The Ravenmaster

by Christopher Skaife

  * * *

  The window of Merlina’s night box originally opened into the large basement of the Queen’s House, where coal was once stored, and which was first used to house ravens in 1946, when two ravens named Cora and Corax were put up there, perched on a pile of coal. We certainly don’t keep our ravens in coal bunkers anymore. (One of the only times in recent history when the ravens have been kept inside at the Tower was during the avian flu virus in 2006, when tens of millions of birds worldwide died, and millions more were slaughtered to prevent the flu spreading. At that time we removed the ravens for their own safety to the upper Brick Tower on the advice of the vets at London Zoo.)

  The old night boxes just didn’t feel right to me. Ravens are wild birds who should be able to perch outside. They need to be able to fly back and forth. Like humans, they need freedom. But they also need protection. I strongly believe that if we’re going to continue to keep ravens at the Tower we have to make it as welcoming a place for them as possible, an environment that, if not entirely natural, is at least a place where they have room to roam in safety. So, soon after I had taken up the post of Ravenmaster, I discussed with the staff of Historic Royal Palaces—the independent charity that looks after the Tower of London, Hampton Court Palace, the Banqueting House, Kensington Palace, Kew Palace, and Hillsborough Castle—the possibility of constructing some sort of large enclosure that would offer the birds protection at night but that we could leave open during the day, thus enabling them to continue to roam freely outside and socialize with one another but also to enjoy some privacy. (I don’t like the word cage, by the way. I don’t even like the word aviary. They’re words that imply capture and containment. I always refer to the ravens’ nighttime quarters as the enclosure.) Historic Royal Palaces were as keen as I was to make improvements to the birds’ living arrangements.

  It took us about two years of research and consultation with London Zoo and Historic England and many other experts to get the design and development of the enclosure exactly right. Obtaining the planning permission alone was quite a feat. Just because we’re the Tower doesn’t mean we can make up our own rules. We had to obtain all the same planning permissions as anyone else. You can perhaps imagine the look on the face of the poor planning officer when our Planning Service application arrived on their desk: “Erection of new cages and night boxes for Ravens, HM Tower of London.” The main thing was to get the build right for the ravens, not just for the Tower or for my benefit or for the benefit of visitors; it needed to be something that the birds would want to use as a base.

  The enclosure is made out of oak and a special fine wire which flexes if the birds should accidentally fly into it, to prevent them from getting injured. A tragic entry in the Tower Orders—which are the records of day-to-day activities at the Tower—for April 18, 1975, notes that Raven Brora was “Discovered entangled in wiring of the raven’s cage. Because of injuries had to be destroyed.” It was of the utmost importance to me when designing the enclosure that this kind of terrible accident could never happen again.

  One of the main requirements when we were planning the enclosure is that it had to be absolutely fox-proof. Even now, I’ll often arrive in the morning to signs that the foxes have once again attempted to dig under the wire to get at the birds. They have no chance: I made sure that the wire goes straight down into the concrete and hardcore foundations. But you’d be amazed where foxes can get in. They can squeeze through the smallest gap—I’ve seen them manage to slip through gaps just a few inches wide, and once they’re in, they’re in and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. We’ve lost many a raven to foxes over the years. They sneak in under the drawbridges, crawl through the gutters, and trot through secret passageways. Sometimes I think my job title should be the Fox- and Ravenmaster: I’m engaged in a continual battle just trying to keep them apart.

  * * *

  The enclosure has separate areas inside for each bird or pair of birds to be able to sleep, and big sliding doors that allow me to open up the entire space so that they can come and go as they please. Each bird has its own perches and a large night box within the enclosure. All of this might sound straightforward, but it took a long time to work out the design, based on careful observation of the birds’ behavior.

