Original subtitles

For me, a great British castle

is a fortress, a palace, a home.

And a symbol of power, majesty and fear.

For nearly a thousand years,

castles have shaped Britain's famous landscape.

These magnificent buildings have been home

to some of the greatest heroes and villains in our national history.

And many of them still stand proudly today,

bursting with incredible stories

of warfare, treachery, intrigue, passion and murder.

Join me, Dan Jones,

as I uncover the secrets behind the six great British castles.

This time I'm in Arundel, near Britain's South Coast.

A classic English castle whose comfort, elegance and grandeur

was enjoyed and admired by Queen Victoria.

But Arundel was originally built for war.

And it survived more than its fair share of battles, brutality and bloodshed.

The story of Arundel Castle expands almost a thousand years.

And throughout it all, the lesson for its owners has been the same.

Chose the right side and you get to keep all of this.

Chose the wrong one and die.

Arundel Castle dominates a hill side

where the Sussex Downs roll towards the English Channel.

It's half medieval fortress, half stately home.

A place that has it's own gatehouse and it's own cricket ground.

It even has a duke.

The extremely prestigious Duke of Norfolk.

It may seem odd but his family line have owned this castle

for more than 800 years.

Even though it's not actually in Norfolk.

But you see he is not any old Duke. He is also an Earl.

Although in Sussex, Arundel Castle is the seat of the Duke of Norfolk

who is the first, or the most important, peer in the land.

He also happens to be the Earl of Arundel.

The oldest earldom in the kingdom. So he is doubly important.

In a few moments, Her Majesty would arrive at the Palace of Westminster.

Awaited by the Earl Marshal, Duke of Norfolk, and the Lord Great Chamberlain.

Traditionally the Duke of Norfolk was one of those who walked backwards

in front of the Queen when she opened a new session of Parliament.

He faced her to show loyalty and respect.

But he had to watch his back, to avoid tripping over a dozing lord.

And actually that pretty much sums up the history of this castle

and of his owners, loyalty.

Who's on your side, who's plotting against you?

You need to watch your back because you never know who to trust.

Howzat!

Today, the Duke's own team is playing.

This used to be his private cricket ground.

Until the 1970's when the Sussex county sides started playing here too.

It regularly hosts big charity and celebrity games.

Even Prince Philip captained a side here in the 1950s.

Arundel has always attracted people of power and influence.

But don't let all this English reserve fool you.

Because underneath its serene exterior,

Arundel Castle has one of the bloodiest

and most dramatic histories of any castle in Britain.

And it all begins more than 900 years ago when England was conquered

by a bunch of men who would sooner have chopped your arm off

than enjoyed a nice game of cricket.

They were the Normans.

The Normans were a powerful and warlike French aristocratic dynasty

descended from Scandinavian pirates.

And they loved a bit of fighting, pillaging and conquering.

In 1066, the Norman lord William the Conqueror

also known as William the Bastard,

landed his boats on the south coast of England

about 50 miles east of Arundel.

He defeated the Saxon King Harold Godwinson

at the Battle of Hastings and took the English crown.

And he set about conquering the whole realm.

Arundel was right at the top of his list and it's easy to see why.

The town of Arundel was perfectly situated.

Fertile land, fresh water and easy to reach from the coast.

A real jewel.

And in 1067, the year after the Normans arrived,

William the Conqueror gave this entire area to

his friend and ally Roger de Montgomery, one of the greatest lords in Normandy.

And what had Montgomery done to deserve all this?

Well, he stayed behind in Normandy, keeping the show running

while William was over here conquering.

Even so, this was a spectacularly good reward.

In fact by the end of William the Conqueror's reign,

Montgomery's fortune amounted to about three percent of entire country's wealth.

He was, if you like, a medieval Bill Gates.

Montgomery needed to protect all of his valuable new land.

So he did what the Normans did so very well.

He built a castle.

Originally out of timber and surrounded by a huge defensive ditch.

When the ditch was dug, the spoil was piled up

to make this huge hundred foot mount or motte.

Then you stick your secure central building right on the top.

That's what today we call the keep.

A wooden castle on top of a hill may not sound impenetrable to us today,

but back in the days before gunpowder, it was pretty formidable.

Historian Marc Morris is a leading expert in Norman castles.

