Berkeley Castle Britain's Hidden Heritage

The British Isles are a treasure trove of incredible buildings,

amazing objects and extraordinary characters

who've all helped to make up our rich history.

We've been travelling the length and breadth of the country,

visiting some of our much-loved country houses,

finding out more about our industrial heritage

and unearthing stories from the past.

'And today, I'm in Gloucestershire at a medieval castle,

'where a trawl through the archives has recently unearthed

'a lost musical masterpiece.'

This is incredible. Real history in the making here.

And it looks so boring from the outside!

'Also on today's show, Clare Balding

'will be in the southeast of England, finding out how we know

'how country houses were decorated in days gone by.'

It is exactly the same. Everything put in the same position.

It's incredible.

'Charlie Luxton will be paying a behind-the-scenes visit

'to an architectural icon of the 1960s.'

I am now 180 metres

above the whole of central London.

'And in Dorset, special guest reporter Dame Kelly Holmes

'will be honouring an underrated wartime vehicle

'that for a brief moment in history, dominated the battlefield.'

We never hear about the brave men

that fought in the British tank battalions.

Today, there's one machine that I want to look at,

and that changed the course of the war.

'These are the stories of Britain's Hidden Heritage.'

'Being a feudal baron during the Middle Ages

'could be a risky business.

'Upset the king and you just might lose your title or your land.

'Or if you're really unlucky you could end up losing your head.'

Over the centuries, almost all of these medieval lords,

barons and baronets have fallen by the wayside.

But one particular family steered a very clever path,

and for over 850 years, they've just about managed

to hang on to everything they own. They're the Berkeley family,

and this is their home and they're still here today.

Welcome to Berkeley Castle.

'This impressive Norman fortress on the western edge of Gloucestershire

'has dominated the vale of the River Severn for nine centuries.

'Its strategic importance may have faded away many years ago,

'but its rugged presence still impresses to this day.

'Built to hold the western defences of the Norman kingdom,

'the stone keep was begun around 1150

'by the first feudal lord of Berkeley, Robert Fitzharding.

'The castle was a reward from Henry II

'for assisting him in battle.'

From the very beginning, the lords of Berkeley wielded great power.

They were all military men, warriors who fought in all the major battles

throughout the Middle Ages and beyond.

And they fought with bravery at Bannockburn, Crecy,

Poitiers, Culloden, and the list goes on.

They were also great statesmen, successful farmers

and shrewd businessmen, always eager to lend money

and military might to a succession of kings.

The story of the Berkeley family's incredible.

How did they manage to hang onto the castle?

Basically, by staying on the right side of whichever monarch

happened to be on the throne at the time.

-It was as simple as that? Who you rub shoulders with?

-Absolutely.

The Berkeley family were quite astute political movers,

and they managed to keep in with the right crowd.

Has much been done to the castle over the years?

I mean, condition-wise, it looks absolutely fabulous.

Surprisingly little.

Most of the family were very satisfied with the castle

the way they discovered it. But in the 20th century,

the last earl did make a number of substantial alterations.

And that's when, obviously, electricity went in and mod cons.

Absolutely.

'The Berkeley family have been living here for 27 generations.

'Nowadays, in order to help pay for the upkeep of the place,

'parts of the castle are open to the public,

'and one of the most impressive attractions

'has to be the medieval Great Hall.'

Now this is a very impressive room. Is this the original Great Hall?

Probably not. There would have undoubtedly been

a wooden one here first,

but this is the most recent and this was finished in the mid-14th century,

about 1355, when the ceiling was put on

with these wonderful carved oak timbers,

probably all cut on the Berkeley estate.

And behind you is one of the most important

and unique features of Berkeley.

This archway over the door is a Berkeley arch.

I've never seen that before. I was expecting a Gothic arch,

like the one we've just walked through.

-That's slightly more Arabesque, isn't it?

-It's really unusual.

-Yeah.

You only find this in two places. You find it here

and you find it in the Bishop's Palace at St David's in Wales.

And there's a whole series of them which run along there?

They frame all the windows.

-Are the stained glass windows a lot later, obviously?

-Yes.

They were part of the improvements put in by the last earl

in the 1920s, 1930s, but nonetheless very relevant to the castle.

Because there are various shields of members of the family,

of monarchs such as Henry VIII.

Shield of King John, who laid siege to the castle

and captured it and took it away from the family for a brief period.

So very relevant to the castle's history.

Presumably, this room would have witnessed so much

-throughout the centuries.

-Absolutely.

One of the most important episodes that happened in this Great Hall

was that the barons from this part of the west of England met here

before joining the other barons to force King John to sign Magna Carta.

So you could actually say that part of the history of England

was written in this very room.

'From the early Middle Ages through to the Tudors and beyond,

'the Berkeley lords were never far from the throne,

'and scattered around the castle

'are mementoes from many significant events that forged Britain's past.'

The whole place just oozes history, it really does. It's exceptional.

Just look at the wall coverings here.

Look at this finely woven cloth

with this wonderful gold decoration throughout,

reputedly from the Field of Cloth of Gold,

where Henry VIII met Francis I of France in 1520,

just outside of Calais, to cement a real friendship

after the peace treaty was signed.

Now both these men were very arrogant and show-offs,

and it really was an opulent display of wealth.

