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Heraldry

Specialty Definition: Heraldry

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

Heraldry is the knowledge and art of describing coats of arms, also referred to as achievements or armorial bearings.

It is important to note that a given coat of arms is defined by a written description, not by a picture. A given coat of arms may be drawn in many different ways, all considered equivalent, just as the letter "A" may be printed in many different fonts while still being the same letter. For example, there is no strict definition of the shades of colours used in Heraldry.

A description of a coat of arms is called a blazon. To draw it is to emblazon it. To ensure that the pictures people draw after reading the descriptions are accurate, and reasonably alike, blazons follow a set of rules. The first thing the blazon describes is the tincture (colour) of the field (background), and then it describes the placement and tinctures of the different charges (objects) on the shield. The charges on a shield are described from the top to the base, from dexter to sinister. Dexter ('right' in Latin) is the left side of the shield, and sinister ('left') is the right. The reason for this is that they refer to the shield-bearer's point of view, not the observer's.

The word "crest" is commonly used to refer to a coat of arms. However, in heraldry, a crest is just one component of a coat of arms. In a complete depiction of a coat of arms, the crest is a design affixed to the helmet. However, crests can also be used on their own; this is particularly useful when there is insufficient space to display the entire coat of arms.

Tinctures

The colours used in heraldry are referred to as tinctures. See Tincture (heraldry) for a full description.

Divisions of the field

The field can be divided into more than one colour. See Divisions of the field.

Charges

Charges can be animals, objects or geometric constructs (ordinaries).

Common animals are lions, leopards, martlets, eagles, gryphons, fish, boars or dolphins. There are dragons and unicorns as well, but they are not nearly as common as most people suppose. The default position of an animal is looking to the left. Animals are found in various different positions - a flying martlet is a martlet volant, a swimming dolphin is a dolphin naiant, and a walking lion is a lion passant. Other words for positions are rampant (on hind legs), salient (leaping), sejant (sitting) and gardant (looking at the viewer). There are humans as well, although they are unusual, like wild men or Saracens. If you show only the head of an animal, cut off at the neck, it is an 's head couped.

Common objects are escallops (shells), crosses, mullets (a conventional five-pointed star shape, as on the American flag, which in fact represent spurs), crescents, bugle-horns, water-bougets, gauntlets and different kinds of trees, flowers, leaves, and other plants. Circles are generally called roundels, but in England instead of being described a roundel vert, they have different names depending on colour; Bezants if they are golden, plates if silver, torteaux if red, hurts if blue, pellets or ogresses if black and pommes if green. A roundel that is barry wavy argent and azure is called a fountain.

Ordinaries (sometimes called "honourable ordinaries") are almost like partitions, but are handled like objects. Though there is much debate as to exactly which geometrical charges consitute ordinaries, certain ones are agreed on by everone. A pale is a vertical charge starting from the top of the shield, ending at the bottom, and wide as a third of the shield's width. (The "Canadian pale," identical to the pale but taking up one-half the sheild's width, was invented in 1964 by Conrad Swan, retired Garter King of Arms.)[1] A fess is the same thing, only horizontal. There are also bends, saltires and crosses, as well as chiefs, bordures and chevrons. A chief is a fess situated in the upper third of the shield. A chevron looks like a saw's tooth, arching from the middle of the left side of the shield to the middle of the right. A quarter is the top left (dexter chief in heraldry) quarter of the shield.

There are diminutives of charges as well.

The diminutive of the pale is the pallet and the diminutive of the fess is the bar. (The diminutive of the bar is the barrulet.) Barry of means that the background is divided into that number of horizontal stripes. There are diminutives of most partitions, like bendy of or paly of. It should be noted that in order to be described as "barry" or "paly" there must be an even number of stripes, otherwise it is a field of x tincture and y pallets or bars. Thus the shield of the United States of America, though officially described as "Paly of thirteen argent and gules, a chief azure," is no such thing; it is "Argent, six pallets gules and a chief azure."

The diminutive of the chevron is the chevronel.

The diminutive of the quarter is the canton, a square occupying, in theory, the upper left third of the shield. In theory a canton is never an original part of the shield, but some form of later addition, but this is not true in practice. Another charge can be completely hidden by the canton (sometimes, if the charge is not part of a predictable pattern of like charges laid out elsewhere on the shield, making it impossible to correctly blazon the shield); the charge so hidden is then called "absconded." When a shield contains both a fess and canton they are always shown in their theoretical size, and with no dividing line between them; as they appear to be one continuous thing, blazoning a shield with a fess and canton can be confusing for the novice.

If you put a mullet on a bend, the bend 'is charged with' the mullet.

