What is a Coat of Arms?

ratings I'm shad and I love coat-of-arms though technically strictly speaking that is an incorrect term but I use it because that will then identify and let you know what I'm going to be talking about because they're awesome don't you think just look cool I got dragons and lions and other things on them but what I particularly love about the conventionally speaking coat of arms is how it's the symbolism in it how to identify the individual to whom it belongs to I just really love that kind of imagery also you know that through visual means you can then you know tell something about this individual person it adds an element of coolness to the individual depending on what they have in their coat of arms I and I have got a cool dragon or other the thing that represents me is a dragon or a lion or a sword or a boar or a stag or any number of things it's just awesome it says something about the individual but it also lets the individual convey what they want to be conveyed to other people now remember how I said that strictly speaking the term coat of arms is actually incorrect and it is coat of arms is actually referring to a coat an actual garment though it has evolved to mean the full armorial achievement or heraldic achievement that is actually the official name of what you think of that when you hear coat of arms it's the amore achievement or heraldic achievement and it is not a crest or family crest which is you know a term or a descriptive phrase that people use to identify the armorial achievement it's not that at all armorial achievements have crests in them okay but they are not crests as a whole that that's an incorrect thing also just to point out I will be using my own armorial achievement that I designed for visual reference throughout this video now it's not official okay I could make it official if I really wanted to but it follows most of their rules of heraldry when describing what is on a full coat of arms and other things like that and so it's a good point of reference that I can show you and also manipulate you know emphasize the part I'm talking about before we get into the nitty-gritty let's step back and establish where the concept of a coat of arms originates and that is of course the problem with knowing who friend or foe is on the battlefield because when you're fighting everything like that you don't want to kill Joe and realize what um he was an outside sorry Joey yeah you're right yeah yeah I guess not having a head is going to be a bit you know difficult there so there needs to be a means to identify who is who on the battlefield especially if those peoples are important now you might think that could be counterproductive if you're an important person and you would you know have this big you know symbol that represents and lets people know who you are that might just paint a target on your head well not really in fact it often saved your life more often than whatever kill it because if you're an important person that meant money and someone saw oh that's so-and-so he is really important it is really rich well I'm not going to kill him because if I capture him that means I can hold him for ransom for his rich family and they can pay me for his release and then I'm get lots of money don't I and so the practice of ransom was actually a very common thing in the medieval period but still we're going back to the beginning let's say let's go back again to where this you know this need for identifying people on the patter for originally that originated for as long as battles ever been around sometimes it wasn't difficult because oh they're wearing this type of armor or this type of culture you know and so we are wearing Roman armor with bright reds and we've got also banners which opal identifiers but if we're fighting the barbaric you know Celts or Goths or other people like that a you know as not as difficult but if we're fighting people who are generally wearing the same time varma that we are wearing and look generally the same then it can be kind of difficult so the first examples of the heraldry and this is kind of it's called proto heraldry here because it is before official heraldry was established but the first types of proto heraldry we find is in the markings on shield by the Normans and we see this in the Bayeux Tapestry and if you're familiar with the early medieval period you will have seen many of these shield designs sometimes it is a division of colors sometimes it's a basic cross sometimes it's a circles a it can be any number of things but this was a means to help identify who was who in a battlefield well then of course that practice was continued and because these symbols were on the arm specifically the shield arms meaning armaments weapons okay and specifically the shield there are the symbols are on the shields they were called arms as well those are they're identifying arms of that person and do you see where the you know cross over kind of happens because they weren't really identifying the symbol though identifying the armaments outer wearing but that is so and so's armaments because it has that symbol on it and that is Joe blows armaments because it has a different symbol on it and those are their arms and that is also technically the correct term for it as well you can call it the armorial achievement but you could also just call it someone's arms just like they would have done in back in the day and that's still very accurate you can see that that is so and so's personal arms well from their origin these symbols and identifying markings started to move from the shield they still were on shield but they started to appear in other things specifically on the garments that these warriors now Knights were wearing and so they would bear their personal mark their device on their surcoat and also later on they're near to bards and so then we have the term the coat of arms because now our coats our garments are bearing the markings