These were tent hangings and the Berkeleys were there.

'And the Berkeley presence at important historical events

'doesn't just stop with Britain's military heritage.

'They were also great patrons of the arts.

'It's said Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream

'was premiered at a Berkeley family wedding.

'And there's one room in the castle which shows they were not frightened

'to confront religious doctrine.'

This is the room I want to show you, it's called the Morning Room,

and like all the other rooms here in the castle,

it has a fascinating story to tell.

It was previously the castle's chapel and you can tell that

by just looking at the design and the decoration of the ceiling.

This dates back to the early 1300s,

but if you look closely, there's something very special up there.

Up there, written all the way along there, are verses of the Bible.

Now, you're probably thinking, "What's so special about that?"

Well, if you look closely you can see they're all written in French,

which had been the spoken language of the Berkeleys at the time.

It marks the beginnings of the Bible being translated

into a spoken common language,

which, at this particular time in history,

would have been strictly forbidden by the Pope.

So this is one of the very earliest attempts of doing that.

It was translated by a Cornishman, John Trevisa, who was born in 1342.

And he ended up being the castle chaplain here.

All of this predates the Protestant Church by a good 200 years.

So no wonder it's been painted over and hidden

and then scraped back to be revealed.

What you see here and in the rest of the castle

are significant points in British history.

Very powerful stuff.

'So significant a historic site is Berkeley,

'that for the last six years,

'it's been the location of an important archaeological dig.

'And later, I'll be joining in to see what finds have been unearthed.

'But before that, our reporter, Clare Balding,

'is in London to check out an incredible archive

'that has helped to save some of our most beautiful historic houses.'

'When English Heritage set about restoring

'the interiors of Eltham Palace in South London, taking them back

'to their 1930s heyday, where did the research begin?

'Family archive? Old paintings, perhaps?

'No.

'The Heritage detectives' first port of call

'is not where you might think.'

Well, I have to say, this is pretty blissful.

Lovely spring day, cup of tea and a copy of Country Life.

Published once a week every week

since Queen Victoria was on the throne, this magazine has been

relentlessly documenting British architecture, interiors

and gardens. Its photographic archive has become a national treasure.

'Long before many of our fine historic houses

'were open to the public, the photos in Country Life

'were the only way to see inside the homes of high society.

'Nowadays, organisations like English Heritage and the National Trust

'are using these photographic records as an invaluable aid

'to many restoration projects.'

So today, I'm not in the country. Quite the opposite, in fact.

I'm in London, on the South Bank, at Country Life headquarters

to find out more about this unique archive collection.

'John, I think of Country Life

'as a sort of airbrushed view of the world,'

You know, every garden is perfect,

every painting is straight, every...everyone looks lovely.

How can it possibly be a realistic historical document?

Well, it's Britain in its Sunday best, should we say?

There's no doubt about that.

It's very much trying to celebrate the architecture and the buildings and show them at their best.

The quality of the photographs in here is just so high.

I mean, these are fabulous.

Well, when it was first published in 1897, it was actually called Country Life Illustrated,

because the publisher was fascinated by a brand-new technology,

which is halftone block printing, which allowed you to reproduce

really high-quality photographs in press for the first time.

Do we know anything about the photographers themselves?

Well, not as much as we would like.

But we do have a particularly good insight into the life and works

of one of them, a man called Alfred Henson,

who worked for the magazine from 1916.

He would install himself, set up his dark room

and work his way around the house,

reorganising interiors to make them look picture perfect.

This is, in fact, a photograph of Henson at Old Rufford Hall

nailing dust sheets to the windows so there was an even exposure of the interior.

So this man is turning the place on its head in order to photograph.

One chatelaine of the house said it was worse than burglars having him along.

But there's one particular Alfred Henson assignment

that really shows how important the Country Life archive has now become.

It was a photo shoot that 75 years later proved invaluable

in saving perhaps the most outstanding 1930s interior in Britain.

'To find out more, I'm venturing underground

'to the Country Life archive

'in search of an article about Eltham Palace.'

Oh, this is it! I've found you!

-Hi, Justin.

-Nice to meet you.

-God, it's cold in here.

-It keeps everything nice and cool,

looks after all the copies we've got here.

We've got a complete run of Country Life dating back from 1897,

when the magazine was first published.

It's an amazing collection, fantastic to work with.

-Now, I've got a request.

-OK.

-Like a really annoying person.

I want something quite specific,

because I know that English Heritage did a lot of work on Eltham Palace

and the research that they did relied on photographs

-that were in Country Life from an edition in 1937.

-OK, fine.

Just wander down here. 1930, 1932...

And...here we go - 1937.

-This is it, is it?

-This is it. So let's have a look.

-Now, I think the article that I'm after was in May...

-Right.

-May, the 29th.

-OK.

-Wow!

-Oh, that's it!

-Fantastic!

Brilliant! Can I borrow this book?

-Absolutely.

-I promise that, heavy as it is,

I will guard it with my life.

'When it comes to interior design,

'Eltham Palace in South East London is a rare gem.'

And one that could easily have been lost for ever.

In 1937, it was hardly surprising

that the Country Life photographer Alfred Henson

should want to pay a visit.

The glistening state-of-the-art mansion had just been completed,

courtesy of Stephen and Virginia Courtauld.

