Tower Green

Tower Green is a space within the Tower of London, a royal castle in London, where two English Queens consort and several other British nobles were executed by beheading. It was considered more dignified for nobility to be executed away from the gawping spectators, and Queen Anne Boleyn and Lady Jane Grey were among the nobility beheaded here. Queen Victoria asked for information on the exact location at which the executions took place, and had some granite paving laid to mark the spot. However it is unclear whether the location is indeed correct because other sources place it on the current parade ground, between the White Tower and the entrance to the current Waterloo Barracks.

Location

Tower Green is an open space located south of the Chapel Royal of St. Peter ad Vincula in the Tower of London, a royal castle in London. Beheading in the privacy of the Tower Green was considered a privilege of rank; the executed were spared insults from jeering crowds, and the monarch was spared bad publicity. Other prisoners in the tower were executed in public on Tower Hill, just outside the fortress, or at Tyburn on the other side of the city. In the middle of the green is a small square plot paved with granite, which shows the site commonly believed to be the spot on which stood the scaffold on which private executions took place. The granite paving was specially created by order of Queen Victoria.