Susan Mann chose….

Dragon roof boss

The dragon boss would not have been discovered had not the staff at the PVC been watching the JCB digging out the foundations at the end of the ribbon factory in preparations for the new stairs to be built in that area. We spotted the digger moving large pieces of carved sandstone blocks. We contacted Margaret Rylatt to inform her of what we had spotted and she came on site and stopped the work that was going on to investigate what the digger had found, which was some column pieces and in the corner of the ribbon factory foundation was the dragon boss carved sandstone. This is a lovely carving with the dragon curled up in the centre of the stone as if sleeping.

Susan Mann is the Priory Visitor Centre's Team Leader

What the curator says:

Dragon roof boss

This carved sandstone roof boss was found during the excavation of the Benedictine Priory. This was the largest of the religious houses in Coventry, having been endowed by Godiva and Leofric in 1043. It was destroyed in the 1500s following the dissolution of the monasteries. The foundations can still be seen today and the Priory Visitor Centre is built on the site.

The dragon features in Christian mythology, most famously in the story of St George, where it represents evil. In medieval bestiaries dragons were said to be the enemy of the elephant. The dragon would hide in a tree near to where elephants walk so that it could catch them with its tail and kill them by suffocation. Dragons were said to live in India and Ethiopia.