HERALDRY
WELCOME KNIGHTS AND LADIES

In 1483, King Richard III began a standard and enforcement of Coat of Arms

        image loading     "Welcome to my Castle"     
    

                                       

The first heralds to be mentioned, beginning in the 1170's, were announcers at tournaments, for years grouped in the royal payrolls along with minstrels, trumpeters, harpers, and even confectioners.  Heralds became the sportscasters of their day. On the tournament fields and battle grounds, a knight in armor was anonymous but for the colorful tunic, or coat of arms, worn overtop of his breastplate, and the matching pattern on his shield and pennant. It was up to the herald to keep straight all the bends and checkers and crosslets and chiefs and to call out, correctly. Eventually they became consultants on such matters and companions of the courts to devise, keep records, and settle disputes regarding coat of arms issues and also record family history and deed in verse and song for whomever the herald's ruling patron was.
                                       
"... a disagreement between two men over who had the right to bear the "barry or and gules" shield was immortalized in a poem which lists at great length (956 verses) the coats of arms borne by the King's men and thus Brian Fitzalan won the argument."
 

Q   HERALDRY    HELM    CREST    SHIELD~CHARGES    ORDINARIES     MANTLE~SUPPORTS    KIBLER

HERALDRY IN MEDIEVAL EUROPE
DESIGNING YOUR OWN COAT OF ARMS: INTRODUCTION

Heraldry is the profession, study, art of devising, granting, and blazoning Armorial Bearings, also known as a Coat of Arms (COA), and ruling on questions of rank and protocol as exercised by an officer of arms, or Herald. For recording COAs, they were, and are, drawn in black & white with various markings used to indicate colors, metals, and furs, divisions of space, types of partitions used, and the nature of figures and geometric shapes that are placed upon the shield itself.

The written description is called the Blazon. Rules for these descriptions are specific regarding the information recorded and language used. A COA should be able to be drawn from the blazon and rendered in color, which is called emblazoning. In the Heraldry Links, available at the bottom of each page, you can access  information on writing your blazon for those interested.

This diagram names the parts of a Coat of Arms that can be described in a blazon.
 
Mottos, sometimes
Crest,  sometimes and sometimes with Torse
 
Helm, sometimes and by rank including crown or cornet
   

Shield with Charges and Ordinaries
    
Supporters, sometimess
   
Mantle, sometimes
  
Compartment, sometimes

The charges on the shield, the crest, and supporters (which can include a compartment) are sometimes separate grants given that legitimize the rights of an individual to display a given set of elements and colors. Thus, one can have a COA with one charge, or more, on a shield alone. It is not required to have mantling but can be added by the heraldic artist, or might be part of the blazon granted. Not all COAs have a helm, crest, torse, supporters, or compartment. Some COAs display an accumulation of armorial displays handed down or assumed over time that incorporate many generations of heraldic uses and is called one's "full" or "complete" achievement.

Below is an blazon for an Irish COA granted to an American citizen in 1995. First mention is the color of the shield, then the charges, in a specified order of description, then ordinaries, then crest, then mantle. A wreath, helmet, supporters, and compartment, are not part of this blazon. A Motto is included, as is typical especially for Irish and Scottish COAs.

Or a lion rampant gules charged with three bars argent holding in the dexter paw a branch of olive proper between in the dexter chief and sinister base a cross crosslet fitchée sable and in the sinister chief and dexter base a shamrock slipped vert. Crest: an anchor erect azure on the stock the letters SPES argent. Mantle: gules doubled argent. Motto: "An leon do bheir an chraobh" (A lion who leaves with the branch).

(If not already familiar with the protocol and language of Armorial Bearings, once you have gone through these six pages, you should be able to interpret such a blazon and design and describe your own Coat of Arms.)

The Law of Arms, or laws of heraldry, govern the "bearing of arms", the possession, use or display of arms, also called Coats of Arms, or Armorial Bearings used by countries, public and private institutions, and by individuals.  In the Links at the bottom of this page you can access information on the rules of each country that has them. The following is a brief for US citizens:

United States: protection of Coats of Arms is for the most part limited to those of units of the armed forces, with a few exceptions. Personal coats of arms may be freely assumed but the right to these blazons is not protected in any way.  A specific rendition of a Coat of Arms as a work of art is protected through copyright law and can be used as a trademark and protected by trademark law. The United States central government and the States do not employ Coats of Arms, but do use seals as their official emblems. Nobility is prohibited by the U.S. constitution so there are few noble Coats of Arms in the country. However private persons including several past presidents employ traditional Coats of Arms either personal or family related. Since there is no official regulation on Armorial Bearings many private individuals have assumed Arms.

The "assumption" of Arms refers to designing a COA and registering it (or not), rather than inheriting or one being conferred upon an individual. Most COAs, not belonging to royal families or otherwise conferred, have been assumed/granted in the past and present.