And it boasted THE most extraordinary interiors in the country.

The Courtaulds were fascinating characters,

fabulously wealthy thanks to the family textile business.

And utterly submerged in the London art scene.

And coming here is like stepping into their world.

It's 1937, an era of Hollywood glamour,

high society and the world of Art Deco.

Wow, this is absolutely stunning.

It's like walking into a film set.

Eltham's entrance hall has been returned to 1937.

In fact, to the very moment when Alfred Henson pressed the shutter on his camera.

And it's just as well he did,

because within eight years of taking these photos,

the Courtaulds had fled their home overlooking war-torn London

and, for the next 50 years, this building was taken over by the Army.

Eltham Palace and its fabulous interiors parted company.

But, in 1995, English Heritage assumed responsibility

and, with the Country Life photographic record to guide them,

set about recreating the world of the Courtaulds.

We could actually be on Alfred Henson's shoulder.

I mean, it is exactly the same.

Everything put in the same position, it's incredible.

We wanted to put it back as people saw it in 1937 in this article.

So these photos were absolutely crucial in helping us to do that.

What he's managed to do is create

this amazingly luxurious ocean-liner feel to this room

and put it in print.

All over the house it was a similar story.

In Virginia Courtauld's bedroom,

one photo revealed her choice of armchair fabric.

This design was recreated

with new chairs upholstered using 1930s techniques.

In the dining room, the bird's-eye maple veneer table and chairs

were recreated by furniture makers in Rugby.

And, finally, the famous Marion Dorn carpet at the entrance hall,

made once again by hand in Donegal, Ireland.

And lined up just as it was in 1937.

What we need to be careful of with Country Life photos

and with using them as historic documents to recreate,

we have to do it with the knowledge that they were staged.

So we're also lucky enough to have an inventory of the house

from slightly later, from 1939,

which lists lots of things in this room that we are sitting in

that don't appear in the photograph.

But it's interesting because it actually increases the influence of Henson

on the heritage picture we have now that he is as much a part of this

-and of how we view it historically as anyone else.

-Yeah.

Today's Eltham Palace is like a stage set,

still touched by the hand of Alfred Henson.

But his meticulous and comprehensive coverage

has enabled a dedicated team of conservators

to recapture a most unusual heritage treasure.

So often, we can only get a taste

of what periods in history must have been like.

But here, the full Art Deco glory of the 1930s is back.

All too often, we think of heritage as being about buildings and objects,

but what I've seen today,

an almost secret stash of photographs buried in a Thames-side basement,

holds an intrinsic value of its own.

Because those photographs are the key not just to recreating the accuracy of the contents here,

but also in bringing to life again

the spirit of a place like Eltham Palace.

Later, on Britain's Hidden Heritage,

Charlie Luxton will be climbing to the top

of one of the country's first and favourite modernist buildings.

The whole of central London spread right before you

out to the countryside.

And Dame Kelly Holmes champions a forgotten World War II vehicle

that was once the Queen of the Desert.

It's filthy, it's small, it's claustrophobic.

But it's done us proud.

But first, my tour of Berkeley Castle continues.

When the Normans invaded England in 1066,

they quickly spread across the country,

taking over Saxon communities

and building defensive castles as they went.

Berkeley was strategically placed to guard against attacks from the Welsh

from across the River Severn.

And it's easy to see why the Normans chose this place as a location.

Here we are. I'm on the roof right now,

level, as you can see, with the treetops.

The general public are not allowed up here, so I'm quite lucky.

But we should get the most marvellous bird's-eye view

of the whole footprint of the castle.

And we do, look at that.

A castle keep, an inner bailey and a curtain wall.

It's the most marvellous example of Norman fortified architecture.

But what a view! You can literally see for miles around here.

Over there, it's the River Severn. Beyond, the Welsh Marches.

But you can see right across the vale.

Stick a sentry up here on guard duty,

and he could see anybody approaching for miles.

And, likewise, the castle itself can be seen from miles away,

standing as a reminder to any would-be Welsh invader

thinking of attacking Norman England.

And there is evidence that the castle was originally rendered with a lime render.

And it's there, look,

it's that creamy render just around the window.

So, from a distance, this whole castle would have looked brilliant white

against this lush vegetation of the landscape.

Standing out as a beacon, a symbol of power and strength.

Little is known of the community that existed here

before the Normans took over.

However, it's thought this may have been a religious site,

dating as far back as the Romans.

In the grounds of the castle,

Bristol University's Archaeological Department

have been trying to find out exactly what went on here

and they've come up with some quite surprising results.

Paul, nice to meet you. How are you?

-That's a big hole.

-It is, it is.

We've been digging here

for about six years, on and off.

And we've got some amazing archaeology in this trench.

I know you're here to see the castle and, in fact, just here...

-There's a wall there.

-There is a wall and, in fact,

-you are looking, believe it or not, at a Norman house.

-Gosh!

This house is contemporary with the stone construction of the castle,

so this is 1150, 12th century.

What were you initially looking for? Why did you start to dig here?

We were interested in the Norman landscape

and, actually, the earlier Saxon landscape.

And what I'm trying to work out is what happens when the Normans arrive.

The castle is in a really strange place at Berkeley,

right up in the back corner.

