Today, the Canadian Government of Justin Trudeau unveiled a new heraldic Canadian Crown replacing the traditional St. Edward’s Crown used on Canada’s coat of arms, police & military badges. The design replaces what the government termed “religious symbols” (crosses & fleur-de-lis) with maple leaves & a snowflake.
The Canadian Heraldic Authority was apparently consulted in this process. Reactions so far have been mixed but mostly disapproving.
It was very interesting to read in the Times that Lord Lyon King-of-Arms, the senior heraldic officer in Scotland will not only take part in King Charles’ coronation on May 6 but will do so wearing the crown that had been commissioned and obtained by the Heraldry Society of Scotland back in the early 2000s. The arches on the crown, which are removable, will be removed for the coronation so it won’t too closely resemble the crown with which the King shall be crowned.
The expensive item and the trouble that went into commissioning and fabricating it was one of the reasons that, despite the Peers not being allowed to wear their coronets at the upcoming, more modernized, ceremony Lord Lyon–and indeed the other three English Kings-of-Arms–will be wearing their crowns. The coronation of the Sovereign is one of the only occasions on which these crowns are traditionally worn.
On February 21, HM King Charles III granted new arms to Her Majesty Queen Camilla. This is the first grant of arms made by the King and they replace the arms previously granted buy the late Queen Elizabeth on July 14, 2005. The arms granted are:
“Within the Garter Our Royal Arms impaling the Arms of Shand surmounted by Our Crown.”
The Supporters are a Lion Guardant Or Crowned proper (dexter) and to the sinister a Boar Azure armed and unguled Or langued Gules and gorged with a Coronet composed of Crosses formy and Fleurs-de-lys attached thereto a Chain reflexed over the back and ending in a Ring all Or (sinister).
This month marks the 80th anniversary of the office of Norroy and Ulster King of Arms. The office of Ulster King of Arms was created by King Edward VI on February 2, 1552, and for its first 36 years, appears to have been regarded as attached to the College of Arms; the two Ulsters in this period, Bartholomew Butler and Nicholas Narboon, had both been English Heralds before their appointment as Ulster. After the resignation of Narboon in 1588, subsequent Ulsters acted independently from the English College. On January 30, 1908, King Edward VII appointed Captain Nevile Rodwell Wilkinson King of Arms and Principal Herald of all that part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland called Ireland, with the title of Ulster. Wilkinson exercised this office, based in Dublin Castle, through a period of great political turmoil in Ireland until his death on December 22, 1940. The political circumstances in Ireland at this time led to the decision to return the office of Ulster to the College of Arms in London, with responsibility for Northern Ireland alone, and united with the office of Norroy.
On January 29, 1931, King George V had appointed Algar Henry Stafford Howard, M.C., as King of Arms and Principal Herald of the North Part of England, with the title of Norroy. Howard still held this office on April 1, 1943, when King George VI additionally appointed him King of Arms and Principal Herald of that part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland called Northern Ireland, without prejudice to his existing appointment as Norroy and with the title of Ulster to be borne after that of Norroy. Howard held these joint offices until his promotion to Garter the next year, and on June 2, 1944, King George VI appointed Sir Gerald Woods Wollaston, K.C.B, K.C.V.O., King of Arms and Principal Herald of the North Part of England and of Northern Ireland, with the title of Norroy and Ulster, which has remained the form of the office to this day. The present Norroy and Ulster, Robert John Baptist Noel, was appointed by Queen Elizabeth II on April 6, 2021. He proclaimed the accession of His Majesty The King at Hillsborough Castle in Northern Ireland on September 10, 2022, the first time Ulster had performed such a duty in Ireland since the proclamation of King George V in Dublin on May 9, 1910.
Between 1943 and 1980, holders of the office of Norroy and Ulster used the arms of office of one of the two offices, or both arms impaled on one shield. In 1980, Queen Elizabeth II approved new arms for the joint office. These are: Quarterly Argent and Or a Cross Gules on a Chief per pale Azure and Gules a Lion passant guardant crowned between a Fleur-de-lis and a Harp Or. Norroy and Ulster King of Arms is also ex officio King of Arms, Knight Attendant, Registrar, and Keeper of the Records of the Most Illustrious Order of Saint Patrick, offices which are purely nominal since the death of the last Knight of the order.
Text taken from the College of Arms Newsletter, No. 71 April, 2023
Buckingham Palace released the royal cypher to be used by King Charles III. It employs the “Tudor” crown rather than the stylized version of the St. Edward’s Crown favored by his late mother, Elizabeth II. Her four predecessors used this Tudor style crown in their cyphers as well as on their coats of arms. This has led to the erroneous belief that there is a “Queen’s crown” and a “King’s crown” used heraldically in British royal heraldry. That is not the case. It is simply a matter of each sovereign’s personal preference.
Today, HM Queen Elizabeth II died peacefully at Balmoral. Her eldest son immediately succeeded her becoming King Charles III. His son inherits his titles as heir to the throne and will now be Duke of Cornwall and Cambridge (among several other titles). King Charles will now relinquish the coat of arms he has borne since 1958 and the royal arms which had been used by his late mother since 1952, immediately becomes his coat of arms.
