Francis Young

Does King Charles’ Green Man make him a pagan?

(Image: Buckingham Palace)

On 4 April the Royal Household revealed the design for invitations to the Coronation, the work of heraldic artist Andrew Jamieson. While the design is a riot of flora and garden fauna, heraldic and otherwise, one feature of the invitation has above all invited comment – the presence of an anthropomorphic green ‘foliate head’, wearing a crown of oak and hawthorn, with leaves of daffodils curling up almost like a pair of horns.

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Written by
Francis Young
Dr Francis Young is an historian and folklorist specialising in the history of religion and belief.

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