Why wouldn't in the first instance they are interested in speed.

Remember there is a few thousand Normans and two million disgruntled Anglo Saxons.

So you are in the midst of a hostile environment.

And you want to rivet your power into place.

So you build quickly.

In the months that follow, start creating that great mound of earth,

behind this the motte, with again a wooden tower on top.

And this is a castle on a big scale.

On the same kind of scale as Windsor.

Is there any part of the castle

that still survives from Roger de Montgomery's time.

Roger De Montgomery is very very powerful.

He has several castles across England and into the Welsh marches.

But as time wears on, he clearly decides

the Arundel being way on the south coast near to Normandy is one

that he wants to invest in heavily and what he does here,

is he starts to invest in stone.

On the gate past behind you, there,

the bottom part of it, the lowest stories that is late 11th century masonry.

So people will lay in that masonry, in the time of Roger De Montgomery,

in the time of William the Conqueror himself.

Norman castles like the one Roger of Montgomery

was building here at Arundel were partly for protection, partly for intimidation.

But the Normans were also very good at falling out with each other.

And the real problems came, when they had to defend against other Normans.

For almost two decades after the death of William the Conqueror,

his sons had fought and squabbled over the English throne.

In 1135, when his youngest son King Henry I died

without a legitimate male heir, the problems got even worse.

Soon the entire country was on the brink of utter chaos.

Before he died, Henry I

commanded his barons to support the claim of his daughter,

Matilda, to be England's first real Queen.

A monarch in her own right, not just the wife of a King.

But with Henry dead, the barons looked at each other

and had a collective change of heart.

Instead of supporting the claim of a woman,

most changed their allegiance to Henry's nephew Stephen of Blois.

Amen!

In a scramble for the throne,

Stephen managed to have himself crowned first.

He was a power grab that would lead to civil war

that lasted for nearly 20 years.

The country was ripped apart by two cousins battling for the crown.

Stephen and Matilda.

And one of the most important showdowns in that whole conflict,

took place here, at Arundel Castle.

The castle was owned by Matilda's stepmother.

So it was a natural safe haven

and the perfect place for Matilda to base her forces.

All those English barons who decided that England ought to be ruled by a man,

had no idea who they were dealing with.

With Stephen and his army on the march towards Arundel,

the fate and future of the England would be sealed right here at the castle.

Today it's hard to imagine how somewhere as pretty as Arundel Castle,

could have such a dark and turbulent past.

But nearly nine centuries ago, in 1139, it was a Norman fortress

with a heart of a bitter power struggle between two cousins

battling for the crown of England.

Matilda and Stephen.

This castle was protecting Matilda, the daughter of King Henry I

and the heir to the English crown.

Outside was the man who would claim that crown.

Matilda's cousin King Stephen.

And he had with him enough men and fire power to besiege

and maybe even to destroy the castle and everything inside it.

As military tactics went, the art of the medieval siege was pretty simple.

One side goes into the castle,

closes the portcullis, lifts the drawbridge and bolts the door.

The other side, armed to the teeth, camps up outside

in a hope that those in the castle

will succumb to thirst, starvation and disease.

Actual attacks were rare. You risked losing too many men.

And those inside the castle had the advantage of height, solid battlements

and later arrow loops and murder holes

to pour boiling oil down on those trying to get in.

But here's the thing, so far as we know a siege never actually began.

So what did happen?

Put yourself in Matilda's position.

Outside is her cousin Stephen with a large army and a bad attitude.

He has more men than you. And your castle is mainly made of wood,

and not stone, so do you resist or or do you negotiate.

Matilda's fate was uncertain to say the least.

And history is equally uncertain.

All we do know is there was a bizarre conclusion.

Stephen agreed to something completely unexpected.

Frankly quite hard to explain.

He decided to let her go.

Stephen basically allowed Matilda to escape.

And he gave her a guaranteed safe passage to Bristol,

where she could meet up with her allies.

It's really hard to work out what Stephen was thinking.

But at the end of it all, I think we just have to write this down

as a major miscalculation.

Stephen's leniency had dire consequences.

Having being let go,

Matilda wasn't just going to let her cousin keep the crown.

She fought back.

For almost two decades, the cousins battled it out

in a vicious, bloody and drawn out war known as The Anarchy.

