The Queen's Beasts

In the 1920s a set of 76 similar heraldic beasts was replaced on the roof of St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, having been taken down in 1682 due to dilapidation.

They are carved in stone and each sits erect, supporting a shield upon which there is a coat of arms or a heraldic badge.

From the beasts themselves and the emblems which they carry on their shields, it is evident that they stood for King Henry and his third Queen, Jane Seymour.

In the autumn of 1952, the Minister of Works, in preparation for the coronation some months ahead, called upon the Royal Academician and sculptor James Woodford, to create ten new beasts similar in form and character to the ten at Hampton Court but more particularly, appropriate to the Queen.

The Beasts were on display outside the western annexe of Westminster Abbey, a glass-fronted structure in which to marshal the long processions before the service.

In 1958 Sir Henry Ross, Chairman of the Distillers Company in Edinburgh, paid for Portland stone replicas of the statues to be made, which are on display outside the Palm House at Kew Gardens.

The original sculptures have been commemorated in the following forms: bone china figurines, cups and saucers, glass tray sets, plaster models, reclaimed material reproductions,[11] porcelain candlesticks, British postage stamps issued in 1998,[12] silver teaspoons, and tea towels.

[15] The Yale was a mythical beast, supposedly white and covered with gold spots and able to swivel each of its horns independently.

[17] The beast holds a shield bearing a lion in each quarter; this was the coat of arms of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, the last native Prince of Wales.

This grandson of Elizabeth Stuart, sister of Charles I, became George I, King of Great Britain and Ireland.

Both of these appear on the Great Seals of Edward IV and Richard III, and were used by George VI when Duke of York.

The unicorn holds a shield showing the royal arms of Scotland, a lion rampant within a double tressure flory-counter-flory.

It was considered a beneficent creature, signifying courage and strength combined with guardianship, vigilance, swiftness and keen vision.

The shield shows the Royal Arms as they were borne by Edward IV and his brother Richard III as well as all the sovereigns of the Houses of Lancaster and Tudor.