We think there's a big Anglo-Saxon minster,

-a big religious site here.

-Right.

-And the castle is tucked just outside it. You'd normally expect to find it in the middle.

-Yeah.

So there's a big ecclesiastical power

and the Normans have to take the only bit of land that's available to them.

And so, I'm keen to find out really what happens with the Saxon landscape

and how the Normans imposed their kind of feudal landscape over the top of it.

And what happened.

And we're trying to find out

what life was like for people that lived in these plots,

what their day-to-day life was like,

what kind of crafts they carried out,

what sort of pottery they used.

And, really, what it was like to be under the yoke of Norman lordship.

So far, the dig has come up with plenty of broken pottery

to prove there was once a thriving community here.

These bits of ceramic have been a key way of dating the site,

and medieval pottery expert Jim Newboult is here to show me

how the pots that have been found at Berkeley were made

and what they originally looked like.

How long has it taken you to make these?

This one here, that took ten minutes.

And this technique is called pinch,

as opposed to thrown, where it's on a wheel.

It's just literally pummelled into shape.

Even when we get the...

Even when we do get the wheel coming in,

in, say, the seventh century,

there's no saying that this technique wasn't just speeded up

by putting that on the wheel and going back to the pinching.

We start by making the actual rim of the pot

and then bring the belly and the bottom of the pot out afterwards,

depending on what you want the clay to do.

So if I take it to that stage,

that's my basic top part of the vessel that you see there.

-Right, I see.

-That's then ready to put to one side.

That's a bit soft there...

This one here, turn over and then,

here's where we put the paddle and anvil.

Here's my soft leather anvil

and then we take the rib

and that will create that large, rounded cooking pot.

I mean, this is the sound that you would probably have heard

in those Saxon houses.

-There we go.

-That's looking good.

That's that...

That real Norman cooking pot.

By the time we get to the 13th and 14th century,

you still see this same shape in use,

because it's a very practical...

The rounded bottom means the heat moves around the outside.

-You can imagine a rolling boil in the...

-Yes, I can.

You could fry sausages in that in the fireplace.

And yet, now we say you can't put pots in the fire.

The Saxons could.

I'll be returning to the archaeology site at the end of the programme

to see if they've uncovered any exciting finds.

In the meantime, our industrial heritage reporter Charlie Luxton

brings things a little more up-to-date

as he travels to London and a 1960s landmark.

It's not very often in this country

that we sing the praises of '60s architecture.

Brutalist, concrete buildings

so loved by modernist architects and designers like me.

Yet, so loathed by the general public.

There was, and still is, an exception.

And, because of that, it's become an important part of our heritage.

The concrete and glass structure has been defining London's skyline for 50 years.

Right from the very beginning, it captured the public imagination.

And, over time, has won over its affection.

I'm talking about, of course, the BT Tower.

'In 1965, the tower opened to great acclaim.'

It marked a time of profound change

when Britain, for the first time in decades,

was looking forward to an exciting future.

'As the rubble of the Second World War was cleared away,

'new and taller buildings began to rise.

'In a few years, the look of London changed entirely.

'And nothing changed it more than the building

'that was eventually to dominate the skyline.'

Now, you could say that the tower isn't really hidden heritage at all,

given the fact you can see it from pretty much everywhere in London.

But, actually, it was closed to the public in the 1980s,

so very few people actually get a chance to see it up close.

So, today, I'm really rather privileged,

as I'm going to be allowed to explore the whole structure,

including the famous revolving restaurant and even the roof itself.

But, first of all,

I want to find out how 13,000 tonnes of reinforced concrete is held up.

So I'm heading somewhere truly hidden.

An area that hasn't seen the light of day since the early '60s.

This incredible space is the base of the tower, it's the foundation.

It's an incredible, enormous concrete pyramid that holds it up.

Now, the way this foundation works is that

the tower sits in the top of the middle of the pyramid there.

And this great big construction here

is actually just to spread that weight out,

to give it a wider base and make it a bit more stable.

But this is not the bottom of the foundation even here.

There's another 50 metres of concrete

going right down through the London clay.

Because of the sensitivity of those microwave transmitters,

the tower couldn't rock.

Now, normally, a tall building

will actually sway quite a lot in the wind.

But this one couldn't, so it had to be super stiff.

80 feet up, that stiffness was reinforced by a collar

clasping the core shaft of the building tightly,

holding all the tower's vital equipment firmly in place.

Technology and communication were the buzz words of the '60s,

and they were the very reason the tower was constructed.

It became the country's biggest telephone exchange and microwave transmitter,

beaming out communication signals across the UK.

'Putting it simply,

'microwaves carry radio signals of very, very short wavelength.

'Like light, they travel in straight lines.

'And like light, they are lost of view or use, as it were,

'by the curvature of the Earth's surface.'

But beyond the technology, the Post Office Tower, as it was first called,

was a global symbol of Britain in the throes of modernisation.

Built with public money and with viewing platforms open to visitors,

in the swinging '60s, the tower was an instant hit.

The 34th floor restaurant was quite literally revolutionary.

To the restaurant level and...

'And the man who opened the tower to those first public visitors is with me today.

'The then Postmaster General, Tony Benn.'

So was this one of the hottest tables in town when it was open?

