plan with an artificial

earthen mound supporting a tower or keep, the entrance to which was

protected by an outer fenced courtyard or baily. Windsor is the most

notable example of a particularly distinctive version of this basic plan

developed for use on a ridge site. It comprises a central mote with a

large bialy to either side of it rather than just on one side as was more

than usual.

As first built, the Castle was entirely defensive, constructed of

earth and timber, but easy access from London and the proximity of the

Castle to the old royal hunting forest to the south soon recommended it

as a royal residence. Henry I is known to have had domestic quarterswithin

the castle as early as 1110 and Henry converted the Castle into a palace.

He built two separate sets of royal apartments within the fortified

enclosure: a public or official state residence in the Lower Ward, with a

hall where he could entertain his court and the barons on great

occasions, and a smaller private residence on the North side of the Upper

Ward for the exclusive occupation of himself and his family.

Henry II was a great builder at all his residences. He began to

replace the old timber outer walls of the Upper Ward with a hard heath

stone found ten miles south of Windsor. The basic curtain wall round the

Upper Ward, much modified by later alterations and improvements, dates from

Henry II’s time, as does the old part of the stone keep, known as the Round

Tower , on top of William’s the Conqueror’s mote. The reconstruction of the

curtain wall round the Lower Ward was completed over the next sixty years.

The well-preserved section visible from the High street with its three half-

round towers was built by Henry III in the 1220s.He took a keen personal

interest in all his projects and carried out extensive works at Windsor.

In his time it became one of the three principal royal palaces

alongside those at Westminster and Winchester. He rebuilt Henry II’s

apartments in the Lower Ward and added there a large new chapel, all

forming a coherently planned layout round a courtyard with a

cloister; parts survive embedded in later structures in the Lower Ward. He

also further improved the royal private apartments in the Upper Ward.

The outstanding medieval expansion of Windsor, however, took place

in the reign of Edward III. His huge building project at the Castle was

probably the most ambitious single architectural scheme in the whole

history of the English royal residences, and cost the astonishing

total of 50,772 pounds. Rebuilt with the proceeds of the King’s military

triumphs, the Castle was converted by Edward III into a fortified

palace redolent of chivalry The stone base was and military glory, as the

centre of his court and the seat of his newly founded Order of the Garter

.Even today, the massive Gothic architecture of Windsor reflects Edward

III’s medieval ideal of Christian, chivalric monarchy as clearly as Louis

XIY’s Versailles represents baroque absolutism.

The Lower Ward was reconstructed, the old royal lodgings being

transformed into the College of St George, and a new cloister, which still

survives, built with traceeried windows. In addition there were to be

twenty-six Poor Knights. Henry III’s chapel was made over for their use,

rebuilt and renamed St George’s Chapel.

The reconstruction of the Upper Ward was begun in 1357 with new royal

lodgings built of stone under the direction of William of Wykeham, Bishop

of Winchester. An inner gatehouse with cylindrical towers was built at the

entrance to the Upper Ward.Stone-vaulted undercrofts supported extensive

royal apartments on the first floor with separate sets of rooms for the

King and the Queen ( as was the tradition of the English royal

palaces),arranged round two inner courtyards later known as Brick Court

and Horn Court .Along the south side, facing the quadrangle, were the Great

Hall and Royal Chapel end to end. Edward IY built the present larger St

George’s Chapel to the west of Henry III’s.Henry YII remodelled the old

chapel ( now the Albert Memorial Chapel) at its east end; he also added

a new range to the west of the State Apartments which Elizabeth I extended

by a long gallery .

During the English Civil War in the mid-seventeenth century, the

Castle was seized by Parliamentary forces who ill-treated the buildings

and used part of them as a prison for Royalists.

At the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 Charles II was determined to

reinstate the old glories of the Crown after the interval of the

Commonwealth. Windsor was his favourite non-metropolitan palace and it

was the only one which could be effectively garrisoned.

The architect Hugh May was appointed in 1673 to supervise the work and

over the next eleven years the Upper Ward and State Apartments were

reconstructed. The result was both ingenious and magnificent, making the

Upper Ward the most unusual palace in baroque Europe.

The interior was a rich contrast to the austerity of the exterior and

formed the first and grandest sequence of baroque State Apartments in

England.The ceilings were painted by Antonio Verrio, an Italian artist

brought from Paris by the Duke of Montagu, Charles II’s ambassador to

Louis XIY. The walls were wainscoted in oak and festooned with brilliant

virtuoso carvings by Grinling Gibbons and Henry Phillips of fruit,

flowers, fish and birds The climax of Charles II’s reconstruction was

St George’s Hall and the King’s Chapel with murals by Verrio. In the

former there were historical scenes of Edward III and the Black Prince, as

well as Charles II in Grater robes enthroned in glory, and in the latter

Christ’s miracles and the Last Supper. All were destroyed by Wyatville inn

1829. The source of inspiration for the new rooms at Windsor was the

France of Louis XIY, but the use of wood rather than coloured marbles

gave Windsor a different character and established a fashion which was

copied in many English country houses.

William III and the early Hanoverian kings spent more time at Hampton

Court than at Windsor. Windsor, however, came back into its own in the

reign of George III, who disliked Hampton Court, which had unhappy memories

for him

From 1777 George III reconstructed the Queen’s Lodge to the south of

the Castle. He also restored St George’s Chapel in the 1780s.At the same

time a new state entrance and Gothic staircase were constructed for the

State Apartments.

As well as his work in the Castle, George III modernised Frogmore in

the Home Park as a retreat for his wife, Queen Charlotte, and reclaimed

some of the Great Park for agriculture. The King designed a special

Windsor uniform of blue cloth with red and gold facings, a version of

which is still worn on occasions today. The King loved the Castle and

its romantic associations. In 1805 he revived the formal ceremonies of

installation of Knights of the Garter at Windsor.

When George IY inherited the throne, he shared his father’s

romantic architectural enthusiasm for Windsor and determined to continue

the Gothic transformation and the creation of convenient, comfortable and

splendid new royal apartments.

In many ways Windsor Castle enjoyed its apogee in the reign of

Queen Victoria.. She spent the largest portion of every year at Windsor,

and in her reign it enjoyed the position of principal palace of the British

monarchy and the focus of the British Empire as well as nearly the whole

of royal Europe. The Castle was visited by heads of state from all over the

world and was the scene of a series of splendid state visits. On these

occasions the state rooms were used for their original purpose by royal

guests. The visits of King Louis Philippe in 1844 and the Emperor Napoleon

III inn 1855 were especially successful. They were invested at Windsor with

the Order of the Garter in formal ceremonies, as on other occasions were

King Victor Emanuel I of Italy and the Emperor William I of Germany.

For the most of the twentieth century Windsor Castle survived as it was in

the nineteenth century. The Queen and her family spend most of their

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