16 January: Windsor Castle

On this date in 1993 Windsor Castle reopened, two months after a Fire swept through it. Here are some things you might not know about Windsor Castle.

1. Windsor Castle, located in Berkshire, England, is one of the residences of the British royal family and is the largest and oldest inhabited castle in the world. British kings and queens have made it their home for almost 1,000 years, starting with Henry I.
2. The word derives from the Old English Windlesoren, meaning “winch by the riverbank.” It's also the surname of the current British royal family, who named themselves after the castle in 1919. King George V decided that their dynastic German name of Saxe-Coburg Gotha wasn't the best idea after a huge war with Germany.
3. The original castle was built by the Normans, who wanted a ring of nine castles a day's march from London, so soldiers could get there quickly to defend the place if necessary. Windsor was the largest of these. William the Conqueror's castle was built from wood. It was Henry I, the first king to actually live there, who replaced the wooden walls with stone. The lavish state apartments were created in the late 1600s by King Charles II.
4. It has been a favoured residence of many British kings and queens including Edward III, Edward VIII, Elizabeth I, Queen Victoria and of course, Queen Elizabeth II. As one of the Queen's homes, the changing of the guard takes place here as well as at Buckingham Palace. If you want to know if the Queen is at home, you can tell by which Flag is flying from the top of the castle. If it's the Royal Standard, the Queen is in. If it's the Union Jack, she's out.
5. Windsor Castle has about 1,000 rooms and 52,609 square meters (13 acres) of grounds. The approach road is 2.65 miles long and 240 ft wide. There are so many fireplaces (300) that a full time fendersmith is needed to take care of them. The same family have been doing that job for generations. There is a library with 300,000 books, prints and drawings, including Queen Victoria's diaries. There are more than 450 clocks in the castle, and yes, there is someone employed to look after them, too. When the clocks go forward in the spring, it takes 16 hours to change them all. When they go back in the Autumn, it takes 18 hours to change them, because most of the clocks can't be adjusted backwards.
6. On display here is a doll's house belonging to Queen Mary. It was built to a 1/12^th scale and designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens and Gertrude Jekyll. The attention to detail is mind-boggling. It has Toilets which actually flush and taps which actually work. The tiny Wine cellar contains over a thousand little bottles containing real wine and Beer; there's Electricity, Lifts, and in the library, tiny books which contain stories hand written by the likes of Rudyard Kipling and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. 1500 artists and craftsmen were needed to build it.
7. Windsor Castle is the headquarters of the Order of the Garter with St George’s Chapel in the grounds as its spiritual home. The order was created by Edward III in 1348, inspired by King Arthur's knights of the round table. Membership is limited to the monarch, members of the royal family and 24 other people chosen by the monarch. According to legend, the order got its name when King Edward III's partner's garters fell off during a dance. He picked them up and pulled them over his own leg. Members of the order gather at Windsor Castle every June for a meal and a service in the chapel.
8. The chapel has 76 statues of animals on its roof. These are known as “The Queen's Beasts” and represent heraldic animals from the history of the royal family. They include the Lion of England, the Red Dragon of Wales, the panther of Jane Seymour, the falcon of York, the Black bull of Clarence, the yale of Beaufort, the White lion of Mortimer, the greyhound of Richmond, the white hart of Richard II, the collared silver antelope of Bohun, the black dragon of Ulster, the white Swan of Hereford, the Unicorn of Edward III and the golden hind of Kent.
9. During the Second World War, the Royal family spent their nights at Windsor Castle, commuting to Buckingham Palace by day. This was a big secret at the time, because they wanted the people to think they were staying at the Palace and braving the air raids along with their subjects. The Castle was reinforced to withstand any bombing; works of art were removed to an even safer place, chandeliers were lowered to the floor and the windows blacked out. Windsor Castle was never bombed, possibly because, as rumour had it, Hitler wanted to make it his home in Britain if he won the war.
10. Windsor Castle has been damaged by serious fires three times - in 1296, 1853 and most recently and devastatingly in 1992. It's believed the latter fire started during renovation work when a spotlight was placed too close to a curtain. The fire lasted 15 hours with 200 firefighters battling to bring it under control. More than 100 rooms were damaged by either fire or the water used to extinguish it. Luckily, many of the priceless works of art had been removed for the renovation work. The cost of restoring the castle after the fire was nearly £40 million.

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