"It has always been perfectly legal and legitimate for any person in the United States to design, adopt, and use an original coat of arms of his or her choice. While some countries have laws or traditions limiting this right to bear arms without official approval, such laws have no force whatsoever in the United States. It has never been legitimate anywhere for a person to take someone else's arms for his own. Since arms are hereditary emblems of identity, the proven descendants of a person who bore arms have a right to those arms in accordance with the rules of heraldic succession applicable to the place and time. However, the mere coincidence of bearing the same family name as another person is not proof of descent from that person. Commercial enterprises that claim to sell the arms of a name do so under false pretenses, and anyone who pays them for such arms has been duped."  American Heraldry Society (link in "Heraldry Links" at bottom of each page ... recommended reading)
 

   
LIVERY  These identifiable designs, representing honors given, achievements, family ties, alliance, and personal indicators, like marks of cadence to distinguish a father's from a son's arms, were also carried on banners or gonfalons (shown below) and flags. During fairs and tournaments, the followers and assistants of a knight would wear that knight's colors and bearings. Sometimes those employed at a castle, for example, wore clothing, sometimes to the effect of being a uniform, of their employer's colors and bearings.

The distinction of having an emblem with color scheme to represent an entity or association is a "livery"; current examples of this are the colors that represent schools and pro sports teams, "police cars" being "black 'n whites", taxi cabs being yellow and so on, otherwise known in modern advertising as trademark and logo "branding".

 
"English heraldry is the form of coats of arms and other heraldic bearings and insignia used in England. It lies within the Gallo-British tradition. Coats of arms in England are regulated and granted to individuals by the College of Arms. They are subject to a system of cadency to distinguish difference (between a father and sons who bore the same arms - an additional charge distinguishing a first son or third son, etc). This system recognises seven principal colors, consisting of two "metals", or light tinctures (gold and silver), and five dark tinctures (blue, red, purple, black, and green). On the continent, however, especially in German and Nordic heraldry, purple (together with ermine,) is not used on the shield, but is reserved for the royal pavilion mantling."

The Indo-European tribes of Europe were known to have personal and tribal emblems, symbols, animal, human, and geometric shapes, etc, decorating their clothing and personal possessions, including headdresses and body tattooing. This "personalization", a type of artisan workmanship or crafting of applying 'design' beyond utilitarian purposes, has distinguished early European cultural artifacts for hundreds of thousands of years. For example: the word "headdress" itself is from : sar, head, in Indo-European roots, + psh-, to don.] or 'what you put or wear on your head'.

The word "heraldry" comes from Anglo-Norman "herald", from the Germanic compound *harja-waldaz, "army commander" but were basically, early on, persons who ran messages for commanders and others between camps or villages.  The early medieval heralds themselves were often minstrels who traveled all over, including to tournaments and fairs, and in doing so became familiar with arms used and were so elicited to identify or settle disputes as it was, no two persons could have the exact same display. Eventually 'powerful leaders' employed their own personal 'heralds' to relay the stories of events and family history in tale and song as well as to be the resident authority of Arms and display of Armorial bearings.
 

   
This is a perfect example of a 21st century Coat of Arms
   

Watson      Alan Watson.

Arms: Argent, an oak tree Proper fructed Or growing out of a mound in base Vert, surmounted of a fess brettessed the crenelles semicircular, Purpure, charged with an hourglass Or.

Crest: A dragon passant Vert holding an inescutcheon Gules.

Motto: Forward

Grant: The Court of the Lord Lyon, Register, volume 87, folio 62.

Leslie Hodgson is responsible for the original design of my arms following some discussions with him regarding what interested me. My thanks go to him for his clever suggestions, particularly for suggesting a new partition line.

The oak tree with fess is common to all Watson arms. I decided I would like a rare colour as part of my arms and chose Purpure. In the Ordinaries most Watson arms have either an Azure or Gules fess. Azure and Gules mixed together form Purpure. The partition line represents my philatelic interests. It is a new partition line and represents stamp perforations. By a happy coincidence the old arms of Falkirk (my home town) had a bend brettessed. The hourglass is taken from the arms of the Faculty of Actuaries in Scotland, my professional body. Their main charge is an owl holding an hourglass representing wisdom and mortality. I decided I would like a fabulous beast as a crest and chose a dragon. The dragon represents my professional life as a guardian of money. The Gules escutcheon represents my heraldic interests and is derived from the Society’s arms and those of Lyon Office. The motto is taken from that of the London and North Eastern Railway Company, on whose rails I have spent many happy hours traveling.
 

ELEMENTS AND COMPONENTS

Crest of Bavaria, Duke of Ludwig of Bavaria 1449
This is an image of an "engraver's trick " with marks indicating colors showing the crest 'wings' of Argent (white=silver) and Azure (horizontal hatches=blue), the crown and lion of Or (dotted=gold), the helm is Gules (vertical hatches=red) and Argent (this helmet was partially leather). The Coat of Arms shown in color is the present-day Arms of Bavaria.
 