It left England a smoldering wreck.

It devastated the countryside, destroyed communities and ruined lives.

One chronicler said it was as if Christ and his saints were asleep.

Matilda never became Queen.

But in 1153, the conflict was finally resolved.

When Stephen agreed to make Matilda's son his heir.

He would become King Henry II.

But it would take England and Arundel decades to recover from the war.

The man who brokered the peace settlement between Stephen and Matilda

was William d'Aubigny.

And he was rewarded by being made the very first Earl of Arundel.

Later by being given Arundel Castle to keep.

The D'aubigny's family held the castle for over hundred years.

Until the fifth Earl of Arundel died without children.

In 1243, the title and the castle was passed to his nephew John FitzAlan.

The FitzAlans were the family who would make Arundel what it is today.

In fact they've occupied it continuously ever since.

Give or take the occasional disagreement with the crown.

This powerful family added the massive barbican and its towers.

A moat, drawbridge and portcullis.

These heavy duty walls and gates were not only for defense,

but also allowed advertisement of the FitzAlan's wealth and status.

No one showed that better

than the great 14th century Earl of Arundel Richard FitzAlan.

During his lifetime, Richard FitzAlan would be a soldier,

a counselor to the King, a clever financier

and one of the wealthiest men of the 14th Century.

He used his riches to transform Arundel Castle

into one of the most spectacular buildings in England.

And where did his money come from?

Friendship and fighting.

As a teenager, Richard FitzAlan became firm friends with a 14 year old

who just happened to be the King Edward III of England.

For 45 years, they embarked on a truly incredible adventure together.

At the heart of it was a war with England's greatest enemy, France.

Edward III was one of the England's greatest warrior kings.

Together Edward and Richard devoted almost their whole lives to the 100 Years War.

A conflict with France that really summed up the golden age of knighthood.

When Kings and Earls didn't just sit around in tents

directing things from afar, they fought in the thick of battle.

The 100 Years War epitomized

an era of loyalty and brotherhood on the battlefield.

Tough military men who had each others backs when it mattered.

Tobias Capwell is an expert on medieval arms and armor.

Toby, in the 14th century, were kings like Edward III

and nobles like Richard FitzAlan really fighting in the middle of battle.

The whole foundation of medieval warrior culture,

was that the leaders had to lead from the front.

It's all about the personal loyalty

of warriors to their masters.

So if your leader isn't there, there is no point in any body else going.

It was expected that a king would fight in the front ranks with his men.

You can't stay behind, you can't stay at home.

You cannot send young men to their deaths without going with them.

The reality for the nobleman, for the knights,

is that they don't do anything until the armies are this close.

I really don't like to be that close

to that sword, which looks pretty sharp.

It sort of resonates for the kind of power doesn't it?

When you know it's something that can make your arms fall off.

That's how male bonding happens.

It's about going through strenuous, traumatic experiences together

when you think you might die

and then you all come home forever bonded closer together.

And that's what the whole fabric of medieval society

knightly culture is based on.

All of Richard FitzAlan's loyal service to his king in the mid 1300s,

was spectacularly rewarded.

He was even left in-charge of England for two years when Edward III was abroad.

And combined with the riches he gathered from victorious battles in France,

FitzAlan, the Earl of Arundel, became almost unimaginably wealthy.

In the 1370s, when he was a noble man,

Richard FitzAlan was said to have 30,000 pounds in cash

stored in a single tower, probably the keep here at Arundel Castle.

Now today, that would be like having

10 million pounds stuffed under your mattress.

Obviously all of the cold hard cash is gone.

But the signs of FitzAlan's war booty are still everywhere in the castle buildings.

Just take a look at this private chapel at the castle grounds.

Medieval nobles were obsessed with legacy and immortality.

What's the use of having a lot money, power and respect

if you can't set it in stone to remind people that you were here?

This stunning FitzAlan chapel was founded after Richard's death.

Using the wealth he built up during a lifetime of royal service.

Beginning with FitzAlan's grandson virtually everyone of the Earls successors

is buried here in this chapel.

You're left in no doubt about how important they were

or at least how important they thought they were.

It's almost an overwhelming space,

it's not very different from the tombs of the great medieval kings

at Westminster Abbey.

