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The Royal Family in Windsor

Queen Elizabeth II is the latest in a very long line of Brtish Monarchs who have called the town of Windsor 'Home'

Her family name is Windsor after all. However this is a comparatively recent contrivance. Britain has had a number of different royal family names and Windsor was only adopted as a family name during the first world war. This was because the line of male decent (which is where the family name is traditionally carried) went back to Albert Saxe-Coburg Gotha, husband of Queen Victoria. To have such a germanic sounding name for the royal family was considered inappropriate at a time when British and German soldiers were killing each other in such numbers on the battlefields of France and Belgium.

However the town of Windsor's association with Royalty goes back much further than this.

We belive that there was a Saxon palace at old Windsor (a mile or so downstream from the present town) around 800AD onwards. However little is known about this and no archaeological remains of such a palace have yet been found.

In 1066 William of Normany successfully invaded, killed the Saxon King Harold and was crowned King in Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day. For more on this see the Bayeux tapestry.

He ordered a defensive ring of forts to be built around London. On the Clewer hill near old Windsor an earthwork and wood Motte and Bailey was set up. The name Clewer relates to an old name for cliff and as seen from the River thames there is indeed a cliff face with the castle perched on top.

Many royals would have come to Windsor over the years but court life was generally always moving from one castle to another, so none would have been permanent residents all year round till well after the Tudor period.