Seal of New Mexico eagles, a change omitted from the 1915 law. New Mexico's first seal was designed shortly after the organization of the Territorial Government, in 1851. The original seal has long since disappeared, possibly as part of the artifacts placed into the cornerstone of the Soldiers' Monument in the Santa Fe Plaza. Imprints of the original seal show it consisted of the American eagle, clutching an olive branch in one talon and three arrows in the other. Along the outside rim was the inscription "Great Seal of the Territory of New Mexico". In the early 1860s an unknown official adopted a new
Great Seal of the Realm held the seal only until 1656, when Cromwell nominated William Steele, Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer in England, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. In 1688, while attempting to flee to France, James II destroyed his Great Seal, apparently by throwing it into the River Thames in the hope that the machinery of government would cease to function. James's successors, William III and Mary II, used the same seal matrix in their new Great Seal. This may have been a deliberate choice, in order to imply the continuity of government. A new obverse was created, but the reverse was crudely