we originally put on our armand sorry our armaments and so now we have the term coat of arms this is my coat bearing the markings I have on my arms coat of arms and that is why the term coat of arms is strictly speaking incorrect because you're actually referring to the coat that Knights and also later heralds would wear that bore all the markings that identified who was who so that is the origin of where the armorial achievement comes from now the thing that to understand about the armorial achievement and look there's no harm in still calling it a coat of arms you can sue to that because that's what the common terminology is nowadays so what you need understand about the coat of arms is the most important parts on it is what is on the shield and also the crest what is the crest because this is a term people get very confused they think a crest identifies the main device or charge that is on the shield the official term for the symbols that are on the shields is actually a charge and there can be more than one but a charge is a symbol and it can be an animal it can be an object or whatever that has some type of connection or relevance to the individual or hence why they picked it that is not a crest though oftentimes the crest was identical to the primary charge on the shield huh that does sound kind of confusing well let's clear up some of these terms okay and using proper heraldic terminology that would be called the escuchan touchiness can you see why I do use you could just call this shield and everyone understands what you're saying here the symbols or markings that are presented on the shield in a classic coat of arms has often been identified as a charges that's the official term via the actual individual symbols they're called charges but they've also been referred to you as crisps as devices and lastly at sigils now out of those terms the official terms are charge and crest but crest refers to something else in the coat of arms in the Fulham Oriole achievement and so you will never actually have a crest on a shield though you will find devices okay and that's another term device and charge can often be used interchangeably which is the main symbol on a shield you often find devices that are identical to someone's crest and sometimes they're completely different and signal is an unofficial one okay I've never found it specifically referenced in any official her aldrick description okay but it's kind of evolved and it works quite well and if if people now I understand what you're saying you could use sigil now sigil then would not refer to a crest it would be referring to what is on the shield so then what is the crest the crest hence where the word comes from refers to something on top of something and so the crest of a mountain or you crested a hill okay and so in regards to heraldry it's referring to what is on top of their helmet you see remember the most most important things in a full coat of arms is what is on the shield and what is the crest so then what's on the shield and what the crest is why because those are the two things that the knight would wear now the crest is only sometimes because you would only have a crest or wear crest really came into play in regards to medieval Europe and knights and such is in the tournament scene and what they would often have thou have the use of fancy big kind of statues things on top of their helmets and that was on the crest of the helmet hence it was called the Knights crest and a practice arose in the tourneys around met in the medieval times to try and knock off the crest of an opponent's or opposing Knights helmet in reality crests are quite impractical because they add more weight to a helmet and so it'd be extremely rare that a knight would ever have a helmet with a full crest if he was going into serious battle they primarily served a function for the tournaments not actual medieval warfare in medieval warfare it was the coat of arms that you would wear that serve the function and so because of that some of the first crests were actually direct duplicates of the primary device that a knight had in his arms his armorial achievement and that's a common practice you can find many many coats of arms right in where their crests are either a copy or a duplicate of something that is on the shield in the cases where crests different that would often be to identify a certain type of achievement that an individual did to something important that gained them prominence or renowned or it could have been the very thing that awarded them right to officially have a coat of arms now in my opinion the most important thing in an individual's arms is the primary charge or device that is on the shield that is the biggest thing that is identifying you as an individual now this with that in mind you can understand why it got might have become a bit more complex later on in history because when certain families would marry it was common to combine people's arms what it is presented on the shield primarily their full device together they might split it down the middle or even or turret and then put them kind of together now an armorial achievement always identifies an individual person you will never ever have to amarilla Chipman that are identical to one another that represented two different people no they were they were there to represent individuals not families and so when you have someone who married or something and then you would add that he when developing his own coat of arms the mine things from the two families I would identify him and he would be the only one who would have this full type of combination well in those cases he will have multiple charges on his shield and there is no longer a specific individual symbol that represents him as an individual person and so when that happens that's when the crest kind of serves the original role of what that individual symbol should have been now oftentimes it will be an element or a charge that