an eagle close

The eagle plays an important part in heraldry in almost every part of the globe. Its earliest rise to popularity, however, was in Germany, where, after it became the emblem of the empire, it was adopted by some of the princes and many of the nobles. A double-headed eagle is also the emblem of Russia and Austria. On the roll of Henry III the eagle appears but twice, but in the roll of Edward II there are forty-three examples of it. Nobles of the Holy Roman Empire place their shields on the breast of an eagle, examples of which may be seen in the arms of the Duke of Marlborough , the Earl of Denbigh and Lord Arundel of Wardour.

The imperial eagle is invariably represented as two-headed, the origin of which is obscure. Charlemagne is said to have used it to signify that in his hands was the government of both the Roman and the German empires.

The eagle is generally borne displayed; that is, upright, breast to the front, and legs, tail and wings expanded (commonly called a “spread eagle”).

The Bald eagle, adopted as the national emblem of the United States, is a large and powerful bird, with a far greater spread of wing than the European white-tailed species.
 

Applied to animals borne with the ears of a different color from that of the body. In such a case the animal is said to be “eared of” such a color or metal.
 

An English office of great antiquity, and is now hereditary with the Dukes of Norfolk. The Earl Marshal is the head of the College of Arms, which institution determines all questions relating to arms and grants of armorial bearings.
 

The eighth officer of state; an honorary title, and personal, until made hereditary in the family of the Duke of Norfolk. During a vacancy in the office of high constable, the Earl Marshal has jurisdiction in the court of chivalry.
 

An officer who had command of the cavalry under the constable. This office was held by the family of Keith, but forfeited by rebellion in 1715.
 

An institution formerly existing in England, presided over by the the Earl Marshal, in which all questions and disputes concerning coats of arms were settled. It has since been abolished.
 

The head attire of an Earl, sometimes used in blazonry. The crest of Davidson in Carlisle Cathedral shows a bird rising out of an Earl's coronet. This is unusual, however. Generally a ducal coronet is used.
 

an oval cartouche

There is no hard and fast dividing line between heraldry in general and ecclesiastical heraldry – each has the same origin, the same lines of coeval development – but the application of heraldry to ecclesiastical purposes first occurs in the appearance of armorial bearings of a personal and family nature on ecclesiastical seals, and of sacred or saintly devices upon vestments and ecclesiastical banners. The latter influence is of less importance because it was more ephemeral and more in the nature of pure symbolism than of armory.

The earliest ecclesiastical seals – nearly all, in early times, vesica-shaped, as they have continued to the present day – bore the bust, half-length or full effigy of the owner of the seal. So, at that period, did the seals of non-ecclesiastics upon which are the mounted effigies of knight and noble with (as they developed) the armorial shield and bardings fully displayed. Then we get, from about 1300, the seal showing no more than the shield of arms, and concurrently the ecclesiastical seal progressed through the canopied effigy with the shield of arms in the base to the later form with heraldic achievement and legend alone. Ecclesiastical heraldry simply progressed coevally and upon the same lines as heraldry in general. The earliest ecclesiastical seals were unquestionably purely personal, bearing the effigy, arms, or device of bishop or abbot respectively, as the case might be, but, in England at any rate, the “Statutum de apportis religiosorum” of 1307 (35 Edward I) enacted that every religious house should have a common seal, and that all grants made to which this common seal was not affixed should be null and void. With the common seal of a community came the idea of an impersonal coat of arms for that community, but as there is no definite date at which such common seals became armorial so there is no common origin from which the devices were drawn.

It has been a matter of keen controversy in England at what date control was effectively exercised by the sovereign authority in matters armorial. It can be definitely carried back to the beginning of the fourteenth century; but in matters of religion the appeal was to Rome and not to the temporal sovereign, and there is little, if indeed any, evidence of a regularized control of ecclesiastical heraldry before the date of the Reformation. For this reason the arms of abbeys and priories have little of the exactitude that characterizes other heraldry of the period, and we find that in England, as in all other countries, the personal arms of donors, benefactors, or predecessors in office were constantly impressed into service for the purpose of impersonal arms of a community. In some cases (e.g., in the case of the arms of the See of Hereford) even these personal arms became stereotyped by repetition of usage into the impersonal arms of the office or community, though of course many, perhaps the majority, from the character of the charges and devices which make up the coat of arms, are obviously designed for, and indicative of, the purpose they serve and the community for which they may stand.

