The portraits are named after the remarkable pendants that Elizabeth wears at her breast in each one. They form a pair: they were painted at around the same time, on wood from the same trees, and the pose in each is a mirror image of the other.
In medieval Europe, the pelican was thought to be particularly attentive to her young, to the point of providing her own blood by wounding her own breast when no other food was available. As a result, the pelican came to symbolise the Passion of Jesus and the Eucharist, usurping the image of the lamb and the flag.
Elizabeth I adopted the symbol in order to portray herself as the "mother of the Church of England".
A pelican feeding her young is depicted in an oval panel at the bottom of the title page of the first (1611) edition of the King James Bible.
The mythical phoenix symbolises rebirth and chastity. It became associated with Elizabeth in the 1570s as an emblem of virginity and uniqueness, and as reassurance that she would be able to regenerate the dynasty.
© Haydn Thompson 2017