  As I said, the enclosure is really only for nighttime. The birds are out flying or walking around during the day, all day, every day. Very occasionally I keep them in the enclosure if they need looking after—if they’re sick, or if they just need a break. Being on show to the public every day can be exhausting, as we Yeoman Warders know only too well. Sometimes you just need to take some time off to be by yourself and to relax and recharge. I’m always looking for signs of stress in the birds. If I sense that they need a break for whatever reason, I keep them in. I’ve been living and working with the ravens for such a long time now that I can tell when something’s not right, the same as you can tell if your loved ones need some extra attention. You just know. The Tower is a community—and the ravens are an essential part of that community.

  6

  TOWER GREEN

  Now that you have a good sense of where we all live, you’ll probably want to know about our daily routine.

  The Ravenmaster’s basic duties and responsibilities can be summarized thus:

    1. Clean and prepare the ravens’ water bowls for the day.

    2. Clean their enclosures and remove any food they’ve discarded from the night before.

    3. Check each raven closely for any health issues.

    4. Feed the ravens; administer any medicines, such as worming tablets; monitor their food intake.

    5. Release the ravens from the enclosures for the day.

    6. Watch the ravens’ movements as they make their way to their territories, checking and recording any wing or leg damage.

    7. Monitor the ravens throughout the day, ensuring the safety of both the ravens and the public and dealing with any issues arising.

    8. Return the ravens safely to their enclosures at night.

    9. Prepare food for the morning.

  10. Final check before lights-out.

  In theory that’s it. Sounds pretty easy, doesn’t it? In practice, though, it’s a little bit more complicated.

  For simplicity’s sake, let’s begin at the beginning. I’m up and out onto Tower Green at the crack of dawn. My first call of the day, every day, is to check on Merlina, since she mostly likes to stay out at night, up on the rooftops. Merlina is the only raven who stays out at night. The other ravens all return to the enclosure on the south side of Tower Green. Merlina refuses to do so. Merlina treats the rooftops around Tower Green as a penthouse suite—a place to retreat and to contemplate the world. Once I can see her silhouette and I can hear her call, I make sure that the whole area around Tower Green is safe and clear from debris or anything that might harm the birds. And then I proceed to fill the water bowls.

  This might sound silly, but I love filling the water bowls. It’s one of the highlights of my day. I scrub and refill the bowls daily. There are plastic water bowls in the raven enclosures and six stone bowls dotted around the Tower’s Inner Ward where the ravens spend their days. I like the simple act of refilling the bowls, the sound of it, the smell of it, the clarity of the water. It’s a ritual for me. It’s my quiet time. This is when I get to clear my head and think about the day. They say that getting up and out early in the morning into the fresh air, no matter what the season, is good for your mental and physical health. All I can say is that I’ve been up and out early in all seasons every day for my entire working life, and so far so good.

  There’s one water bowl which is up on the north side of Tower Green, by the Chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula. It’s believed that there may have been a place of worship there for over a thousand years, predating even the White Tower. Some even claim that this part of London is one of the nation’s ancient holy places, our own little centra
l London Glastonbury or Stonehenge. And legend has it that there was once a spring of fresh water up at Tower Hill, the site of a sacred mound, and you get druids turning up these days in their costumes to celebrate the spring equinox, though I’ve never been tempted myself. According to Celtic legend, around here is also where the head of Brân the Blessed, the king of England in Welsh mythology, was buried. Brân means “raven” and he’s supposed to have been buried not far from the ravens’ current enclosures, which seems appropriate. (Bran is also of course the name of a character in the series of novels by George R. R. Martin, A Song of Ice and Fire, and its famous television adaptation, Game of Thrones. But more about Mr. Martin and the ravens later.)

  I’ve heard it said that the name of London derives from Lugdunum, from the Celtic Lugdon, meaning town of ravens—mind you, I’ve also heard that the name comes from Llyn-don, Laindon, Karelundein, Caer Ludd, Lundunes, Lindonion, Lundene, Lundone, Ludenberk, Longidinium, and goodness knows what else. History and prehistory, legends, fables, and stories, they’re everywhere here. I sometimes think that the Tower is just a vast storehouse of the human imagination, and the ravens are its guardians.