Points on a shield, or escutcheon
 

Markings to Identify Colors and Furs in Blazonry

In heraldry, tinctures are the colors used to emblazon a coat of arms. These can be divided into several categories including light tinctures called metals, dark tinctures called colors, nonstandard colors called stains, furs, and "proper". A charge tinctured proper (also sometimes termed "natural") is colored as it would be found in nature. Drawn feathers or fur indicate they are to be rendered proper. Claws, beaks, horns, teeth, and tongue of animate charges, or crests or supports, are usually a different color than the animal color and if so included, mention is to be made regarding their colors.

One of the few fundamental rules of heraldry is that metals must not be placed upon other metals and colors must not be placed upon other colors, while furs and proper can be placed upon either or both. This is referred to as the rule of tincture.

Nonstandard colors called stains were introduced in the late Middle Ages, but have largely been shunned as contrary to the heraldic spirit of bold images and bright colors. A peculiar fad of the Renaissance sought to couple each tincture with an associated planet, gemstone, flower, astrological sign, etc., but this practice was soon abandoned and is now regarded as wildly divergent from the science of heraldry. The 19th century saw the rise of "landscape heraldry" and extensive use of charges tinctured "proper", especially in augmentations (and more often in German heraldry than English), but this practice too has been deprecated as essentially unheraldic.

Although over time several types of ermine were distinguished by slightly different markings, the field is argent, or white, with small sable (black) markings meant to depict the tails of ermine 'pinned' on a background. Vair is the 'fur' of a European squirrel that has a bluish back with a white front; again, the markings to depict this fur represent this squirrel's tails.

Purpue:The Germanics mixed a tincture from oak bark with copper and made a purple pigment. In medieval Europe, blue dyes were rare and expensive. The working class wore mainly green and brown.  Europeans' idea of purple shifted towards this more bluish purple known as royal purple because of its similarity to the royal blue worn by the aristocracy. This was the shade of purple worn by kings in medieval Europe. The word 'purple' comes from the Old English word purpul which originates from the Latin purpura. This in turn is derived from the Koine Greek πορφύρα (porphyra), name of the Tyrian purple dye manufactured in classical antiquity from a mucus secreted by the spiny dye-murex snail. The first recorded use of the word 'purple' in English was in the year A.D. 975.

Vert: Sap Green is made from the unripe berries of the Buckthorn. It is highly fugitive, as is another Sap Green, or Iris Green, made from the juice of the Iris Flower. In medieval times it was reduced to a heavy syrup and sold in bladders, not dry pigment form. Green Earth is derived from the minerals glauconite and celadonite and is one of the oldest pigments. Their colors range from neutral yellow green to pale greenish gray to dark matte olive green. In the Middle Ages green earth could also have been known as prason.

Azure: Azurite is a copper carbonate prepared by grinding the lump form, then washing and levigating to separate the color from impurities. Coarsely ground azurite produces a dark blue, while finely ground azurite produces a lighter tone.  Wode: the words indigo and woad were basically interchangeable. Woad plants are indigenous to Europe. The pigment was made from the froth or “flower of woad” that rose to the top of the dyer’s vat. It was skimmed off and combined with any variety of white bases. The pigment has been used since ancient times, perhaps by the early inhabitants of Britain to dye their skin blue.

Gules: Vermillion is formed from red mercuric sulphide obtained from cinnabar, the principle ore of mercury, or artificially by heating sulphur and mercury together. The best cinnabar is known to originate in Spain. Vermillion was frequently mixed with red lead and sometimes with yellow in medieval painting. The term “lake” in the Middle Ages applied to red pigments that were extracted from organic dyestuffs. Red Kermes is produced from the dried bodies of the female Kermes vermilio (insect) that are found in great numbers on the scarlet oaks of Europe, a highly prized dye in 15th century Florence. It produced a dark hue resembling blood and kermes is the linguistic root for the English word “crimson.” A similarly colored pigment was madder, a natural dye from the root of the Rubia tinctorium. It was more common than kermes, and not as highly prized

Sable: Lamp black is made from the soot produced from burning linseed or other oils, pitch, candles, or resin and frequently mixed with gum and used for ink. Vine black, a charcoal made from grapevine twigs, was one of “the most perfect colors”. Black pigments also include carbon black, charcoal black, ebony, ivory black and onyx. Pigments that absorb light rather than reflect it back to the eye "look black". A black pigment can also result from a combination of several pigments that collectively absorb all colors.
 

    Drawn Trick                           Engraved Trick Hatching                Color rendering
Blazon: Azure, on a bend gules, filleted Or, between four fleurs-de-lys six saltorelles Or

     Or, a lion rampant Gules           Azure, a lion rampant Argent         Gules, a lion rampant Or        

:: MEDIEVAL MUSIC ::
LISTEN TO AND DOWNLOAD MIDI MUSIC FILES HEARD ON THIS SITE AND MORE

Q    HERALDRY    HELM    CREST    SHIELD~CHARGES    ORDINARIES     MANTLE ~SUPPORTS    KIBLER
 

Music: anonymous Salterello, a medieval jumping dance
Copyright © 1997 - Present gothagepress.com ALL RIGHTS RESERVED   PUBLISHED 2010