The Red Dragon of Wales - Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew (London, UK)
N 51° 28.727 W 000° 17.534
30U E 688025 N 5706546
Depicted stone statue of the Red Dragon of Wales, one of ten heraldic beasts known as the "Queen's Beasts", you can find on the Palm House Terrace in Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew...
Waymark Code: WMM7YM
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 08/07/2014
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Depicted stone statue of the Red Dragon of Wales, one of ten heraldic beasts known as the "Queen's Beasts", you can find on the Palm House Terrace in Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew.
The red dragon was used as his badge by Owen Tudor. His grandson, Henry VII, took it as a token of his supposed descent from Cadwalader, the last of the line of Maelgwn, King of Wales. The beast holds a shield bearing a leopard in each quarter; this was the coat of arms of Llewelyn ap Griffith, the last native Prince of Wales.
The Queen's Beasts in Kew Gardens, sculpted in Portland Stone by James Woodford in 1958, are replicas of the original plaster sculptures made for the coronation ceremony of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953, placed at the entrance of Westminster Abbey. Each of these ten beasts was once used as an heraldic badge by Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II’s forbears and together they symbolise the various strands of the royal ancestry.
More information you can find in Wikipedia.