Written By: Ben Cosgrove
Anyone who has remained in power for longer than many people remain alive even if that power is far more symbolic than practical is worth paying attention to. And when it comes to England’s Elizabeth II, paying attention is something the world has been doing for a long, long time.
“Her current Majesty,” TIME’s Belinda Luscombe once noted, “is very likely the most portrayed woman on the planet. Billions of stamps, millions of coins and notes and hundreds of thousands of postcards bear her likeness. Her face, especially in profile, is recognized in every English-speaking land and is ubiquitous in several. Hers is not the exotic, come-hither face of a Marilyn or an Angelina. It’s the face of distant historic authority, a literal figurehead, having no real power but oodles of symbolic supremacy.”
[Buy the LIFE book, The Royal Baby.]
Here, LIFE.com offers a series of informal portraits of the Queen, including several that never ran in the magazine. And while some of these images do convey “oodles of symbolic supremacy,” it’s also worth noting that, in at least a few of these shots, there’s also a flicker of something that one hardly ever associates with Elizabeth: namely, a quite self-aware and yet wry sense of fun.
Now that’s something to celebrate.
Princess Elizabeth 1942
David E. Scherman The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth, 1953
Cornell Capa The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth, 1957
Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles at Princess Margaret’s wedding in 1960
Loomis Dean The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth II, Ghana, 1961
Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth II, Bermuda, 1961
Lisa Larsen The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth, India, 1961
Hank Walker The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth II, Sudan
John Loengard The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth in Ethiopia in 1965
John Loengard The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth In Ethiopia 1965
John Loengard The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth in Ethiopia 1965
John Loengard The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth II, Trinidad and Tobago, 1966
Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Queen Elizabeth 1966 on Caribbean Tour
Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