May she Rest in Peace. God Save the King!
A sincere wish for health and happiness to Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II on her 95th Birthday.
1926 — April 21 — 2021
In light of the recent announcement that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex (aka Prince Harry & Meghan) will be stepping back from duties as senior royals and, consequently no longer styling themselves as “royal highness” not a few people have contacted me to ask out of curiosity if this in any way will have an impact on the coats of arms they both use.
The simple answer is, “No”.
As the grandson of the sovereign Prince Harry employs a coat of arms that indicates he was born a grandson of the sovereign. British royal heraldry is different than many other countries in that the sovereigns children and grandchildren generally bear the royal arms differenced by a variety of labels of either three or five points and the points are charged with marks of difference. That’s really rather boring if you asked me but that’s what they do and they haven’t asked me!
So, when he turned 18 Harry was granted his own arms depicting the royal arms difference by a label of five points the first, third and fifth of which are charged with a red escallop shell. The shell is a charge borrowed from the coat of arms of his late mother, Diana (neé Spencer).
His supporters were also charged with the label for difference and the arms are surmounted by a special coronet used by the children of the heir to the throne. In addition, the royal crest is also charged with the label for difference.
Upon marrying his wife Harry was created Duke of Sussex. Nothing in his coat of arms was modified to reflect this title. Consequently, there is nothing to change in his coat of arms to reflect his new status of stepping down from a senior position in the royal family. He is still a grandson of the sovereign and son of the heir to the throne; he is still the Duke of Sussex; he is still actually an “HRH” but will choose not to style himself as such.
In fact, even after his grandmother passes away and he is the son of the sovereign and, indeed, even after his father passes away and he is the brother of the sovereign the crown used on his arms will remain unchanged as the crown for the child of the heir is identical to the crown used by children of the sovereign and siblings of the sovereign.
So…no changes.
On July 1, 1969 Prince Charles was formally invested as Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester. He had been given these titles in 1958 and had, from the time of his mother’s accession to the throne been the Duke of Cornwall, the title traditionally held by the heir apparent to the British throne. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the event.
In 2017 Prince Charles surpassed the record set by his illustrious ancestor, King Edward VII, by becoming the longest-serving Prince of Wales in history.
His arms (above) appear very much like those of his mother except that his are differenced by a white label (repeated on both supporters and the badge for Wales as well); in place of the compartment there is a device intertwining his motto and his badges as well as a small shield with the arms of Cornwall; there is an inescutcheon for Wales; and the crowns on the helm, the two small shields and the lion supporter all have a single arch as befits a Princely crown rather than a royal one which has two arches.
God Bless the Prince of Wales!
Despite my speculation in a previous post the newly-created coat of arms for the Duchess of Sussex was released today!
According to the website of the Royal Family:
A Coat of Arms has been created for The Duchess of Sussex. The design of the Arms was agreed and approved by Her Majesty The Queen and Mr. Thomas Woodcock (Garter King of Arms and Senior Herald in England), who is based at the College of Arms in London.
Her Royal Highness worked closely with the College of Arms throughout the design process to create a Coat of Arms that was both personal and representative.
The blue background of the shield represents the Pacific Ocean off the California coast, while the two golden rays across the shield are symbolic of the sunshine of The Duchess’s home state. The three quills represent communication and the power of words.
Beneath the shield on the grass sits a collection of golden poppies, California’s state flower, and wintersweet, which grows at Kensington Palace.
It is customary for Supporters of the shield to be assigned to Members of the Royal Family, and for wives of Members of the Royal Family to have one of their husband’s Supporters and one relating to themselves. The Supporter relating to The Duchess of Sussex is a songbird with wings elevated as if flying and an open beak, which with the quill represents the power of communication.
A Coronet has also been assigned to The Duchess of Sussex. It is the Coronet laid down by a Royal Warrant of 1917 for the sons and daughters of the Heir Apparent. It is composed of two crosses patée, four fleurs-de-lys and two strawberry leaves.
The arms of a married woman are shown with those of her husband and the technical term is that they are impaled, meaning placed side by side in the same shield.
Mr. Thomas Woodcock, Garter King of Arms said: “The Duchess of Sussex took a great interest in the design. Good heraldic design is nearly always simple and the Arms of The Duchess of Sussex stand well beside the historic beauty of the quartered British Royal Arms. Heraldry as a means of identification has flourished in Europe for almost nine hundred years and is associated with both individual people and great corporate bodies such as Cities, Universities and for instance the Livery Companies in the City of London. ”
This past week it was announced from Buckingham Palace that HRH the Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh would be withdrawing from public engagements due to his advanced age. This led not a few of my friends, the the real kind and the Facebook kind, to write or comment on the Duke’s well-known coat of arms (below).
In addition, as seems to be the case all the time now, there ensued a discussion about how the coat of arms presently used by HRH, and used by him since 1949, was not the original design.