is on the shield duplicated in the crest but it's one of them with there's multiple but sometimes it can be completely different and that crest then would identify that individual person so in that regard I see more of a purpose in their need of a crest in afula Morial achievement but when you have a primary you know device charge on the shield that is not combined with anything else such as a single one there is actually no real need for a crest in your own armorial achievement if you ever decide to make one so in regards to my coat of arms there's actually less need for a crest in it then if I had multiple charges on the shield if I did well then yes having a crest to identify what is my primary kind of device that I want to represent me that's when a crest will be more appropriate and of course if I was a knight in medieval times you know going into tourneys and justing about things like that and I wanted a crest on my helm or to have a preston helm well then I would use my primary symbol that identifies me which is my main device which is on my shield and then my crest would then become by default the same as what is on my shield because that is what I'm using on my helm and if that was the case this is what my crest would look like it would be a Reidy representation of my primary device because that's what it would look like on my helmet but even though I have less need for a crest I still have picked one that is different to my primary device and that is a book but you also notice i duplicate themes that are on my shield on the books cover which again is a common practice you will find many historical coats of arms in which their crests have either the same design as the primary device on the shield or is at least duplicating or has some elements of that primary device in the elements of the crest sorry how did one get an armorial achievement or that very they're between country to country in some countries all it's more difficult in some countries it was far more easy and in those countries where is easier you didn't have to be of noble blood if you performed a special or a significant act for society or had a unique achievement you could a petition for a coat of arms and be given one even in like the 1400s but in other countries you had to be of noble Baths to get one now I've mentioned before that an armorial achievement represents an individual person look I'm going to explain that because this is something that is often misunderstood in regards to the subject of coats of arms and that is the thought of but this is my family crest or it's a family coat of arms and this passed down first of all a coat of arms represents an individual person period okay they never represented whole families they couldn't be passed on to a descendant but not the whole all of the person's children it would only be the firstborn male who could inherit a coat of arms and even in those cases if say I inherited my father's coat of arms I would have to change something on it to identify that it is me who has this coat of arms and not my father but because a coat of arms did become hereditary in that sense that's kind of where the concept of this is my family arms or my family coat of arms comes from what I do need to say here is that it was common for certain families to adopt a specific type of charge or device that was then used throughout really any member of their family who could have a coat of arms and whether they were male or female to identify that yes I am part of his family but the whole armorial achievement wouldn't be the same they would just have a specific device within their shield that was the same that identified their family and that could be anything from an apple to an object like a goblet or an arrow or a sword or it could be a lion or indeed three lions on top of one another and that's one you will see very often repeated in the British Royal line and because these devices were also often used as the crest of these individual coats of arms the term family crest kind of appears now it's not referring to a family coat of arms at every individual family member had a right to but it was referring to a device that was used by most family members to identify membership of a family line and so you could have devices that were the same as devices that other people had within their own armorial achievement crests seems to have been more regulated but the main rule was that the whole coat of arms had to be different or distinct in some way from anyone else's so say your family device was a lion and you as a member of that family were expected to use a line as your primary device or at least a smaller device or charge on the shield to do that there would have to be something different on your shield as a result a different field that the device sat upon different color maybe a stripe or a line of color through the field that was different to someone else's maybe your lion would have a crown or a helmet atop its head it could be holding an object such as a sword or a goblet or anything like that just something different that made it distinct the thing is officially even if you find an ancestor that had an official coat of arms you have no right to claim it and say this is therefore yours because you're their descendant that isn't how works unofficially there's nothing wrong for you saying well this you know as my ancestors I would like to use it represent myself you would have no official right or legal right to do so but there's really no harm in it okay if you wanted something more official that identified who you were well then you would need to make your own if you do decide to make one it wouldn't be official unless you're a member of the British realm and I'm Australian so I actually could if I wanted to I just need ten thousand Australian dollars to register it my goodness if you're not a member of the British realm well getting an official coat of arms you can't have it be included in you