Well, it was certainly very popular

because it gave you such a fantastic view of London.

So you could book a table here...

And see the whole of London while you had your main course.

Yes, you could, yes.

Why do you think this building is held in such affection by so many people?

Because it's an intensely modern building. But people really love it.

Well, I have a special feeling for it,

having been here when it was opened and so on.

But it was seen as a symbol of the age into which we were moving.

And then, we had the opening when Billy Butlin ran this restaurant.

And the Queen came and it was a great event.

Now, I understand that it actually still turns.

Well, I hope it does. It'd be very nice if it did.

-Shall we go and see if we can get it working?

-Yes.

Who knows where the button is?

THEY CHUCKLE

With the restaurant and the tower long since closed to the public,

something of an urban myth seems to have developed

that the 34th floor no longer rotates.

But, as you can see, when VIPs ask nicely, it clearly does.

Furthermore, the engineering is unchanged since the 1960s.

Well, I've always thought what a wonderful place to have a state banquet.

So you'd have the Queen or the Prime Minister here

and the guests would go by.

So when you had that awkward silence, you'd just sort of drift gracefully off.

Yes, you'd drift off, that's right.

And then come back again and you'd have forgotten what it was about.

HE LAUGHS

Whilst state dinners never quite made it here,

the 34th floor was certainly an exclusive spot.

The capital's first high-level vantage point.

But it's not quite the best view of all.

Today, I'm being allowed to venture even higher.

Right,

I am now 180m above the streets of London

and I've got a 360-degree view.

It's stunning!

There's Wembley over there, you can just see the arch,

and then just the whole of central London spread right before you

out to the countryside, to the Olympic Park...

Absolutely fantastic.

Throughout the late '60s and '70s,

the tower was the tallest building in London.

Incredibly, it stole the title from a building that had held

it for 250 years - St Paul's Cathedral.

In the past, we built tall to reach toward heaven.

But the construction of this tower changed all that.

It wasn't built to reach towards God,

it was built to point towards the telephones and TV sets.

But technology has come a long way since 1965

and Londoners may have noticed that the famous horns

and dishes that the tower was built to support have recently disappeared.

Getting a closer look involves a very scary step off the side of the tower.

Hope you like heights, Charlie.

In 2011, Bob Semon was part of the team

responsible for dismantling an era of communication technology.

There's nothing on the outside here

that's transmitting or receiving information?

The core stuff which used to carry all the radio and TV,

nothing like that whatsoever.

-How big were the horns?

-The horns were around 9m in height.

So you lifted them from up there then dropped them

down onto one of these decks?

-Correct.

-And then just cut them up?

-Yeah.

-How did you get them down from there?

-We had to cut them up into small enough pieces to get into the lift.

-Cos they were massive!

-Huge.

You can imagine the size of pieces we had to cut them

into to get them down.

The BT Tower is still very much in use

but the important stuff no longer happens up there at the top on display,

it happens down here at the base.

This is the international media centre

and the vast majority of mainstream TV is managed through here.

In fact, you're probably watching me on technology controlled just there.

But that information is no longer sent through the air,

it goes underground on fibre optic cables and those cables go

under the Channel, to the Atlantic, to America and beyond.

This building is hard-wired into a massive spider's web that

circumnavigates the globe.

So here we have a very rare thing indeed - a working '60s building,

made of concrete, but one that undoubtedly holds our affections.

But there's much more to the BT Tower than just a gleaming,

modernist structure born in the optimism of the 1960s.

It stands, I think, as a triumph of its function - communication.

The technology might have moved on but its place in our heritage

is assured because it stands as the original hub of modern Britain.

Still to come, Dame Kelly Holmes is off to Dorset to champion

an unsung mechanical hero of WWII.

Here's where the shell would have been put in for the gun.

The rebound off the gun would have been immense.

But first we're back at Berkeley where my tour continues.

Now, one could hardly come to this castle without acknowledging

one of the most notorious and darkest tales in Britain's

history which supposedly took place here in 1327.

But is it true, or is it just a story?

Now, Winston Churchill is supposed to have said history is

written by the victors,

and if there's one episode that proves this true, it's the event

that overshadows all the other incredible history here at Berkeley.

And that's the imprisonment and brutal murder of King Edward II.

According to history, he was considered an incompetent king.

He was lavish with his money, he put too much trust in his advisors

and was a complete failure in battle.

He was hated by the people, hated by the barons, but even more

so hated by his wife Isabella, who, with her lover Roger Mortimer,

raised an army against him, had him deposed and flung into prison here.

After several unsuccessful attempts to poison him by his captors,

he was finally brutally murdered on the orders of his wife.

Politeness forbids me from telling you exactly how legend says

he was murdered, but let's just say it was with a red-hot poker

and a considerable amount of pain.

Now, is this true or did the victors rewrite history to suit themselves?

Where are you taking me, what's this room?

This is actually the guard room,

although it's known amongst castle staff as the prison cell

and this is said to be where King Edward was murdered.

The first theory which is the one that you

and probably most of the schoolboys in the audience like is that he

was killed with a red-hot poker somewhere rather painful

which would mean he wouldn't want to sit down for a long time.

The second theory is that he was strangled or suffocated

and that was the story that was current at the time.

So, it's likely that he was murdered on this site,

we all agree on that, how did the Berkeleys get away with that?

