Also see the heraldry dictionary
The use of symbols of identification, or insignia, is common in primitive societies, where all or most of the population is illiterate. In medieval Europe, however, such emblematic identification became a highly complicated science, the roots of which predate AD 1000. There is evidence that the Vikings used a galley in full sail as an emblem, and many of the Scottish clans, or tribes, used the device of the lion. The horse was a symbol found among both the Anglo-Saxons and the Saxons of Germany, whereas the eagle, which is associated with Charlemagne, became a widespread symbol in Germany. All these emblems predate formal heraldry, but they later passed into heraldic use.
Heraldry itself dates from the beginning of the 12th century, when coats of arms began to appear and were adopted rapidly throughout Western Europe. These symbols were developed because of the military necessity of identifying armor-clad warriors, whose faces were covered by helmets. Because of the Crusades, in which men of many nationalities were involved, the idea of heraldic identification spread readily among the nobility of Western Europe. Because the majority of the nobles could not write, their coats of arms were soon incorporated into the design of the wax seals with which they stamped letters and documents. Within a short time coats of arms were adopted for the same purpose by clerics, lawyers, and the heads of corporations such as colleges, merchant companies, and towns.
Although heraldry started in the noble classes, in some countries (such as Germany, the Low Countries, Italy, and Scandinavia) it came to be used by the burghers, giving rise to non-noble, or burgerlich, arms. In the cities of Italy and in the Alpine regions, patricians--who were accorded equal status with the landed nobility, although not descended from them--also adopted the use of heraldry.
Heraldry became systematized early in its history and developed a specialized vocabulary called blazon to describe the devices used. In the British Isles the vocabulary of blazon was derived from Norman French with much borrowing from other languages.
For descriptive purposes the shield-shaped field, or ground, of the coat of arms is divided into nine areas. The three at the top are called (from viewer's left to right) dexter chief, center chief, and sinister chief; those in the horizontal center, dexter flank, fess point, and sinister flank; and those at the bottom, dexter base, center base, and sinister base. The designations "dexter" (Latin: "right") and "sinister" (Latin: "left") are given from the point of view of the warrior behind the shield.
The colors, or tinctures, of the field are limited to two metals, gold (or) and silver (argent); five, or sometimes seven, colors, red (gules), blue (azure), black (sable), green (vert), purple (purpure), and sometimes sanguine (murrey) and tawny (tenne); and various furs, such as ermine (appearing in stylized form as black tails on a white field) and vair (squirrel; bell shapes of alternating blue and white). Later a system of lines and dots was adopted in order to show the tinctures in black and white illustrations.
Superimposed on the field are the charges. The most common charges are called ordinaries, basic geometric bands of color such as the fess (a horizontal band across the central third of the field), the chief (a band across the top), the pale (a vertical band down the central third), the bend (a wide diagonal band), the bar (a horizontal band one-fifth the depth of the shield), and the chevron (an inverted V). Also called ordinaries- -or by some experts, subordinaries--are such less-common shapes as the cross, the saltire (a diagonal cross), the pile (a triangular wedge from the top), the billet (a small rectangle), the bordure (a narrow border), the orle (a border set in from the edge), and the inescutcheon (an inner shieldlike shape), among many others. Many of these charges appear in multiple and diminutive form, in which case they are called barry, bendy, paly, or by the appropriate plural form.
In addition to the ordinaries are a myriad of other charges that depict both animate and inanimate objects. Animals such as lions, eagles, dolphins, and boars appear in profusion and with many different attitudes. Mythical animals (for example, the dragon and griffin), trees and flowers, ships, and weapons are also common.
Division of the field is accomplished by partition lines that often follow the lines of the ordinaries and are called accordingly per pale, per bend, and per saltire, for example. The sections thus formed are of different color, and charges may change color on either side of the line, thus becoming counterchanged.
The partition lines need not be straight; variations include indented, wavy, engrailed, invected, embattled, and nebule lines.
The process by which arms are combined to show matrimonial and other alliances is called marshaling. Marriage is usually shown by impalement, in which the shield is divided vertically, with the husband's arms in the dexter half and the wife's in the sinister. Their children might use both sets of arms on a quartered shield, with the arms repeated diagonally.
Cadency is the name given to the modifications made to differentiate various branches and members of a family entitled to bear the same coat of arms. There are two systems. Major brisures, which involve changes of charges or tinctures or the addition of ordinaries, indicate different branches of a family. They were used in Scotland and continental Europe, except Germany. In England, the use of major brisures was discontinued in the 15th century, when the Wars of the Roses virtually eliminated the old families. The English, therefore, came to use only minor brisures--small symbols added to designate the position of a member within the nuclear family. For example, the symbol of the first son is a label (a narrow strip with three pendants); that of the second, a crescent; that of the third, a mullet (five- pointed star); and that of the fourth, a martlet (mythical bird).
As time passed the armorial bearings began to include elements other than the shield. Helmets took varying shapes to indicate the rank of the warrior, and at the beginning of the 14th century English knights began to wear distinctive crests on their helmets. Although originally restricted to knights of tournament rank, crests soon became widespread and, in most heraldic jurisdictions, were granted with coats of arms. Originally these crests were borne directly on the helmet, but distinctions emerged. The crests of knights were borne on wreaths of the livery colors; magnates often had a crest coronet; and some (in Scotland, feudal barons) had their crests on a chapeau.
The helmet and crest were placed above the coat of arms in the complete grouping of elements, called the armorial achievement. Other elements added over the centuries were mottoes placed below and above the arms and crest; a compartment, some form of ground placed below the shield (in Scotland and France it had special significance); and supporters, usually in animal or human form, which flanked the shield and stood on the compartment. At an early date arms were also placed on FLAGS.