  Anyway, I refill the bowl by St. Peter ad Vincula, where generations of Tower residents have been baptized—not in the ravens’ water bowl, I might add!—and married and, most famously, buried, including Sir Thomas More, Bishop Fisher, Queen Anne Boleyn, Queen Catherine Howard, and Lady Jane Grey, the uncrowned Queen of only nine days. Quite a few of them were also executed near the Chapel, or within the walls of the Tower—Anne Boleyn, of course, and Catherine Howard, Lady Jane Grey, Margaret Pole, Robert Devereux—so it’s certainly a church with a colorful history, though I’ve always thought the historian Thomas Macaulay was a bit down on the place in his History of England:

  In truth there is no sadder spot on the earth.… Death is there associated, not, as in Westminster Abbey and Saint Paul’s, with genius and virtue, with public veneration and imperishable renown; not, as in our humblest churches and churchyards, with everything that is most endearing in social and domestic charities; but with whatever is darkest in human nature and in human destiny, with the savage triumph of implacable enemies, with the inconstancy, the ingratitude, the cowardice of friends, with all the miseries of fallen greatness and of blighted fame.

  It’s not that bad! I rather like the chapel. It’s our parish church, after all, with a chaplain to guide and direct our spiritual lives and a fine choir and organists to lead the worship and uplift our spirits. Though, to be honest, I prefer to say my prayers outside, with brush and bucket in hand.

  Fresh water sorted, brush and bucket safely stowed, every morning I then make my way to unlock the storeroom where I keep all of the food and equipment needed to aid me in looking after the ravens. I walk under the archway of the Bloody Tower onto the old cobbles of Water Lane (so-called because this is where the water of the Thames used to lap up against the walls of the Tower). Water Lane is part of Edward I’s Outer Ward, which was created during his big expansion program in the thirteenth century. It was reclaimed from the river by sinking thousands of beech piles into the Thames mud. I like having the storeroom here. I’ve always thought that back in the day Water Lane would have been full of wheelers and dealers, and duckers and divers coming in and out of the Tower and the old pubs that used to be here—the Stone Kitchen tavern was one, shut down by the Duke of Wellington long ago. The Tower has always been full of people, inside and out, and the Ravenmaster’s storeroom just sort of fits here, right in the thick of things, behind its own ancient black door, like an old apothecary’s shop.

  Like all the other Yeoman Warders, on my key ring I keep a whistle to alert the others if there’s a problem. Plus I have a little skull and crossbones memento mori—you can’t work with ravens and not develop a bit of a taste for the macabre—and a small wooden raven totem pole, which I keep as a kind of talisman.

  Now let me open up the storeroom and show you the Ravenmaster’s inner sanctum.

  7

  BISCUITS AND BLOOD

  I like to keep the storeroom neat and tidy at all times, the result no doubt of a lifetime in the military. When you join the army as a young recruit you’re taught everything, and I mean everything. You learn how to clean your teeth and how to make your bed and tie your boots, how to iron and fold your clothes. Above all, you’re taught never to just leave stuff lying around. It’s drilled into you. You survive by following routines and procedures. A place for everything and everything in its place. No excuses.

