The Coronation service fell into six parts: the recognition, the oath, the anointing, the investiture (which includes the crowning), the enthronement and the homage. The St. Edward's Crown, made in 1661, was placed on the head of The Queen during the Coronation service. It weighs 4 pounds and 12 ounces and is made of solid gold.

The principal decorations for the processional route were in The Mall where there were four twin-spanned arches of tubular steel that were illuminated at night. The arches were lifted into place by giant mobile cranes. Linking the arches down the route were the long lines of standards mounted with golden crowns and each hung with four scarlet banners bearing the Royal Monogram. The Archbishop of Canterbury conducted the service, a duty which has been undertaken since the Conquest in 1066. For the first time in 1953, a representative of another Church, the Moderator of the Church of Scotland, also took part. The Ministry of Food granted 82 applications for people to roast oxen if they could prove that by tradition, an ox had been roasted at previous Coronations – a welcome concession at a time the meat ration was two shillings a week.In 1937, the 11 year old Princess Elizabeth had watched her father, King George VI, crowned in the elaborate ceremony and 16 years later on 2 June 1953, her own official coronation was to take place. Queen Elizabeth II is the sixth Queen to have been crowned in Westminster Abbey in her own right. The first was Queen Mary I, who was crowned on 1 October, 1553. Some people in the Abbey witnessed their fourth Coronation. Princess Marie Louise (Queen Victoria's granddaughter) had also seen the Coronations of King Edward VII (1902), King George V (1911) and King George VI (1937). Coronations have been held at Westminster Abbey for 900 years and The Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II was to follow suit. But the Coronation of 1953 was ground-breaking in it's own right – the first ever to be televised, it was watched by 27 million people in the UK alone and millions more audiences around the world. Here are 50 little known facts about that remarkable day on 2 June 1953:

Queen Elizabeth II was crowned on 2 June, 1953 in Westminster Abbey. Her Majesty was the thirty-ninth Sovereign to be crowned at Westminster Abbey.The monarch was very pleased with the overall effect of her coronation dress and told Hartnell that it was "glorious." She considered it such an important design that she wore it again to the state openings of parliament during her Commonwealth tour in the months after the ceremony, where it was kept in its own cabin aboard the ship taking them from port to port. The Queen succeeded to the Throne on the 6 February, 1952 on the death of her father, King George VI. She was in Kenya at the time and became the first Sovereign in over 200 years to accede while abroad. Today, the coronation dress is part of the Royal Collection and has been exhibited on a number of occasions, most recently at Windsor Castle in 2022 to mark the late queen's Platinum Jubilee. Design for Queen Elizabeth II's coronation dress by the design house of Norman Hartnell (L) in 1953, and the queen on her way to Westminster Abbey on the day of her coronation wearing the dress (R) on June 2, 1953. Haywood Magee/Picture Post/Getty Images/Monty Fresco/Topical Press Agency/Getty Images