But it's still incredible to think that all of this

was built from the spoils of the war.

None of the grandeur brought to Arundel Castle would it been possible

without the war booty plundered on foreign battlefields.

But the biggest war was yet to come for the Earls of Arundel.

Because they were Catholic

in England that was about to become violently Protestant.

They would have to fight for their very existence

under the reign of the Britain's most famous King, Henry VIII.

Arundel Castle had been a seat of great wealth and power

since the time of William the Conqueror.

But in the 16th century, every ounce of wealth and power came under threat,

because of King Henry VIII.

In 1534, Henry set up the Protestant Church of England.

With himself as it's head and separated from the Catholic Church of Rome.

Anyone who failed to pledge allegiance to the new Church of England,

was in danger of incurring the King's wrath.

Hundreds of Catholics were killed for defying Henry.

But the FitzAlan Earls of Arundel remained true to the Catholic faith.

Even given their high status, they were treading a very fine line.

And today the chapel at Arundel Castle still shows

how the FitzAlans brazenly challenged the authority of the King

and his new Protestant religion.

This glass door looks pretty ordinary.

In fact it's anything but, because it marks the division

between the church of England, parish church on that side

and the catholic chapel, the FitzAlan's chapel

within Arundel Castle on this side.

But it's not just rare. Although it is rare.

It's also very symbolic.

Because in a way it tells you the whole story of the English reformation.

The time when Henry VIII ripped the English Church

away from the Church of Rome

and ushered in a period of repression and persecution,

when your loyalty to your God and to your king was constantly under question.

And if either was found wanting, you would meet your maker.

In 1555, the FitzAlans joined forces

with another of England's most powerful Catholic families.

Lady Mary FitzAlan of Arundel married Thomas Howard, the fourth Duke of Norfolk.

From then on, this new Catholic dynasty would be known as The FitzAlan Howards

or sometime simply The Howards.

These statues represent the two families.

On one side we have the horse of The FitzAlans.

And then over here, is the lion representing The Howards.

The Earls of Arundel

and the Dukes of Norfolk, this was a marriage of title, of wealth, and power.

This combined family now had two titles.

They were the Earls of Arundel and The Dukes of Norfolk.

But all the power and wealth was in jeopardy.

As long as their Catholic beliefs

were at odds with England's official Protestant faith.

Henry VIII's daughter Queen Elizabeth I

had the fourth Duke of Norfolk Thomas Howard executed in 1572

for plotting against her.

Then she had his son Philip locked up in the tower of London

for refusing to renounce his Catholic faith.

The dynasty was suffering a disastrous fall from grace.

Jessie, after the turmoil of Henry VIII reformation,

this was a very dangerous time to be a big Catholic aristocratic family, wasn't it?

Yes, definitely was. And especially for The Howards who are the preeminent

Catholic family in the country.

The Howards had a very turbulent 16th century.

They really did actually.

For about four generations, you see,

them just being knocked over like skittles.

You have Thomas, he fourth Duke of Norfolk.

He was caught up in a plot to replace Protestant Elizabeth I,

on the throne of England with Catholic Mary, Queen of Scots, her cousin.

And then his son, Philip, Earl of Arundel

was sent to the tower of London for 10 years.

And he died there of dysentery.

Why didn't they just keep their heads down?

You think they would? Wouldn't you?

The fourth Duke of Norfolk Thomas, he did. He wrote this desperately

desperately sad letter to his son Philip saying

beware blind papistry, as he put it.

And beware of high degree.

In other words, yeah, keep your head down, watch your back.

In a way, it's a miracle

that this family actually survived and the Arundel Castle,

is still here today.

Yeah, it is. Their motif is virtues and victor.

The only virtue unconquered. There's that amazing self belief.

But there's also that Icarus quality.

They always would sail little bit too close to the sun

which is why you get these disgraces.

But they would always rise up.

The union between The Howards and The FitzAlans of Arundel,

which had promised so much

had instead been marred by calamity.

In the space of four generations,

four family members were imprisoned for treason with two of them beheaded.

And of course they lost everything.

Their titles and their castle.

Which reverted to Queen Elizabeth I.

It all leads you to wonder how on earth

are The FitzAlan Howards still at Arundel Castle today.

How did they retain all that power and royal favor?