  So in the storeroom there’s the fridge, the freezer, the sink, and the countertops, all kept spick-and-span. Raven calendar on the wall, obviously, and our daily diary underneath it, so the whole team can keep up-to-date and log what’s happening with the birds. There’s the fishing net on its shelf, used for raven-catching purposes, if a raven is injured and needs immediate veterinary attention. Chasing a raven around the Tower in full view of the public, fishing net in hand, like the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang—believe me, that really is an experience. The first-aid kit: you certainly know if you’ve had a nip from a raven. Scales for weighing the birds, which we do once a month. Chopping boards and equipment for preparing the meals. Rubber gloves. Leather falconry gloves. Metal gauntlets—which I do not recommend for handling the ravens, because they do sometimes like to try to crush your fingers, and picking metal out of flesh is never nice, as I can testify. A couple of wooden boxes to carry sick birds to the vets we work with at London Zoo. There’s also an old plastic KerPlunk, which we like to use for the ravens’ entertainment. (In KerPlunk: The Raven Edition, the challenge for the birds is to remove the straws in order to win a dead mouse, which we place on top of the straws, ready to fall down and be eaten. Good clean raven fun. Munin is the reigning champion.) I also keep a jar full of raven feathers in the storeroom, kindly donated by the ravens once a year during their molt, and which I occasionally like to distribute to deserving/well-behaved/lucky visitors. If I’m doing a Tower tour, for example, and I discover that a couple just got married or engaged, I like to give them a pair of feathers—a primary and a secondary, since without one the other is no good. I’m an old romantic at heart. Sometimes people request feathers for use as quills, or for medicinal purposes, or for musical instruments, though exactly which musical instruments or for what medicinal purposes I’m not entirely sure, or indeed whether raven feathers make particularly good quills.

  * * *

  As the Ravenmaster you get used to fielding all sorts of bizarre requests and questions from the public. No, you cannot buy the birds. No, you cannot sponsor them. And no, you cannot borrow them. They belong to the Tower: or the Tower belongs to them. In case you’re interested, here are the top five questions that people tend to ask us Yeoman Warders, and the sorts of answers we like to give:

  1. “Where’s the bathroom?”

  Usually asked by our American visitors, who—may I say—are unfailingly charming and polite. Alas, in British English we tend to rather crudely refer to what Americans call the bathroom as the “toilet,” and to us a bathroom is the place you go to have a bath, so we tend to reply, “Why, sir, do you need a bath?”

  2. “Where are the instruments of torture?”

  Answers to this one vary from Yeoman Warder to Yeoman Warder, but they tend to go along the lines of “Try working here every day and you’ll soon find out.”

  3. “Where was Anne Boleyn executed?”

  This one demands the obvious answer, “Somewhere around the neck area, sir.”

  4. “Have you ever seen a ghost?”

  Some Yeoman Warders like to use this question as a prompt to tell the classic tales about the boy princes, the headless apparitions, Sir Walter Raleigh on the battlements, and all the other chain-rattling Victorian nonsense. My preferred response tends to be something like, “No, sir, but we certainly keep plenty of spirits in our clubhouse.”

  5. “Who built the Tower?”

  The Tower was buil
t over the course of several centuries (though the medieval defenses are essentially unchanged), so this question can elicit all sorts of responses, ranging from the patriotic “As well to ask, sir, who built the spirit of the Great British people!” to “Well, we haven’t quite finished it yet, but we’re getting there,” to a fully comprehensive explanation of the major enlargements and extensions to the building undertaken by Edward III and Richard II during the fourteenth century, to the confusing but accurate “Either 1075, 1078, or 1080, depending on which historical sources you consult.” I prefer to explain that the Tower was founded by William the Conqueror and that the building of the great White Tower in stone was probably supervised by the Bishop of Rochester, Gundulf of Bec, who is not to be confused with Gandalf the Grey.

  To be honest, the answers all rather depend on what day of the week it is, but basically, if you keep setting ’em up, we’ll keep knocking ’em down.

  * * *

  Anyway, as I was saying, that’s basically the storeroom. Except, of course, for the dog biscuits. Bag upon bag upon row upon row of dog biscuits, all neatly lined up on the shelves. When people ask if they can come and see the ravens, or if there’s a group who want to come and talk to me about them, I have one simple request and requirement: that they bring with them a bag of dog biscuits. This is absolutely nonnegotiable. I like to think that our ravens have the best diet of any bird in the world, a proper varied diet which keeps them strong and healthy. But everyone deserves a treat now and then, and the ravens love a nice dog biscuit soaked in blood. To prepare biscuits in blood, you simply place the dog biscuits into a container filled with blood and leave to soak for at least an hour—the longer the better. Et voilà! Bon appétit!