It just shows how shrewd they were and how they knew the right

people because they were accused of being complicit

in King Edward's murder, but, by having friends at court

and by having the right arguments,

the right paperwork and the right friends,

they managed to avoid it.

They claimed they were at their manor house at Wootton

whereas the household accounts show they were here,

so a very clever piece of political manoeuvring.

The real facts of that grizzly murder will be for ever

lost in the mists of time but what an intriguing story.

And one that makes Berkeley Castle such a fascinating place.

In fact, with its seemingly endless connections to the past,

its glorious displays of antique furniture

and the work of master craftsmen in every nook and cranny,

this private house is of real national importance.

As we've mentioned, the Berkeley family have pretty much owned

and lived in the castle for nine centuries which gives this

magnificent building an almost unique and unrivalled continuity.

It just doesn't pertain to the fabric of the building,

but also its contents.

Everything here has been passionately collected by each

generation over the centuries.

As you walk from room to room, you'll notice

a series of family portraits and they're all of exceptional quality.

If you look at the signatures they read like a veritable

who's who of every great British portrait painter worth his salt.

There are three marvellous family portraits in here - John,

the third Lord Berkeley of Stratton here, and his wife Lady Jane.

They make a handsome couple and they were painted circa 1670

by Sir Peter Lely who followed in the footsteps of Van Dyck.

Lely was a Dutchman who settled in London as a young man

and later in life became a naturalised Englishman.

But his talents earned him the right to be court painter to Charles I.

His skills got him

through that unfortunate incident of Charles losing his head.

He ended up painting for Charles II, became a court painter

as well, and in 1680, at the age of 62 he was knighted - Sir Peter Lely.

These paintings are so special

because this is the birth of what's known today as the English

portrait style and throughout this period of history it was

the vogue, it was the fashion to have your portrait painted

like we like our photographs taken.

To maximise his earnings, Lely employed a studio full of assistants

who would paint in the foreground, background and a lot of the body.

Lely would come in and just paint the important bits - the face,

maybe, and the hands and a little bit of detail. Rather clever.

So, that's why there's an awful great body of Lely's

work around, because he was so prolific.

There is one other painting I want to show you, it's George I,

Earle of Berkeley and it sits unassumingly above the doorway just up there.

That was painted in the mid 1680s by a female artist, Mary Beale.

It was exceptionally rare to have a professional female

artist as the profession was considered a male occupation.

She really flourished in the last quarter of the 17th century,

right up until her death in 1699.

There you are, a very rare example

of a professional female artist's work.

For the Berkeley family to have held their collection of artworks

and antiques together,

and in the same place for such a long time, is an extraordinary feat.

I met up with Charles Berkeley who, along with his father,

has the mighty task of keeping their ancestral home going.

Thank you, Charles. Wonderful textures in this room, very rich.

A lot of people must think you're very privileged to

own your own family castle.

I know and you do get a lot of comments, "Oh,

"how lucky you are to have grown up in such a magical, wonderful place."

-But it does have its...

-Headaches.

Headaches, yeah. A lot of hard work.

We've just rewired and put new heating in the whole of the castle,

we've done a whole lot of repair work to the roof and various other places.

It is a constant challenge to be able to put money back in.

What was it like growing up here as a kid?

I mean, great fun playing hide and seek, I would imagine,

and trying on the armour.

It was fantastic.

We were up to all kinds of mischief.

It was lovely to be able to enjoy such a place like this

and the visitors always loved it too.

They saw these two boys racing around coming out from behind sofas.

Yeah, it was magical.

Where are we going, Charles?

We are going up to the Great State Room, Paul,

one of the main bedrooms in the castle which has got a lot of history

and a very fine bed.

Fabulous bedroom.

The centrepiece is that lovely bed.

-Oh, what's its history?

-Wonderful carvings. Well, it's fascinating.

We believe it's a 16th century oak tester bed,

and these wonderful carvings

supposedly of Lord and Lady Berkeley at the time.

This is an exquisite bed. Who has slept in this?

We believe Henry VIII stayed here with Anne Boleyn.

On one of her travels, Elizabeth I did a pilgrimage

and certainly stayed for two nights here.

In those days there would have been about three mattresses

stuffed with horse hair.

It would have come up to about here. Thankfully, you've changed it now.

We got a new mattress put in.

With Berkeley Castle being

such an important part of Britain's heritage, what a huge responsibility

it must be for Charles and his family to maintain the place

for future generations.

Especially with 850 year's worth of his ancestors watching over him.

Now, each week on Hidden Heritage, we send out a guest reporter

to champion their own heritage passion.

Today, Dame Kelly Holmes is in Dorset

to celebrate an unsung wartime vehicle

that was once the Queen of the Desert.

Now, lots of you will know me from my exploits on the athletics track,

but when I left school, one of my first jobs was in the British Army,

behind the wheel of an HGV truck.

Quietly, though, I've always had the passion for something a bit bigger.

I love vehicles and what I've always wanted to do is have a go

in one of these, a tank, the beast of the battlefield, and today I'm in it.

Whoo!

Here at Bovington in Dorset,

it's not modern tanks like this that I've come to see.

Instead, I want to wind the clock back a little over 70 years.

