HERALDRY,

A SCIENCE which teaches how to blazon, or explain in proper terms, all that belongs to coats-of-arms; and how to marshal, or dispose regularly, divers arms on a field. It also teaches whatever relates to the marshalling of solemn cavalcades, processions, and other public ceremonies at coronations, installations, creations of peers, nuptials, christening of princes, funerals, &c.

Arms, or coats-of-arms, are hereditary marks of honour, made up of fixed and determined colours and figures, granted by sovereign princes, as a reward for military valour, a shining virtue, or a signal public service; and which serve to denote the decent and alliance of the bearer, or to distinguish states, cities, societies, &c., civil, ecclesiastical, and military.

Thus heraldry is the science, of which arms are the proper object; but yet they differ much both in their origin and antiquity. Heraldry, according to Sir George Mackenzie, "as digested into an art, and subjected to rules, must be ascribed to Charlemagne and Frederick Barbarossa, for it did begin and grow with the feudal law." Sir John Ferne is of opinion, that we did borrow arms from the Egyptians; meaning, from their hieroglyphics. Sir William Dugdale mentions, that arms, as marks of honour, were used by great commanders in war, necessity requiring that their persons should be notified to their friends and followers. The learned Alexander Nisbet, in his excellent system of heraldry, says, that arms owe their rise and beginning to the light of nature, and that signs and marks of honour were made use of in the first ages of the world, and by all nations, however simple and illiterate, to distinguish the noble from the ignoble. We find in Homer, Virgil, and Ovid, that their heroes had divers figures on their shields, whereby their persons were distinctly known. Alexander the Great, delirious to honour those of his captains and soldiers who had done any glorious action, and also to excite an emulation among the rest, did grant them certain badges to be borne on their armour, pennons, and banners; ordering, at the same time, that no person or potentate, through his empire, should attempt or presume to give or tolerate the bearing of those signs upon the armour of any man, but it should be a power reserved to himself; which prerogative has been claimed ever since by all other kings and sovereign princes within their dominions.

After these and many other different opinions, all that can be said with any certainty is, that in all ages, men have made use of figures of living creatures, or symbolical signs, to denote the bravery and courage either of their chief or nation, to render themselves the more terrible to their enemies, and even to distinguish themselves or families, as names do individuals. The famous C. Agrippa, in his treatise of the vanity of sciences, cap. 81, has collected many instances of these marks of distinction, anciently borne by kingdoms and states that were any way civilized, viz.

The Egyptians bore an ox, The Athenians an owl, The Goths a bear, The Romans an eagle, The Franks a lion, The Saxons a horse.

The last is still borne in the arms of his present Britannic majesty. As to hereditary arms of families, William Camden, Sir Henry Spelman, and other judicious heralds, agree, that they began no sooner than towards the latter end of the 11th century. According to Father Mabellier's opinion, a French writer whose authority is of great weight in this matter, Henry l'Oiselleur (the Falconer) who was raised to the imperial throne of the West in 920, by regulating tournaments in Germany gave occasion to the establishment of family-arms, or hereditary marks of honour, which undeniably are more ancient and better observed among the Germans than in any other nation. Moreover, this last author affirms, that with tournaments first came up coats-of-arms; which were a sort of livery, made up of several lists, fillets, or narrow pieces of stuff of divers colours, from whence came the fess, the bend, the pale, &c., which were the original charges of family-arms; for they who never had been at tournaments, had not such marks of distinction. They who enlisted themselves in the Croifades, took up also several new figures hitherto unknown in armorial ensigns; such as alarions, bezants, esclop-shells, martlets, &c., but more particularly crofes, of different colours for distinction's sake. From this it may be concluded, that heraldry, like most human inventions, was infinitely introduced and established; and that, after having been rude and unfettered for many ages, it was at last methodized, perfected, and fixed, by the Croifades and tournaments.

These marks of honour are called arms, from their being principally and first worn by military men at war and tournaments, who had them engraved, embossed, or depicted on shields, targets, banners, or other martial instruments. They are also called coats-of-arms, from the custom of the ancients embroidering them on the coats they wore over their arms, as heralds do to this day.

Arms are distinguished by different names, to denote the causes of their bearing; such as,

| ARMS | |-------| | Of Dominion, Of Patronage, | | Of Pretension, Of Family, | | Of Concession, Of Alliance, | | Of Community, Of Succession. |

Arms of dominion or sovereignty are those which emperors, kings, and sovereign states, do constantly bear; being, as it were, annexed to the territories, kingdoms, and Heraldry

Arms of pretension, are those of such kingdoms, provinces, or territories, to which a prince or lord has some claim, and which he adds to his own, although the said kingdoms or territories be possessed by a foreign prince or other lord. Thus the kings of England have quartered the arms of France with their own, ever since Edward III. laid claim to the kingdom of France, which happened in the year 1330, on account of his being son to Isabella, sister to Charles the Handsome, who died without issue.

Arms of concession or augmentation of honour, are either entire arms, or else one or more figures, given by princes as a reward for some extraordinary service. We read in history, that Robert Bruce, king of Scotland, allowed the earl of Winton's ancestor to bear, in his coat-armour, a crown supported by a sword, to show that he, and the clan Seaton, of which he was the head, supported his tottering crown. Queen Anne granted to Sir Cloudely Shovel, rear-admiral of Great Britain, a chevron between two fleurs-de-lis in chief, and a crescent in base, to denote three great victories he had gained; two over the French, and one over the Turks.

Arms of community, are those of bishoprics, cities, universities, academies, societies, companies, and other bodies corporate.

Arms of patronage, are such as governors of provinces, lords of manors, patrons of benefices, &c., add to their family-arms, as a token of their superiority, rights, and jurisdiction. These arms have introduced into heraldry, castles, gates, wheels, ploughs, rakes, harrows, &c.

Arms of family, or paternal arms, are those that belong to one particular family, that distinguish it from others, and which no person is suffered to assume without committing a crime, which sovereigns have a right to restrain and punish.

Arms of alliance, are those which families, or private persons, take up and join to their own, to denote the alliances they have contracted by marriage. This sort of arms is either impaled, or borne in an escutcheon of pretence, by those who have married heiresses.

Arms of succession, are such as are taken up by them who inherit certain estates, manors, &c., either by will, entail, or donation, and which they either impale or quarter with their own arms; which multiplies the titles of some families out of necessity, and not through ostentation, as many imagine.

These are the eight classes under which the divers sorts of arms are generally ranged; but there is a sort which blazoners call assumptive arms, being such as are taken up by the caprice or fancy of upstarts, though of even so mean extraction, who, being advanced to a degree of fortune, assume them without a legal title. This, indeed, is a great abuse of heraldry; and common only in Britain, for on the continent no such practice takes place.

We now proceed to consider the essential and integral parts of arms, which are these:

The Escutcheon, The Charges, The Tinctures, The Ornaments.

The shield or escutcheon is the field or ground whereon are represented the figures that make up a coat of arms: for these marks of distinction were put on bucklers or shields before they were placed on banners, standards, flags, and coat-armour; and wherever they may be fixed, they are still on a plane or superficies whole form resembles a shield.