Special charges known as differences may distinguish otherwise similar blazons; these often indicate "cadency," or what number son owns the shield, to distinguish him from other sons and the father.

Blazons

Full descriptions of shields could look as follows:

Argent, on a fess azure between in chief two anchors crossed in saltire sable and in base a lion passant gules a fleur-de-lis Or.

Sable, two swords crossed in saltire argent, between four fleurs-de-lis Or, all contained within a bordure purpure.

Party per fess argent and sable, in chief a falcon close vert, in base a plate charged with a fleur-de-lis vert.

There are, of course, more complicated designs:

Party per fess: The chief Argent, charged with five bezants, the centre bezant charged in chief with a latin cross of the field, on a canton in sinister base of the first, a bucket: The base party per pale Azure and Argent, the dexter side charged with three rings conjoined at their centres in pairle, the sinister side charged with a bend sinister Azure bearing three quatrefoil of the field. Behind the shield a pastoral staff. The shield contained within a cartouche and ensigned with an ecclesiastical hat supporting six tassels on either side of the shield.

Coat of Arms of Saskatchewan, with parts labelled

Besides the shield

In addition to the shield, most coats of arms include a crest, placed above the shield, and a motto, usually placed below it.

Other items may be added to the coat, such as a helmet (decorated with mantling) in a variety of meaningful postures and designs; supporters on either side of the shield and the compartment on which they usually stand; and a variety of medals, ribbons, and other decorations. These items are often granted as special honours by the sovereign.

Modern heraldry

Heraldry is still practiced today, especially in monarchies such as the United Kingdom. Institutions, companies, and members of the public may obtain officially recognized coats of arms from governmental heraldic authorities. This typically has the force of a registered trademark.

However, many modern "heraldic" designs are not registered with heraldic authorities, and do not follow at all the rules of heraldic design.

There are also many people who are interested in heraldry as a hobby; many of them participate in the Society for Creative Anachronism and other such medieval revivals, not to mention micronationalism.

See also:

• List of coats of arms
• Chivalry
• Court of Chivalry
• Time immemorial

External links

Authorities

• The College of Arms for England, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Commonwealth
• Court of the Lord Lyon of Scotland — see also [1], [1]
• Office of the Chief Herald of Ireland
• The Canadian Heraldic Authority

Societies

• The Heraldry Society
• The Heraldry Society of Scotland
• The Royal Heraldry Society of Canada
• A Heraldic Primer (Society for Creative Anachronism)

  Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Heraldry."

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Heraldry of Åland

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

Åland, which was a Province of Sweden, was granted its coat of arms prior to the funeral of King Gustav I of Sweden in 1560.

Åland

Blazon: "Azure a Deer passant Or"

The coat of arms originally blazoned for Åland displayed two roe deers on a field with nine white roses. The roses which adorned were symbolically linked to the nine white roses present in the coat of arms of Finland. But Åland was never to be granted the arms which was originally intended, instead it was awarded a coat of arms displaying a deer. An odd fact since the Åland fauna never included deer.

In the 1940s the office of the Swedish Herald of the Realm (Riksheraldikerämbetet) discovered that a less than flattering mistake had been committed, almost four centuries earlier. The arms granted to Åland had been originally been intended for Oelandia. Oelandia, an island off the coast of Smalandia, was similarily the victim in this mixup. It had with its history of beeing a royal game park, had an abundant supply of deers but no natural connection to the nine Finnish roses which adorned its coat of arms. The coats of arms had been mixed up and the blunder went unnoticed, from the proper authorities, for several centuries.

Finland

Finland

Main article: Heraldry of Finland

Description: The lion holds a raised sword in its right gauntleted fore leg and is trampling a curved sabre. The lion, the crown and the sword and sabre handles are gold, as are the gauntlet joints. The blades and the gauntlet are silver. The field is adorned by nine silver roses.

Oelandia

Main article: Heraldry of Oelandia

Oelandia

In 1944 the Swedish Herald of the Realm decided to withdraw Oelandia's granted arms and issue a new grant for the coat of arms originally designed for the island. The heraldic authorities in Finland decided not to adopt the coat of arms originally intended with the roe deers and the nine Finnish roses.

This decision to adopt the coat of arm originally intended made it necessary to introduce some minor alterations for Oelandia. It included the introduction of a collar and differentiating the color of its armamanent, antlets and hoofs.

Blazon: "Azure a Deer Or attired, hoofed and gorged Gules."

See also: Heraldry of Sweden

Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Heraldry of �land."

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Synonyms within Context: Heraldry

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Usage Frequency: Heraldry

Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.

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Expression: Heraldry

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Modern Translation: Heraldry

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