York Gate Watergate - not a triumphal arch, and the only surviving part of the luxurious mansion, once located on the Strand. They show how to change the Thames and it was in the previous century. Now the gates are in the gardens of Victoria Embankment, 137 meters from the water (at the corner of Buckingham Street and Watergate Walk), and before they went into the river.

When the York House was built (no later than 1237), the Thames was much wider than today, there were even islands. Stored in a museum in London picture of Henry Peter, "York-Watergate and the Adelphi from the river, in the moonlight," shows that to get to York House through the gate could be straight from the boats or ships - stage of which now remains only three were in the water . Gates erected much later the house, about 1626, had been a kind of jetty.

York House, built as the London home of the Archbishop Norwich, often changed owners. The most famous was George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham first - the same. On the facade of the gate is still visible his coat of arms. Fans of "The Three Musketeers," Dumas Buckingham are in love with Anne of Austria noble knight. George Villiers, who was considered the most beautiful man in Europe, was indeed erected a knight, but not only. The son of a poor nobleman, got to the court of James I, Villiers for eight years received the title of Baron, Viscount, Count, Marquis, and finally, the Duke - all because they became beloved favorite of the king.

Monarch Buckingham loved, and the people and the parliament (accused him of waging war and treason) hated. Indicative text of the leaflet, which once hung in the street: "Who rules the country? King. Who rules the king? Duke. Who rules the Duke? Devil".

In 1628 an army officer John Felton killed Buckingham in Portsmouth. Across the country, it began a violent jubilation in the streets of London lit bonfires. Felton arrested were taken to the capital, people ran to look at it, the mother raised babies, so that they looked at the "savior of England," and when Felton arrived in London, the people already believed the murderer of the saints. Three months later, he was hanged at Tyburn.

The mansion in which the literary Buckingham reveals that the two suspension cut, has not been preserved - in the construction in 1865-70 years had to narrow down Victoria Embankment and the Thames to carry a lot of expensive houses. They survived only gates York Watergate. Their exquisite facade - one of London's few remaining reminders of the Italian-style court of Charles I. It allows to assume that the gate built by Italian masters follower Inigo Jones.