know the full standing official coat of arms that still exists today and I used for individual people though there is a very close modern comparison or equivalent to medieval coat of arms and that is trademarks trademarks essentially fulfill the exact same purpose and so if you're not a member of the British realm and you want an official coat of arms to be regarded officially in society you can make one up and then trade market it would cost you a bit of money all right and if you don't use it in any official you know things that they usually will expire or be withdrawn but what that really means if someone else wanted to use the exact same trademark and you haven't been using it they can then try and file for their own trademark and that kind of take away yours and then you'll need to renew it every 10 years that's for Australia don't know what it's like for you but that is the modern equivalent to essentially what the medieval coat of arms are kind of like but again finding an ancestor who had an official coat of arms does not mean that is your family's coat of arms at all completely not the cakes and so those websites that t-shirts type in your family name here and we will show you your family crest or at which and well if you ever say will show you your family crest in referring to a whole coat of arms that's a clear sign that this website is absolute bullcrap because it's an incorrect term they don't even know what they're talking about there and then if they try and present you a full coat of arms saying this is your family you know armorial achievement no it's not if you are a direct line descendant okay and there was no one else who had a more direct descendent wine than you you could actually petition to try and inherit it's very rare good luck at finding you know proving that as well my goodness yeah it's rare but it could be done and if there's a case if you're a direct line descendant you could petition to inherit it and dependent on how strict the country years we're observe all because there are some countries that just don't even care use it for whatever you want it's not official anymore but for say in the British realm from what I've read you would still have to change at least one thing on it to identify it as you being the one using this coat of arms then your ancestor personally I like the feel of just making a brand new one that identifies you as an individual who you are I had such fun designing my own armorial achievement because I went deep into heavy symbolism and this thing really represents and tells a story of Who I am and what I value in life and if you are interested in the symbolisms behind my own personal coat of arms and again it's not official but I can still say this is my coat of arms that I made to represent me okay and because I've published it on the evening and I also have copyright over it but anyway if you want to know the symbolism behind it I will be making a video on it and you can watch at your leisure and I hope you will enjoy it so I've talked about the main symbol or device that is on the shield and that can be more than one depending on the individual I generally like I want you know a singular primary device on the shield to identify an individual person that those are close are my favorite designs now on top of this device we're sorry not on top real actually say behind the device is the field okay now the field can be a single color or it can have divisions be put into multiple colors now these divisions can serve purposes sometimes that is if you have multiple devices in the shield generally then the shield will be divided to create a space for each individual charge or device that's on it other than that having divisions on the field can just be up for aesthetic purposes to dress it up make it look a bit nicer but because the colors have individual meanings in terms of heraldry and officially the colors are called teachers okay using old language but each individual color does have a an official meaning in Rory and so if you wanted to convey a meaning through colors you would then have certain divisions on your own on the field of your shield and that's exactly what I have done for the field on my own shield in my own coat of arms as well what you need to understand though is that in many cases in the past the primary device was actually a division of colors in and of itself and that would be someone's primary charge identifying symbol for themselves in their coat of arms and you probably see many as well like for instance having a four-way quartered shield with two colors opposing one another or having a cut you know split down the middle of two different colors aligned above the top or a cross or there's any number of Chevron okay there's any number of shield divisions now these divisions can serve like I said as I a full device okay representing an individual person or they could be for the background that field having a symbol in front of it you might have noticed that I haven't talked about the other elements in the coat of arms yet such as their mantling which is the drapery that kind of sits behind it also the helmet there's the shield supporters the motto all these other things the reason why I haven't focused on them yet is because they're far less important indeed you could have a full-fledged coat of arms like absolutely official that is just the shield and the primary device and field that's everything is in the shield and that's it you don't need anything else that can be your coat of arms because that is the primary thing that a knight would have worn on his surcoat or on his shield Horta bard everything else is an embellishment and is not required to fulfill the function that a coat of arms as meant to serve now of course these embellishments Ally can serve functions in certain eye symbolic things identifying this or that also presenting the prestige and wealth of the individual but the primary purpose of a coat of arms can