The Queen’s Beasts Collection Continues, Struck in Fine Gold

At Her Majesty The Queen’s coronation in Westminster Abbey in 1953, she was guarded by ten ancestral beasts of heraldry, myth and legend. These beasts are symbols of royal authority and the ancestry which defines them, tracing royal bloodlines from medieval times to the present day.

We have celebrated The Queen’s Beasts since 2017, also releasing two coins in 2018, the year of the 65th anniversary of the coronation of The Queen. The sixth coin in The Queen’s Beasts Collection features the Yale of Beaufort. The yale is a mythical beast, described in ancient times as being the size of a hippopotamus with the tail of an elephant, the jaws of a boar and of a black or tawny colour. This beast descends to The Queen through Henry VII, who inherited it from his mother, Lady Margaret Beaufort, who had played a central role in the Wars of the Roses. Her position as matriarch of the Tudor dynasty gave the yale prestige and symbolic meaning.