Buckingham Palace has been a building site for ten years. The renovation has cost 480 million euros, and when the workmen lifted the wooden floorboards, out came a history that no royal portrait tells: the history of the people who kept the palace running but never stood on the balcony.

Under the floors they found a pair of workmen's boots, a pack of Silk Cut cigarettes - the brand Queen Camilla once smoked - and a copy of the Standard newspaper from 1889 with the West End theatre listings. Next to them lay an unfilled football pools coupon from 1957, a glass bottle of Schweppes Malvern mineral water, old dishes and jugs. Some of the items had even survived the major restoration after the Second World War.

The loveliest detail was wedged into stone: a ticket for a whist drive - whist being an English card game - organised by the royal household's social club. The ticket cost sixpence and is dated 14 April 1949, when George VI was still on the throne. So the staff didn't just hold up the Crown behind the scenes - they had their own club, their own tournaments and their own nights off.

A programme also turned up for the diplomatic corps reception marking Elizabeth II's Silver Jubilee, 25 years since she came to the throne. The instructions are almost comically precise: the Queen and the royal family were to move through the room clockwise, and aides were to encourage guests to talk to the diplomats. Protocol leaves nothing to chance - not even the direction you walk in.

Among the finds was a copy of the Daily Express from 1966, its front page about life in maximum-security prison for the men convicted of the Glasgow-London mail train robbery three years earlier. Then a worn box of six Christmas cards with their envelopes, 19th-century Minton ceramic fireplace tiles and a wooden junction box. The renovation, which was also meant to replace the wiring, uncovered old cabling insulated with vulcanised rubber - a material that can catch fire. So for decades the royal residence was living on top of cables that were a potential hazard.

From home to the monarchy's office

Buckingham has been the official residence of the British monarchy since 1837, when Queen Victoria moved in. After her father's death, Elizabeth II wanted to stay at Clarence House and only moved after a conversation with Winston Churchill. She never liked Buckingham, and from the start of the pandemic until her death she lived at Windsor Castle. Charles III has no intention of moving in even once the renovation ends next year - the palace remains the base for official business, not a home.

That's the point of the whole story. The royal apartments are a small part of the palace. The rest was carried for centuries by people whose names no textbook records, and what's left of them is boots, a betting coupon and an empty cigarette packet under the parquet. How many stories like this are lying under the floors of our own old public buildings - and would anyone even bother to look?