They certainly didn't roll over and convert.

They remain staunch Catholics to this day.

That fate of the FitzAlan Howard dynasty rested on the next in line.

Thomas was named after his grandfather,

the recently beheaded fourth Duke of Norfolk.

But he wasn't born in a castle.

He was born in the shame and relative poverty

of a humble village in Essex.

You'd have to say that this young Thomas's prospects didn't look good.

But when Queen Elizabeth died

and James I came to the English throne in 1603,

the FitzAlan Howard family's fortunes changed dramatically.

The new King James I was pretty well disposed towards the family,

that supported his mother Mary, Queen of Scots

and then supported his own claim to the English thrown.

Now the king repaid their faith.

Thomas was reinstated as Earl in 1604.

And The FitzAlan Howards were back at Arundel Castle.

Young Thomas was smart enough to know that he needed to start from scratch.

To keep his head down, steer clear of politics

and try to restore the family name and fortune.

And he started in the very best way possible.

He married an incredibly wealthy woman.

This is Thomas's wife Alethea Talbot.

She was the daughter of the Earl of Shrewsbury.

And she inherited huge estates across the north of England.

Now her wealth,

meant her husband could indulge his single great passion,

which was art collecting.

With the family back in the money and back in royal favor,

under Charles I, Thomas acted as government envoy traveling across Europe.

He spent a lot of time in Antwerp and in Padua in Italy

and he liked what he saw.

The art he collected came back here to Arundel Castle.

Thomas the Collector Earl was obviously very cultured, very sophisticated.

I think he was very politically savvy as well.

The reign of Charles I was a very turbulent time.

It would end in English civil war.

Actually this wasn't a bad moment to be getting out of England on long

art collecting tours.

I think there was more to it even than that.

Considering what had happened to generation after generation,

of this family,

amassing all of this art this cultural splendor

was a way of restoring family pride.

It was a way of saying, "We're back.

"And we're back greater than ever."

By the time he died in 1646,

Thomas Howard had amassed a vast array of art, literature, gems and jewelry.

His library included priceless sketchbooks by the great Leonardo da Vinci.

In his will, he stated he wanted the whole collection kept together.

Sadly that didn't happen.

But the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford houses the Arundel marbles.

Thomas's personal hoard of ancient European statues and carvings.

Where in Europe did he go to get all these wonderful antiquities?

He travels to Rome and undertakes what are called excavations.

But what we actually think was they weren't true excavations.

But there were some statues planted for his benefit, to find.

Which he then had to purchase. And then bring back to England.

Could you give us an idea of the contribution of the Collector Earl

to British art and British heritage in general?

Well, he inspired all the future collectors.

So when you travel around Britain today and you see these

country houses full of these beautiful objects,

we have Arundel to thank for them.

Although much of his collection is now elsewhere,

recently, the castle decided to commemorate Thomas, the Collector Earl.

With a specially designed garden to recognize his artistic taste

and his legacy.

This used to be a car park.

His body is in the family tomb in the chapel.

But his spirit is in this garden

which is a recreation of the formal gardens of the 17th century.

Thomas Howard defined how this period in British history

would be seen and remembered.

The artists he encouraged went on to paint

an entire generation of Britain's ruling class.

Most notably, the Flemish master Antony Van Dyck,

whose work is all over the castle.

But there is an irony there.

Because Van Dyck's pretty much famous work is a portrait of King Charles I.

The monarch who helped bring about the downfall of the Arundel Castle.

In 1642, civil war broke out, dividing Britain.

The royalists supported Charles I,

and his right to rule his country as he pleased.

The Parliamentarians, known as Roundheads, challenged the authority of the King.

Arundel Castle which had become more of a art gallery than a fortress,

was suddenly called back into action.

But at the outbreak of the Civil War,

the collector Earl, Thomas Howard was abroad.

His health failing.

He would never see his beloved castle again.

Thomas died in Italy as civil war raged across England

and engulfed Arundel.

December 1643, Arundel Castle was held by royalist forces loyal to Charles I.

But outside the walls, a huge Parliamentarian army was gathering

maybe 10,000 strong.

They battered the castle for more than two weeks.

Until eventually, on the 6th of January, 1644,

it surrendered.

The castle and the chapel were badly damaged.

