LONDON // A year after the huge celebrations for her diamond jubilee, Queen Elizabeth II yesterday marked the 60th anniversary of her coronation in private.
The private service in the small chapel at Windsor Castle, west of London, set the tone for a series of low-key events organised to mark the anniversary.
Tomorrow, 2,000 guests will attend a service at Westminster Abbey, the scene of British coronations for nearly 1,000 years.
The guests, including the queen's husband Prince Phillip, the Duke of Edinburgh, and other members of the royal family, will hear speeches by Justice Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, and David Cameron, the country's prime minister.
And during the summer there will be a four-day coronation festival, including a gala concert and special exhibitions themed around the coronation.
The relatively muted celebrations are in contrast to the high-profile festivities for the 60th anniversary of the British monarch's accession to the throne last year. It was marked in all 16 Commonwealth countries over which Elizabeth, 87, is queen regent.
In Britain, it was celebrated with a bank holiday, street parties up and down the country, a concert at Buckingham Palace, a traditional religious service at St Paul's Cathedral and a pageant on the Thames with 670 vessels, the largest-ever procession on the river.
The queen's coronation on June 2, 1953, took place 16 months after she acceded to the throne, to allow a period of mourning for her father, King George VI.
It was the first coronation to be televised. More than 20 million people in Britain watched the live broadcast, while another 11 million listened on the radio.
Lady Moyra Campbell, one of Queen Elizabeth's maids of honour at the coronation, said it had been an "unforgettable day".
"There was that amazing sincerity with which she made those incredibly solemn promises," she said. "And I, for one, thank God that I have been blessed with a life long enough to see those promises fulfilled in a way that I would challenge anyone else to do."
The coronation ceremony is a largely religious affair and marks the only time that a British monarch, as the head of state, takes any oath of office, which is meant to commit the monarch to a lifetime of service to the country.
It is a Christian rite, in which the monarch is consecrated with holy oil, and has changed little since 1066, when William the Conqueror was crowned at the site of the future Westminster Abbey. Construction at the present church at Westminster began in 1245.
Queen Elizabeth is only the second British monarch to reach 60 years on the throne. Queen Victoria's reign spanned 64 years until her death in 1901.
Meanwhile, royal thoughts are now turning to the birth of the first child of Prince William and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, expected in July, who will be the third in line to the throne.
Tomorrow's celebrations will mark the first time the young couple have attended an event at Westminster Abbey since their wedding in April 2011.
* With additional reporting by Agence France-Presse