|
ENGLISH HERALDRY
The Complete Coat of Arms
The main elements composing a full coat of arms, called a complete achievement of arms, derive from the equipment of a medieval knight. They are: a shield with heraldic markings or devices (called charges), above which are a helmet topped by a crest. Often attached to the helmet and surrounding the shield is flowing material known as mantling, which is derived from the material used to protect the knight from the sun's rays (it is now solely decorative). A motto (or war cry), which can be changed at will, usually completes the coat of arms. The shields of peers, senior knights and leading corporate bodies are flanked by supporters (usually representations of real or imagined creatures).
The Language of Heraldry
Heraldry is a highly symbolic and stylized art with a language all its own. Blazon, or heraldic description, is a combination of Norman French (the language used when heraldry became codified), Anglicized Latin and Old English.
Since the original purpose of the shield of arms was to be clearly seen across a battlefield or tournament ground, only a limited number of contrasting colors - sable (black), gules (red), azure (blue), vert (green), purpure (purple) - and metals - argent (silver), or (gold) - were used. A basic rule or heraldry states that no color should be placed on another color, or a metal on another metal.
The surface of a shield is called the field and it may be all of one color or have small designs scattered across it. Any design placed on a shield is called a charge. The most widely used charges are simple geometric shapes known as ordinaries. Some common ordinaries are:
Fess - a wide horizontal stripe dividing a field
Chief - a wide stripe across the top of the field
Bend - a diagonal stripe slanting from top left to bottom right
Bend sinister - a diagonal stripe slanting from top right to bottom left
Bar - a thick horizontal stripe
Pale - a vertical stripe
Chevron - an inverted "V"
Saltire - a diagonal cross
With the growth of heraldry, charges of a more pictorial and symbolic nature were adopted, including birds, lions, boars, leaves, weapons, crescents, stars (mullets), and scallops (escallops). Practically any object, animate or inanimate, can be and has been used as a heraldic charge.
Once the language has been mastered it is easy to translate such precise heraldic descriptions as Sable a cross Or, a golden cross on a black field.
Arms can be used to show marriage alliances, the holding of two or more lordships or the acquiring of important offices by the arms holder. This is done by the practice or marshalling, which takes two forms. Impaling is dividing a shield down the middle and having each side show the original coat of arms in its entirety. Quartering is the division of a shield into two or more parts; an extreme example of this is the coat and crest of Lloyd of Stockton, which contains some 350 quarterings.
Heraldic art is full of wit and humor. Canting is the use of emblems that are puns or rebuses of the name or title. For example, the crest of Sir Edmund Bacon has a decidedly porcine motif and the arms of Sir John Islip show an eye and a man falling from a tree (i.e., eye-slip). The crest that was given to William Shakespeare's father shows a falcon gripping a lance (spear) in one of its talons.
|
|
