Heraldry is the system of visual identification of rank and pedigree which developed in the European High Middle Ages, closely associated with the courtly culture of chivalry, Latin Christianity, the Crusades, feudal aristocracy, and monarchy of the time. If heraldry is to be considered as the tight discipline developed over the following centuries and, in popular perception, centred on shields, then perhaps the beginnings may be seen in when King Henry I of England hung an armorial shield around the neck of Geoffrey of Anjou, his future son-in-law.
Purple Purpure Royal majesty, sovereignty and also justice. The first coat of arms was used to distinguish one knight from another. Because of this, knights began to paint symbols on their shields. The obvious national coat of arms on the Royal Standard usually comes to mind first.
But on closer inspection, most schools, colleges and universities, cities or towns, military groups or police forces, corporations and even many pubs use coats of arms today as a proud symbol of their heritage and comradeship.
Heraldry is about showing people who you are. Middle Ages for Kids. Coats of Arms, Shields, Heraldry. In medieval times, every noble family wanted everyone to know how important they were. They also wanted to brag about their history.
Since most people could not read, heraldry was invented. This was a way to brag about who you were without using words. Heraldry was a design and short saying. Noble families designed a coat of arms that incorporated their heraldry their design and short saying. During the first Crusade, only thirty years after the Conquest, the mass cavalry charge of mail-clad knights remained the standard tactic of warfare.
Order was maintained in the ensuing fight by the use of mustering flags bearing the personal devices of commanders and it is clear that these were sufficiently distinctive to be recognised, even in the heat of battle. It is likely that they also possessed a peacetime function - that of marking territory and symbolising authority - and that the devices used for this purpose also came to be engraved on seals by which documents were authenticated.
Hereditary devices may have been known in , and symbolic banners seem to have been carried at the battle of Hastings and in the First Crusade. If the undoubted links of the ruling families of Flanders with Charlemagne had any heraldic connotations, the political decline of Flanders in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries and the misfortunes that overwhelmed its ruing houses, would have given their descendants in England an additional urge to preserve their heritage and promote their armorial devices.
Whatever its origins, it is clear that what had been, in the late eleventh century, the inheritance of a small group of interrelated families in north-west Europe, spread through the upper ranks of society in the twelfth century. This widespread adoption of colourful devices and symbols was one aspect of the twelfth-century renaissance. Once symbols were transferred to the shield, they gave rise to what is accepted as heraldry, and this practice spread across Europe in a period of less than thirty years.
By the beginning of the thirteenth century, admission to the tournament was established as the prerogative of the knightly class. Heralds were attached to royal or magnatial households as advisers and emissaries and it was they who were responsible for arranging and supervising tournaments: they determined the eligibility of participants and declaimed their prowess, marshalled the contestants and adjudicated at the fight.
The heralds thereby acquired an expertise which was peculiarly their own. This was concerned, not only with the management of ceremonial and protocol, but also with the ordering and recording of personal devices used on seals, at tournaments and, increasingly, in warfare and because it was they who exercised this expertise, it became known as "heraldry. The earliest recorded seal showing an armorial shield dates from , and thereafter the increasing importance of the shield as a vehicle for armorial display had more to do with the development of armory as a well regulated system than with military expediency.
The shield was itself a symbol of the mounted warrior and, while the devices placed upon it were peculiar to the individual, the fact that they were carried on a representation of a shield served to emphasise the status of armiger. Clearly, it was considered both convenient and desirable that an heir, on coming to his estate, shall adopt the same device as his father as a symbol of familial and feudal continuity.
The same shield later appears on the tomb at Salisbury Cathedral of Geoffrey's bastard grandson, William Longespee, Earl of Salisbury d. The earliest shields of arms were simple and uncluttered and consisted for the most part of geometrical shapes derived from the practice of decorating the raised ribs, bosses and struts of early wooden shields.
From its simple origins in the twelfth century heraldry developed in complexity and elaboration. By the thirteenth century it was acquiring the rules and terminology which are the basis of its present laws and language.
As time passed, it became increasingly complex in its design with the introduction of a number of fabulous and chimerical creatures, and patterns which moved far away from the simple vigorous geometry of the early days. A later development, originating in Spain, was the incorporation of quarterings of other arms inherited via heraldic heiresses, creating ever more complex patterns.
In its early stages heraldry was remarkably uniform throughout Europe. Similar armorial bearings were adopted in the middle of the twelfth century in most western countries. The sudden and widespread emergence of heraldry is thought to have been associated with the Crusades and the rise of tournaments, which brought together knights from all over Latin Christendom, and emphasised the universality of western civilisation.
During the thirteenth century the science of heraldry crystallised into approximately the form we know today, with the same range of colours, metals, and furs, and the same rules for marshalling arms. The principle that arms were personal property and could not be used by another was generally accepted throughout most of Europe, though this was only enforced nationally, so that similar arms do appear in different countries.
Gradually all the leading ruling houses came to have officers of arms or heralds, whose job it was to regulate heraldry and to record arms. Heraldry London: Tiger Books International, , As a result they came to exercise supervision over arms, and were called upon to adjudicate in cases of dispute. In the fifteenth century in France and England, the heralds were formed into colleges with permanent headquarters and libraries.
The establishment of officers of arms and heraldic records led to the rules of heraldry becoming formalised and regulated, to be handed down from generation to generation in the European kingdoms.
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