King and Queen celebrate Shakespeare's First Folio at Windsor

Charles and Camilla looked at the manuscript after the performance

The King and Queen hosted an evening to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's First Folio at Windsor Castle.

Charles and Camilla took front row seats to watch extracts by actors and musicians from the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC).

Published in 1623, the First Folio contains 36 plays,

Without it 18 - including Macbeth, Julius Caesar, As You Like It and Twelfth Night - would have been lost.

Lucy Phelps joked the performers were more nervous of "acting royalty" in the audience than the King and Queen

The evening saw actors, including Ray Fearon, a former Coronation Street star, Lucy Phelps, Sir Simon Russell Beale and Dame Harriet Walter take to the stage in the Waterloo Chamber.

They performed extracts from Macbeth, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, Twelfth Night, Antony and Cleopatra and The Tempest.

Charles and Camilla were treated to extracts from some of the plays most famous scenes

Speaking afterwards, Dame Harriet Walter said: "I feel very lucky that our King and Queen are lovers of Shakespeare because it's my big love, it was a really great feeling."

She said about Charles and Camilla sat in the front row: "I felt there was total appreciation and familiarity, the room was silent and they were listening and laughing at the nuances. It was a very rewarding audience.

"It is important to realise how very close we came to not having it (the First Folio). I can't imagine a world without Shakespeare."

Charles and Camilla took front row seats to watch extracts by actors and musicians

Among the guests at the castle event were some of the country's leading actors, including Dame Judi Dench and Helena Bonham Carter, Dame Vanessa Redgrave, her daughter Joely Richardson, and David Oyelowo.

A copy of the First Folio, a prized possession of the royal library at Windsor Castle, was on display during a reception held after the plays.

It was first published in 1623, about seven years after the playwright's death

The first (left) and second folio of works by William Shakespeare