Officers of arms were necessary to control heraldry, to see that arms were not duplicated or wrongfully assumed. These officers were called heralds and pursuivants. They supervised the medieval tournaments (displays of knightly combat) and the actual mustering of knights in war, for which they drew up the magnificent rolls of arms.
The heralds were eventually subsumed under national armorial administrations, some of which still exist. Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Italy, Switzerland, South Africa, Kenya, and New Zealand are among the monarchies and republics that have heraldic offices. The most famous such institutions are the English College of Arms and the Scottish Court of the Lord Lyon, where arms and pedigrees are recorded and new arms given to individuals and corporations. In addition, the Scottish Lord Lyon King of Arms retains judicial functions, adjudicating on the rights to use arms and titles. ROBERT GAYRE OF GAYRE AND NIGG
This article was rewritten from the Academic American encyclopedia's article on heraldry. It had the following
Article Number 0136580-0
A fleur-de-lis, or "lily flower," is a heraldic device associated with the French crown, which adopted it as an emblem in the 12th century. It is composed of three vertical petals, the central one erect, the others curving to the right and left, joined near the base by a bar (see HERALDRY). Of obscure origin, the device is commonly believed to represent a lily, signifying purity, supposedly sent from heaven in AD 496 to the Frankish king Clovis. It remained part of the French coat of arms until 1830. A red fleur-de-lis is the heraldic symbol of the city of Florence. A motif resembling the fleur-de-lis is also found in Oriental art.
The ankh (crux ansata) was an ancient Egyptian T-shaped cross surmounted with a loop. It symbolized the creative energies of the male and female and the essence of life. The simple T-shaped cross is named for the Greek letter tau. it is often referred to as the Old Testament cross because Moses supposedly placed a brazen serpent on a T cross (Num. 21:6-9), and according to legend, the Israelites on Passover eve marked their doors with blood-drawn tau crosses to identify themselves as Yahweh's followers. Another name for the T cross is the crux commissa.
In ancient Asian, European, and pre-Columbian American civilizations the left-directed swastika, or cruz gammata, appears to have been symbolic of solar power and movement. Hindus see the swastika as a sign of the resigned spirit, whereas Buddhists consider it an emblem of the Buddha's mind. The German Nazis adopted a right-directed swastika for their party logo because they believed it to be an ancient Nordic symbol.
The erect pole and crossbar used to crucify Jesus Christ became the principal symbol of Christianity. A cross stood for both the actual Crucifixion and the concept of the Christian church. More than 50 variants were to develop, but the most important are the Greek cross, with its equilateral arms, and the Latin cross, with a vertical arm traversed near the top by a shorter horizontal arm. The Greek cross derives its name from its frequent use in the Greek and other Eastern Orthodox churches; the Latin cross was favored by the Western, or Roman Catholic, church.
Other major shapes include the diagonal, or x-shaped, cross on which Saint Andrew is said to have been crucified, and the cross paty (or patee), in which the arms widen at the extremities. A variant of the cross paty is the Maltese cross, has eight points. The Chi-Rho is a cross formed by joining the first two letters of the Greek word for "Christ." The Celtic or Iona cross, developed in early medieval Ireland and Scotland, is distinguished by a circle surrounding the point of crossing. Two graduated crossbars indicate the Lorraine cross associated with archbishops and patriarchs, whereas the Papal cross has three graduated crossbars. A commonly used Eastern Orthodox variant of the cross of Lorraine has an additional crossbar diagonally placed near the base.
The placement of the cross is often symbolic. Crosses surmounting orbs or spheres refer to the global triumph of Christianity. A cross erected on the site of a pagan temple indicated the victory of Christianity, and territory conquered by Christians would be claimed initially by planting a cross in the ground.
The cross was not widely depicted before the 4th century AD, when Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire. Earlier, when Christians were often persecuted, the cross was frequently disguised as an anchor, or some other mundane object. Second-century Christians, however, had already begun to make the sign of the cross as a gesture of identification, blessing, and warding off of evil. In the Roman church the sign of the cross was made from left to right and in Eastern Orthodox churches from right to left.
A crucifix is a cross bearing a painted or sculptured image of Christ. Crucifixes first appeared in the 5th century, and from the 9th century on medieval artists increasingly aimed at a realistic portrayal of Christ's suffering. The Renaissance created a fashion for a more ideally conceived imagery that dramatically returned to pathos under the emotional taste of the baroque period. During the Reformation, Protestants generally repudiated the use of representational religious imagery; the crucifix therefore became associated with Roman Catholicism.
When the art of HERALDRY developed in medieval Europe, various types of Christian crosses were employed as symbols, or charges, in the designing of coats-of-arms. A cross with equal arms and a diagonal cross, or saltire, were the most traditional heraldic forms. Many of the insignias for medieval and Renaissance chivalric orders were crosses: the Maltese cross, for example, was the heraldic symbol of the Knights of Malta (the Hospitalers). The flags of Switzerland, Greece, and the Scandinavian countries display various crosses. The British Union Jack was designed to unify the diagonal crosses of Saint Patrick (Ireland) and Saint Andrew (Scotland) with the rectilinear cross of Saint George (England). A Saint Andrew's cross dominated the American Confederate flag, and it was subsequently incorporated into the state flags of some former Confederacy members.
During the 19th and 20th centuries many decorations awarded for military distinction were crosses. The German Iron Cross, the French Croix de Guerre (War Cross), the English Victoria Cross, and the American Distinguished Service Crosses of the army, navy, and air force are among the most significant medals that have been awarded for battle bravery. (See also MEDALS AND DECORATIONS.)
Robert J. Loescher
This article was rewritten from the Academic American encyclopedia's article on heraldry. It had the following