In 1947 the arms devised for him were these:
This coat of arms combined the coat of arms of the royal house of Greece, into which Prince Philip was born, those being Greece with an inescutcheon of the royal arms of Denmark because that family, Oldenburg-Glücksburg, was also the royal family of Greece. When the Greek monarchy was established they solicited a Danish prince to become King George I of the Hellenes rather than any Greek citizen. In addition to the Greek royal arms a small inescutcheon of the arms of Princess Alice, a granddaughter of Queen Victoria, was included in dexter chief.
This coat of arms was used by him at the time he married Princess Elizabeth of York and was created Duke of Edinburgh.
However, in 1949 the College of Arms revised the design of the Duke’s coat of arms as the earlier design was deemed too busy. They came up with the design currently in use which combines quarters for Denmark, Greece, Battenberg (because his mother, Princess Alice, was also a Battenberg, a name later changed to Mountbatten which is the family name used by Prince Philip and assumed by him when he became a naturalized British citizen and renounced any claim to his Greek and Danish titles) and the arms of the city of Edinburgh for his title.
However, just for fun, because this is how heraldists have fun, I drew up a rough little sketch and cut-and-pasted it together with a black and white drawing of the Duke’s original arms to depict something of what I might have proposed for the design of the arms of HRH in 1949 when it was decided to try and simplify the achievement.
Here I have combined quarters for Denmark (1) and Greece (4) reflecting that he was born a Prince of Greece with Danish ancestry. There is also a quarter (2) depicting what is usually on the smallest inescutcheon of the Danish royal arms, namely, the dynastic arms of Oldenburg-Glücksburg, the cadet branch of Oldenburg which succeeded to the Danish throne and the paternal family of Prince Philip. I have included a quarter for Battenberg for his maternal family. Finally, the allusion to his title of Edinburgh is placed on an inescutcheon overall. It’s not as simple as the Duke’s current arms but it is still a simplification over the arms he originally bore and it displays connections to the countries of his origin as well as the family arms of both sides of his family while including a mention of his title. It was just a bit of fun.
Best Wishes to Queen Margrethe II of Denmark on the 45th anniversary of her accession 1972 – 2017.
With the death of King Bhumibol of Thailand, who was the world’s longest reigning monarch at the time of his death, the country enters into a period of mourning under a regent until the accession of Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn. According to Thai law Prem Tinsulanonda, President of the Privy Council, assumes the regency until the accession of the new king.
While the former Kingdom of Siam made use of an emblem a bit more similar to the western idea of a coat of arms the current royal emblem or “arms”, which appears on the yellow royal standard, is the Buddhist Garuda.
Appearing in the Hindu epic, the Ramayana, Garuda is the mystical firebird who serves as the mount of the god Vishnu. Garuda appears as the coat of arms of the Republic of Indonesia as well as the royal emblem of the Kingdom of Thailand.
Again, a continuation of this examination of different versions, as opposed to merely different renderings of the exact same version, of the coat of arms of one armiger used at various times, for certain occasions, for a specific place or group or to either add to or subtract from the elaboration of the display. We turn once again to the glorious Imperial arms of the Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary, later to be the Austro-Hungarian Emperor.
First we have the “small” arms of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine (displaying the arms of Habsburg, Babenberg and Lorraine impaled together on the shield.
The second image shows the “medium” common coat of arms of Austria Hungary with the shields of (counterclockwise): Hungary, Galicia, Lower Austria, Salzburg, Styria, Tyrol, Carinthia & Carniola, Silesia & Moravia, Transylvania, Illyria and Bohemia. This was used from 1867-1915.
Third, we see the “small” arms of Hungary.
Fourth is the “medium” coat of arms of Hungary also displaying: Croatia, Slavonia, Dalmatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Transylvania, the city of Rijeka and the Kingdom of Hungary on the inescutcheon.
Next, the fifth example is the “medium” coat of arms of Austria.
The sixth is the small common coat of arms of the dual monarchy from 1915-1918.
Finally, the seventh is the “medium” common arms used 1915-1918.
One Emperor: lots of versions of his coat of arms all of which are his.
Another in this kind of series I’m doing on single armigers with various versions of their coats of arms. This time it is Elizabeth II, well, really the British Sovereign regardless of who it is. The first is a “small” version. You can see this one carved in stone on the facade of Buckingham Palace but it shows up most frequently on Letters Patent for a grant of arms.
The second is a kind of “middle version” and it is versions like this frequently used by the government on documents and signage.
The third is, of course, the “large” or full armorial achievement.
Next is the Royal arms as used in Scotland (same sovereign but a different version of the arms).
Fifth is the Royal arms OF Scotland as opposed to the Royal arms of the U.K. as used IN Scotland.
Finally, one used by the sovereign for the Duchy of Lancaster. (By the way even though the Queen is a woman she is still the “Duke” of Lancaster).
Best wishes for a happy 31st birthday to Prince Henry of Wales.
Best wishes to HM King Tupou VI who has been king of Tonga since 2012 and is finally being crowned on July 4, 2015.
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
Fr. Guy Selvester's blog of Ecclesiastical Heraldry
EXARANDORUM 