But ultimately, the reason the siege had succeeded,

was that they'd run out of water.

The men inside were dying of thirst.

But there was worse to come.

After the Roundheads won the war,

and chopped Charles I's head off,

they set about slighting British castles,

tearing down or dynamiting their walls and towers,

to make sure they could never be used for military defense again.

Some of the greatest castles of Britain were ruined,

and Arundel was no exception.

Arundel was a shadow of the palatial fortress

it had been for so many centuries.

But its enemies had failed to destroy this place for good.

In fact they'd left the foundations for another

golden age in the castle's history.

Arundel was about to be reborn in the image of the perfect castle.

A castle fit for a queen.

Or at least for a queen's visit.

And that was just as well.

Because Queen Victoria was coming to stay.

By the end of the 17th century,

the once mighty Arundel Castle lay in ruins.

But it was about to be returned to its former grandeur.

The rich and powerful family who owned it,

The FitzAlan Howards, held two titles.

They were Earls of Arundel and Dukes of Norfolk.

In 1786, Charles Howard became the Earl of Arundel.

And set about making some changes.

An extravagant socialite,

he saw Arundel as a potential pleasure palace.

And he began making major renovations before taking up residence.

Along with Arundel,

Charles also inherited the title of the 11th Duke of Norfolk.

The castle, like the Duke was going to be big, brash and impressive.

The 11th Duke was a rambunctious character.

He loved to entertain and to hold parties here at the castle.

He was also a member of London's infamous Beefsteak club.

Dedicated to the principles of liberal prosperity,

their motto was beef and liberty.

But there was a fair amount of wine involved as well.

He was nicknamed the Drunken Duke or the Dirty Duke.

He had such an inversion to soap and water,

that his servants had to wait until he passed out in a stupor

before stripping him off and giving him a wash.

His personal life was predictably chaotic and unconventional.

His first wife died in childbirth

and his second was certified insane

and had to be confined for almost 50 years,

leaving the Duke to make his way through a succession of mistresses

and father at least six illegitimate children.

Charles wasn't just flamboyant, he was fashionable too.

And he began remodeling, rebuilding Arundel Castle,

according to the taste of the day.

This picture gallery was totally redesigned

so were rooms across the castle.

And ornate new wings were added in the Gothic revival style.

Today, you'd call that retro.

It was harking back to an earlier greater period in time.

In this case, the imagined romantic English Middle Ages.

But at the turn of the 19th century,

that was the height of the hipster cool.

Charles's ambition with a make his castle a place to be seen.

By 1797, he was estimated to have spent 200,000 pounds on the castle.

And by the time he died, that had risen to 600,000.

Or about 40 million pounds in today's terms.

Perhaps, because of those costs,

he also decided to do something incredibly modern for the time.

He started letting in paying tourists.

Social historian Ruth Goodman explains how Arundel Castle was at the forefront of

the 19th century obsession with the past.

So, Ruth, in the 19th century,

that was really the birth of tourism at the castle, wasn't it?

Absolutely, I mean I think when you look around this place,

it's like a film set, isn't it?

And that was very much the purpose.

People were rediscovering the past again, there was a certain fantasy element

to enjoying the past.

When you look around the castle today, you see a lot of tourists.

Arundel is right at the forefront of that.

Starting to collect tickets.

Thank you very much for coming to see our marvelous, recreated Gothic home.

Ruth, I loved the story of the Dirty Duke who is so filthy

that his staff waited till he was blind drunk

and passed out before they washed him.

He was a bit extreme.

But it was an age in which it was really quite difficult to be clean.

So what would you use to get rid of the stench of the age?

This is the perfume of the Victorian age

which is a mixture of lemon and bergamot.

-Very simple ingredient. -Very simple ingredients,

but the two mixed together.

Very fresh.

This scent was the scent of Victoria and her court.

Sure, I don't need to wash this hand today.

And it carries.

There is no doubt it carries.

This one here, this is a gentleman's hair product.

Quite a light one this, hardly any scent it has at all.

-Have a go? -Go for it.

Just a tiny bit on your fingers.

Okay, there we go.

-Yeah. -Quite light.

Bit of, sort of...

Shine to it, I imagine. It's fine. What's in it?

Well, all sorts of things.

