A sculptor who created some of the best known carvings in Oxford has died, aged 86.

Patrick Conoley created the mythical beasts, birds and figures that adorn the High Street frontage of Magdalen College.

Over 11 years, from 1971, Mr Conoley designed and carved 53 sculptures on the building, including a king killing a lion and a reaper at the foot of the Great Tower.

He also created a 5ft statue of St Mary Magdalen in a niche at the top of the tower by Magdalen Bridge, and a sculpture of St John the Baptist, which surveys the cloisters and deer park.

Son Christopher Conoley said: “I think his greatest satisfaction came from standing back and seeing what he had done.

“When he got to the stage that walking was difficult, I photographed many of his sculptures for him. He was absolutely delighted that they had weathered so well.

“He was not a proud man, but he could look at them and say ‘they can’t take that away from me’.”

Although never completely deaf, Mr Conoley’s hearing slowly deteriorated after a hospital operation to remove his tonsils when he was seven.

He went from being an academically bright child, to struggling to make sense of anything that was said. His artistic talent was first noticed at Kingham Hill School, near Chipping Norton, when he began whittling wood with a penknife.

Aged 14, his housemaster suggested he try carving stone and before long he had set up his first studio at the school.

After school, he started an apprenticeship with the internationally renowned R L Boulton & Sons in Cheltenham, while studying under Adam Seaton White at Cheltenham Art School.

Over his career, he produced hundreds of wooden and stone sculptures on buildings, churches and cathedrals throughout the world.

He helped in the restoration of Blenheim Palace, Woodstock, and of figures and stonework at St Michael at the Northgate Church in Cornmarket, Oxford, after a 1970 hammer attack.

The grotesques on Christ Church Tower are also his creation.

Mr Conoley also worked for Oxford booksellers A R Mowbray & Co in the 1950s and became a member of Oxford Arts Society in the 1980s.

He died in Gloucestershire on January 21, and a commemorative exhibition will be held in his honour at Gloucester Museum and Art Gallery in November.

He leaves a wife Vera, 81, three sons and 11 grandchildren.