Angels in lapis-lazuli robes and white chaplets of roses, gathered about the Virgin and Christ Child on the right-hand panel of the Wilton Diptych, the celebrated monument of Gothic panel painting of the late fourteenth century, have become a riddle for a

The principal explanations come down to the personal iconography of King Richard II, who is himself portrayed kneeling on the left-hand panel with his patron saints John the Baptist, Edward the Confessor and Edmund the Martyr. Eleven was the number of gold coins that Richard offered to the Virgin in Westminster Abbey in the year his reign began. Richard ascended the throne at the age of 11. Moreover, 11 is the number of stars in the dream of the seventeen-year-old Joseph (And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it his brethren, and said, Behold, I have dreamed a dream more; and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made obeisance to me), the sun being, accordingly, Christ, the moon the Virgin, and the stars the angels.

And the white hart with a golden collar and chain is Richard's personal emblem.