be achieved just by the shield and in fact that is the central most important part of it with a sub kind of you know category of the crest if a crest is more needed and I've talked about the circumstances where it would be now having said that there are some you know embellishments that I find to be more significant than others for instance the motto now the motto can either be underneath the shield or it can be above the shield it varies but I really like that element I like you know having because it says something about the individual and this is all the purpose of what a coat of arms is and so I'm motto therefore in my opinion adds a really important and significant element to it so I love it so I think you know you should always try and have a motto with your coat of arms they're not next let's look at the helmet because the helmet does serve a purpose in identifying the status of the person whom this coat of arms belongs to and so if the helmet is open-faced so it has an opening and has bars over the top that generally is reserved for people of significant social standings particularly royalty and then extension to that people who own lands and other things like that a closed face helm represent someone who has not a higher up Noble just like a landless a knight or something like that and so because I am not an official Noble I of course have a closed faced tilting helmet that it was used in you know the jousting tournaments in my own coat of arms but the helmet is not at all necessary especially if you're not royalty or a significant higher up noble you don't need a helmet because that was really there for to identify your your status your position and so if you just don't have one and also identifies you as not someone who's higher up in the noble hierarchy and so my own coat of arms achieves the exact same thing without the helmet as with I have the helmet on it just mainly because of tradition if I want if I want the full a memorial achievement and to show the classic what is a coat of arms on someone thinks coat of arms I have it in there just so if I wanted the full blown shebang this is my armorial achievement and the supporters are even more of an embellishment because they don't represent rank or position or anything like that they're mainly there for like I said for embellishment but also in the extension that sometimes they're there to represent the country to which the person comes from and so it might be a native animal or something like that and of course you notice that in the Australian coat of arms but it has an emu and a kangaroo but again they're not necessary and they're primarily an embellishment but they still that I can see why they were added because they everything helps frame that shield to present it as a very prominent important thing so it just looks awesome I can see why people adage supporters to a coat of arms again makes it look cool this is the same with the mantling as well and most of the other embellishments okay there just to make the coat of arms look better and to kind of present and frame the most important part which is the shield itself but I should really rephrase that and say the things that are on this shield because it didn't always have to be assured especially if you're a woman a shield is more of a masculine thing and so men would have shields but a woman they she they would generally have like an oval or a diamond but it's not a perfectly symmetrical diamond like it's a square that's being turtle that's a thinner diamond on the sides now as complex as all this might have appeared to be it's really scratching the surface there is a lot of sophistication and details that go right into it like the exact type of colors and again they're called tinctures so the exact type of tincture that's on the shield what does it means if there's more than one helmet or more ND it sometimes even more than one crest what about when there is multiple different coats of arms within the main shield itself to represent you know marriage and unity from past people and other things like that because there are some crazy one that you add a huge amount of you know devices full devices previous coats of arms combined together and then there are the specific rules about what is allowed and what isn't in some cases and this did depend on countries certain colors weren't allowed to be combined together and that can vary on in which ways they're use like for instance the mantling i've heard in some cases you could only have a color that represents a metal and a regular color combined together but you couldn't have two normal colors and my coat of arms i have two normal colors red and blue in the mantling and so there might be I think there is a circumstance where that would not be allowed then there is regulations on the type of charges that can be used for instance the eagle is generally a more regular dated symbol on coats-of-arms because it's a specifically a symbol of sovereignty and there's more so as complex as this might have appeared to have been it's the basics that I've shared with you but it's awesome because even the basics have this a beautiful level of sophistication behind it thank you for watching I do hope you have enjoyed and you might also like my video where I explain the symbolisms behind my own personal code of arms until then farewell if you would like to support shadow versity or express appreciation for a video that you particularly enjoyed please become a patron through patreon your one dollar donation would be absolutely wonderful

Channel: Shadiversity

Views: 273,729

Rating: 4.9133554 out of 5

Keywords: coat of arms, armorial, heraldic, heraldry, coat, arms, arm, shield, device, crest, family, sigil, charge, escutcheon, tinctures, medieval, knight, knightly, knight's, noble, royal, supporters, moto, shad, shadmbrooks, symbolism, symbol

Id: aiJCqjvVpec

Length: 29min 28sec (1768 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 17 2016