A large number of ecclesiastical, as of other public, coats of arms, are based upon the figures and effigies of patron saints originally used and represented as such and without heraldic intention. The natural consequence is that in many cases of religious communities there are two or more entirely different coats of arms doing duty indifferently. Impersonal arms of this character were borne for the sees, episcopal and archiepiscopal, and for the abbeys and priories, and for the religious orders. These arms, regarded merely as coats of arms in all matters of heraldic rule and blazon, conform to the ordinary rules and laws of general armoury so far as these may concern them; nor in character do they in any way differ therefrom, save in matters of external ornament.

One point, however, may he alluded to here. The shield is the ordinary vehicle of a coat of arms. It is obviously and essentially a military instrument, and the supposedly peace-loving ecclesiastic has often preferred to substitute for the shield the oval cartouche. In some countries, notably Italy, Spain, and France, the use of the cartouche for ecclesiastical purposes has been very general, but with the recognition of this ecclesiastical preference for the cartouche, it should not be overlooked that the laity have also made occasional use of it for purely personal armory and that the usage of the shield for ecclesiastics is too universally general at all periods for any suggestion of impropriety to follow its use in preference to the cartouche.

– Source: (u)WOODWARD, ecclesiastical heraldry (London, 1894); FOX-DAVIES, Art Of heraldry (London, 1904); CHEVALIER, Topo Bibl. (Montbéliard, 1894-99), s. vv. Armoiries, Blason; BATTANDIER, Ann. Pont. Cath. (Paris, 1889) 269-323; (1900), 389-393; (1902), 366-84; (1904), 127. (/u)
 

Applied to an ordinary to denote that the edging is placed only between the ordinary and the field, and not where it joins the escutcheon.
 

A spear with barbed forks for spearing eels.
 

(French.) Said of an animal when represented as rearing on its hind legs from fright or rage.
 

Applied to the wings of a bird when upright and expanded.
 

Embattled on both faces of the ordinary.
 

One embattlement upon another.
 

One who emblazons; also, one who publishes and displays anything with pomp.
 

Having a border of the same tincture as the field.
 

Braced together; bound or tied together.
 

A term applied to a hill or mount with several copings or rises and falls.
 

Small escutcheons affixed to the shoulders of an armed knight.
 

This is a term used to describe a shield in which coats of arms are placed side by side, each occupying one-half the escutcheon. The shield is divided by a line down the center (per pale). The arms of the husband are placed on the dexter side, and those of the wife on the sinister.
 

Applied to a bordure charged with eight birds.
 

(French.) Anything which is represented as let into something else, particularly when the bearing so let in is square.
 

a line endented

Sable, a fess endentedargent

A form of complex line that consist of alternating bends and bends sinister, similar to dancette, but tighter.
 

One of the diminutives of the pale, being one-eighth the breadth of that ordinary. The endorse is used only in pairs one on each side of the pale. This subordinary, like the pallet, was unknown in ancient heraldry.
 

(French.) bearing acorns or something similar.
 

To indent in curved lines; to make ragged at the edges; to spot as with hail.
 

Covered with or resembling a sleeve. Said when the chief has lines drawn from the center of the upper edge to the sides to about half the breadth of the chief. See also Maunch.
 

In a leaping posture. It is sometimes used to describe the position of a horse which in the case of other animals would be saliant.
 

Said of a shield decorated with branches.
 

A term used to describe a bordure charged with eight animals of any kind. When birds are used enalurion is the proper term.
 

Applied to charges around which serpents are entwined. Also used in the case of laurel or other plants.
 

Encircled; bound round or about.
 

Said of a tree torn up by the roots.
 

Applied often to crustaceans instead of haurient, and to reptiles instead of rampant.
 

Ermines

Ermines is the reverse of Ermine with black fur and silvery spots
 

erminites

Erminites is the same as Ermine, but with one read hair on each side of the Ermine spots.
 

A gold fur powdered with black Ermine tails. The reverse in known as “Pean”.
 

an escallop

The figure of a scallop shell. This was originally worn to signify that the wearer had made a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. James, Compostella, Spain. Later on it was placed on the shield to show that the bearer or an ancestor had been a Crusader or had made a long pilgrimage.
 

(French.) An escutcheon or a bearing which is covered with curved lines resembling scallop shells. These lines should represent the lines as overlapping each other.
 

To cut or notch in a square form or across.
 

Cut or notched in a square form or across.
 

A term applied to anything shivered by a battle axe.
 

an escutcheon

The shield, on which all lines are drawn and charges delineated; the background on which coat armor is represented; known in blazon as the field. It originally represented the war shield of a knight, upon which his arms were displayed.
 

Said of a bird represented with its wings half open, as if preparing to take flight.
 

A star which has four straight and four wavy rays
 

A term made use of in speaking of the spots in a peacock's tail.
 

Applied to eagles or other birds in their nests.