If you were the King, then it actually be based on bear fat.

Oh Jesus Christ.

Have I just put bear fat in my head?

No, you haven't. Most people couldn't afford bear fat.

You be glad. You just got lard.

Lard, almond oil, little bit of rosewater, a bit of vodka...

Genuinely amazing but it sounds disgusting but...

It is really effective.

Yeah I mean, modern products are not so dissimilar.

It all goes back to the Victorian times.

And it all goes back to the Victorian times.

Clever Victorians.

The restoration work at Arundel started by Charles, The Dirty Duke,

was completed by the 13th Duke Henry during the reign of Queen Victoria.

And in 1844, Arundel was given two year notice that

the Queen and her husband Prince Albert were coming to stay.

So Ruth, we're living in Arundel Castle, let's say, and we get word

that Queen Victoria is coming to stay presumably, is panic station.

A vast army, this huge machine, has to set to ratchet up into action.

Because you need everything to be utterly ready.

I mean you got to produce food fit for a queen

and you gotta be able to entertain night after night after night.

All the flowers to decorate the rooms, to produce the beautiful smell.

Then you gonna have to have stacks of clean linen. This is a vast effort.

The castle has to be looking its absolute best.

Absolute best.

No matter what the reality is actually.

-Shove it all under the carpet. -Exactly.

And there is a huge number of people to do that.

All these things are very labor intensive.

There aren't any sort of mechanized quick cheats.

It's all about people. So it would be pulling in extra labor,

from the towns and villages around to get it going.

Victoria's visit was a great success.

She stayed for three days.

There were fireworks, conjurers, Ethiopian singers and lots of dancing.

She said Arundel reminded her of her own castle at Windsor.

This ringing royal endorsement encouraged successive generations of Dukes

to keep the process going.

And drag Arundel right into the 20th Century.

It would go on to become one of the very first houses in England

to have electric lights, service lifts and central heating.

Ruth, it's quite light, even airy and certainly comfortable here today.

But it wouldn't be like this in the 19th Century, would it?

No. No, it wouldn't. To be fair to Arundel,

they were one of the first castles to install electricity and central heating.

And gives us this feeling that we got today.

But for most of the Victorian period in most castles,

you gotta think of it without the lights.

You've gotta think of it without the heatings.

I mean they're built to store huge spaces.

Fundamentally, life in a castle is pretty uncomfortable.

Cold, dark, even if it looks nice in pictures.

So, Ruth, this room is pretty dazzling.

We got the bed Queen Victoria slept in.

This is the actual one.

This is the actual bed that she and Albert slept in. Lovely crest above it

I mean it looks dazzling and beautiful.

Another thing that the castle didn't have, even in the rooms prepared for the Queen,

was running water.

So this looks like rather a smart drinks table.

Except this is the bathroom.

It's not even a separate room.

-A chamber pot. -A chamber pot.

The famous chamber pot, this is the toilet.

-That is the toilet. -Never mind a flush or system.

-This is it? -That's it.

And everywhere you went.

I mean Buckingham palace is the same. There was no running water

at this stage within people's houses.

Even at the very top of society.

Even the Queen is busily having to cope with a chamber pot.

In some ways I find this chamber pot quite reassuring

and even quite comforting.

Because even if you're the Queen,

even Queen Victoria, you know, greatest monarch in the world,

when it comes down to it,

you still need one of these just like everybody else.

Yeah.

Today the castle is very much a home as well as a tourist attraction.

And it does have running water.

The present Duke Edward FitzAlan Howard

is the 18th Duke of Norfolk and the 29th Earl of Arundel.

But he doesn't walk backwards anymore at the stage opening of Parliament.

It was the tradition in order to show respect.

But the Queen herself asked for tradition to change.

Because she was worried that the Duke might trip over and hurt himself.

Arundel Castle is still home to the most prestigious peer in the land,

who holds the oldest Earldom in the entire country.

And even has his own cricket team.

Arundel Castle really is about as English as it gets.

From William the Conqueror to the Queen.

From invasion, to reformation, to revolution.

Now it's all hidden beneath this perfectly civilized genteel veneer.

But scratch the surface and you find a story of loyalty

tenacity and single mindedness

which has placed Arundel Castle at the heart of Britain's stormy history.