When it comes to World War II,

I think the history of the tank has been so overlooked.

We always hear about Spitfires and Lancaster Bombers.

We never hear about the brave men that fought in the British tank battalions.

Today, there's one machine that I want to look at

and that changed the course of the war.

I want to celebrate the Matilda,

because for one vital World War II campaign in North Africa,

the Matilda tank helped give our forces the upper hand

and virtually ended the Italian ambitions in that region.

It was a time when tank warfare was still in its infancy

and yet, today, the Matilda is virtually forgotten

except by tank enthusiasts and the heroes who fought in them.

When I was conscripted, I asked if I could join the Royal Air Force,

but they wouldn't play ball on that one.

I didn't know a thing about tanks.

Most of the training was done in trucks

and you went out on training exercises in trucks, not in tanks.

Before World War II, the whole concept of how a tank should operate

on the battlefield was still far from clear.

Matilda Mark I had been designed in 1935 purely to assist foot soldiers.

More like a moving barricade,

it was designed to offer great protection

and clear the path at the front line.

But with just one machine gun, its firepower was very limited.

However, by the start of the war, a new tank was in production

and this time it would be a fully-fledged attacking machine.

This is Matilda II, much bigger, 27 tonnes

and, as you can see, thicker armour and a very serious weapon.

Matilda II was an innovation that, in 1939,

kept Britain at the top table of tank power.

This is just one of a few Matildas left in working order

exactly as it would have looked when a 22-year-old Maurice Bourne

arrived in North Africa with the Royal Armoured Corps.

By that time, I'd been put into a tank as a driver

and I'd hardly driven one at all,

but they were a fairly simple thing to drive.

Its first real big test came

in the Western Desert at the very end of 1940 during Operation Compass,

a two-month offensive against the occupying Italian force.

The opposition was armed with 600 tanks.

More than twice as many as the British.

But the small Fiat-built machines were no match for the Matildas.

The Italian anti-tank guns were unable to penetrate

the eight centimetres of British steel.

The Matildas' two-pounder shells however,

could deliver a fatal blow to the smaller Italian machines.

In a matter of weeks, the British were able to push the Italian forces

far west out of Egypt and across the Libyan desert.

When it came to action, of course, you were closed down

and the driver could see very little.

He just had to go where the tank commander told him

over the intercom.

It may not be 40 degrees here in Dorset,

but today I get a bit of a taste of what driver Maurice

and his three crew mates must have experienced.

On the arm rest, which is here, he's got to look through just here

so he can see where they're going.

You can only just see. This is where they put the shells.

They would have inserted the shells in here.

The rebound would have been just amazing.

It would have been hot, sweaty, smelly,

but I could not imagine what it would be like.

It's filthy, it's small, it's claustrophobic,

but they've done us proud.

With Matildas being the key attack weapon,

Operation Compass was a complete success,

earning the tank the nickname, Queen of the Desert.

But the Matilda's time at the top was not to last.

Even by 1941,

bigger and better machines were being rolled out on all sides.

Not least by the Germans.

The problem is, with tanks and warfare, whatever you've got,

I've got to get something better quickly, so development speeds up.

What happens with the Matilda, the armour's very, very thick

and Hitler himself sees a report of German rounds

hitting the armour of the Matilda and bouncing off.

So he starts a programme

for the German army of building massive tanks.

He starts a thing called the Tiger Programme

and that eventually leads to whopping great things like this.

This is a King Tiger here.

This? So they went from Matilda, the tiny little thing, to that?

This is about three years later.

This is the type of round that the Matilda II fired.

-OK, it's quite heavy, though.

-Quite small, quite heavy.

-Yeah.

But by the end of the war you've got rounds as big as this.

This is a round that's been fired by the King Tiger we looked at earlier.

-They've gone from this to that.

-Within four years of the war.

Amazing.

The Matilda II eventually became a victim of its own success.

Ultimately, being outclassed by the bigger

and more destructive tanks it had inspired.

The days when 300 British Matildas could defeat a force

twice their size were rapidly consigned to the past.

The war continued on European soil,

and whilst fighting in Sicily, Maurice Bourne was now

up against the new German 88mm guns, the nemesis of all Allied tanks.

We were overseeing an infantry attack on a wood.

The gun opened up.

I saw a flash.

It came through the hull of the tank.

The shell went past my ankle and bruised it

and into the engines and set it on fire.

Unfortunately, the co-driver in the front

was killed instantly by the shell going through him.

Poor fella.

Before I leave Bovington, there's one important meeting left for me.

But for 92-year-old Maurice Bourne, it's a very special reunion.

-How old were you when you drove one of these?

-21.

-21.

Very comfortable.

Never worried about things.

-So you're 92?

-Yes.

You still have all those memories over 70 years ago.

-Well, you can't forget.

-No.

Especially the salient features, you know,

when you get a shell coming through the tank,

sparks flying over your head and leaping out a bit quickly.

-You're never going to forget that, are you?

-No.

Do you feel lucky, though,

because there were a lot of people who wasn't?

I feel luck or something was on my side. All the way through.

I can't explain it but here I am to tell the story.

I do honestly believe that there is something looking after one.

With heroes like Maurice at the helm,

Matilda made a key difference at a specific point in the war.

Amongst the further horrors and the ultimate victory which followed,

this desert story can easily be forgotten.

