A coat of arms of George III (1760-1820) hanging above the Kings Arms in Bermondsey, it's a pub I walk past frequently as I walk from Waterloo station across to our office in Crucifix lane beside London Bridge station. Apparently this very coat of arms was a feature of the original London Bridge (1209-1831) placed there in the late 1700s sometime after a widening project, at it's Southern end.
The drawing below shows the bridge in 1616 from the Southwark side, I guess the arms were mounted on the gatehouse somewhere, and, yes, those things on spikes are the heads of executed prisoners. Many famous heads ended up there including William Wallace, Thomas More and Thomas Cromwell, the last head being spiked on the bridge in 1661 after which they were placed on Temple Bar (Fleet St) instead. Clearly London was a less welcoming place in those days..
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