The Tower of London will now be depicted as “a key site” in England’s medieval Jewish heritage to its millions of visitors, after researchers shed new light on the national landmark’s “particular significance for London’s Jews”.
Rupert Gavin, chair of Historic Royal Palaces, announced that the Tower – which attracts three million visitors per year – will incorporate the newly-understood Jewish links into its Yeoman Warder tours as well as its school education programme.
He said he was also looking at options for a “living embodiment of the Jewish presence” at the site, which was defended from attack by the De Montford barons in 1267 by Jewish men-at-arms.
Gavin described these Jewish defenders as “an extraordinary group” and said the research has meant that Jewish involvement in this famous battle scene is now being re-enacted for tourists, 80 percent of whom come from abroad.
Tower historians, drawing on treasury documents from the time, have shed light on several areas, revealing that part of the Tower, including Traitor’s Gate, was built using revenue raised from taxing Jews, who were then “the property of the King”.
Gavin’s announcement follows publication of a detailed study into the central and multi-faceted role the Tower played in the protection, power and persecution of England’s first Jews from their arrival from France until their expulsion in 1290.
“Royal ownership of Jews meant the Crown used the Tower and its officials to exercise direct control over them,” said Dixon-Smith, adding that the Tower’s national reach “is clear in its role in legal proceedings against Jews from communities other than London, such as the Lincoln blood libel case of 1255”.