But it's a story that I believe deserves to be heard.

Within months, Matilda's moments had passed

but it was long enough to stop North Africa getting into enemy hands.

It was a result that changed the course of the war.

Earlier on, back at Berkeley Castle,

I met the team of archaeologists from Bristol University

who were investigating the site's early days.

So, before we leave,

it's time to look at some of the treasures they've unearthed.

-Hello.

-Hi, everyone.

-Good to see you again.

-And you.

What have you found for me?

Well, this is the key find that I really want to show you, Paul.

This is what this site's all about, is it?

This is what this site's all about.

Basically, we're inside an Anglo-Saxon minster.

What we're looking for is evidence that we've got monks and nuns

and one of the things we know about minsters is they're literate.

This is a period where most people are illiterate.

For instance, if the King wants a document drawn up,

he'll go to the minster to get that document written

so we're looking for evidence that we've got monks and nuns.

This is a thing which is absolutely unique actually in this country.

It's called an astle and, basically, you would have a long bone pointer

from the bottom and you use it to follow the illuminated manuscript

as you read aloud, for instance, in church.

How wonderful.

And when you get to the end of the page, you use it to turn the page.

-This end would turn the page, so you don't touch it.

-Absolutely right.

This is a unique find in this country. So it's 8th to 9th century.

-Oh great.

-What it tells us is we've got Anglo-Saxon literacy.

-You can see it's ecclesiastical.

-You can.

There's no doubt it's an ecclesiastical piece.

But that's absolutely the star find from our site so far

and it's a wonderful piece of archaeology.

The archaeological dig outside the castle is not the only place

that has been a source of hidden heritage.

Locked in the vaults way under Berkeley are the family archives.

The home of some rare and remarkable documents.

Gosh, what a lot of books.

David Smith has been the archivist at the castle for over 30 years,

in charge of cataloguing thousands of documents and artefacts.

So what we've got here is basically the residue

of a country gentleman's library in the 18th century with additions

because it's a living library.

Things still come in here if they are relevant to the castle,

the family or the archives.

'In 2001, David came across a seemingly insignificant book

'that turned out to be anything but.

'It was nothing less than a lost manuscript

'by the great Italian composer Antonio Vivaldi.

'This was a discovery of worldwide importance.'

Can you remember the moment you discovered this Vivaldi manuscript?

I can remember the moment when I was told what it was.

Was it a Eureka moment?

Well, not for me because I don't understand music.

It was someone who I managed to find as a consultant to look at it.

This is Professor Michael Talbot of Liverpool.

He's a man of few words

and I don't think he would mind even his friends saying

that he hasn't got a great deal of expression.

So he came in here.

I put the book out for him and he got his head down and he looked at it

and he worked on it solidly without saying a word for about two hours.

He was measuring the distance between the staves because that's how

you find out which music shop it was copied in and all that sort of thing.

And then he looked up and me and he said,

"Go into any antiquarian music shop in Europe

"and you'd find a book that, on the outside, looks like this.

"But you'd never find one with the contents

"when you open it that this one has."

-Gosh.

-And that was the moment when I realised what we'd got.

So it wasn't signed "Vivaldi" anywhere at all?

Well, the word "Vivaldi" is written on the top of some

of his compositions, but what you have here is

a compilation of something like 50 tunes

and, of those 50...

and they're not all by Vivaldi by any means, I think about a dozen are.

Of those 50, 17 are not known in any other place.

They are absolutely unique to this manuscript

and six are new Vivaldi music.

In other words, it was known that he composed the arias,

but the music had not survived.

-And they do survive in here.

-This is incredible. Absolutely incredible.

This is real history in the making here.

And it looks so boring from the outside.

In his lifetime, Vivaldi wrote over 500 instrumental

and choral works, including an opera by the name

of The Triumphant Constancy Of Love And Hate,

and it's from this that the missing arias came, written around 1716.

They were lost for nearly 300 years.

And just in case you wondered what they sound like, well,

we couldn't let this occasion pass without getting in a few musicians

to bring this particular bit of hidden heritage to life.

SHE SINGS IN ITALIAN

That was brilliant.

Thank you so much for bringing that piece of music alive

and I know we put you on the spot.

You only had about ten minutes to practise that wonderful singing.

-Beautiful voice.

-Thank you.

That's got the body of a lute. What instrument is that?

It's an instrument called Chittarone or Tiorba.

It's a 17th century Italian type of lute

that was used in Vivaldi's time.

Wow, well, it certainly sent me back in time, put it that way.

That's lovely. Thank you so much.

What's it like playing in a room like this?

This music was discovered here so it's a real privilege

to be performing something so rare in such beautiful surroundings.

It's really wonderful.

QUARTET PLAYS

SHE SINGS IN ITALIAN

What a glorious way of ending my tour of Berkeley Castle,

with the strains of one of the lost Vivaldi arias ringing out

in the Great Hall as they might well have done some 300 years ago.

I wonder what other discoveries might be found here in the future?

This magnificent castle connects the present Berkeley family

with their ancestors.

It's their family history but it's our heritage

because Berkeley Castle, its contents and the events that

took place here, really have shaped Britain's history.

What an incredible place. See you next time.

If you'd like more information, check our website:

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd