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Heraldry evolved in
12th-century Western Europe, probably in response to the growing
difficulty of recognising men in armour as that armour became heavier
and more enveloping. At Hastings, when a rumour spread among the Normans
that WILLIAM I (THE CONQUEROR) had been killed, he had only to tilt his
helmet back as he rode among them for all to see that he was alive. Two
hundred years later such a feat would have required considerable
exertion and the help of a squire. Men in armour could by now only
distinguish one another by devices on their shields or on the surcoats
worn over their armour. Noblemen's devices were used by their followers
as badges on their own shields and coats, and in the feudal army men
were accustomed to muster under the banner of their lord, which was
marked with his coat of arms. Crests, which were also distinguishing
marks, came later.
Heraldic devices became hereditary as first the son then the more remote
descendants of the original feudal lord retained the original device so
as to guide their followers in battle. The devices outlived the use of
armour, however, and by the 17th century were being widely used in
non-military ways. By now the granting and use of coats of arms in
England had come under the supervision of a body of heralds called the
College of Arms, which had been set up under royal authority in 1483. In
Scotland the Lord Lyon, supervised the use of arms.
It is probable that arms were not originally granted by anyone but were
assumed by various persons as and when they pleased. Thus from time to
time two or more people might be using the same device. In the
Scrope-Grosvenor case in the late 14th century, when Lord Scrope (see
BLG 1965) challenged the right of Sir Robert Grosvenor (see WESTMINSTER,
D) to use the same coat of arms that he did himself, the duplication was
accidental. Indeed there was a third person mentioned as using those
arms, a Cornish knight called Carminow.
This celebrated case was only finally settled by the King, RICHARD II,
who found for Scrope. By now the Crown was assuming jurisdiction over
the use of arms. A century later this had become firmly established, and
since then it has been heraldic law that arms can only be borne in
accordance with the rules drawn up by the heralds under royal authority;
unfortunately, the forum for prosecuting illicit assumptions of arms in
England, the Court of Chivalry, is obsolescent, despite a brief revival
in the early 1950s. In Scotland the Court of the Lord Lyon has more
teeth and still enforces laws against the irregular or illicit
assumption of arms. |
