Author:  Anonymous

Release Date:  July 12, 2005 [eBook #16273]

Language:  English

Character set encoding:  ISO-646-us (us-ASCII)

***Start of the project gutenberg EBOOK the Manual of heraldry; fifth edition***

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| Transcriber’s Note:  The following changes have been made to     |
| inconsistent spelling in the original text:  Chap.  IV.:  ‘scarpe’ |
| for ‘scrape’; and, in the dictionary:  SEME/seme for seme/seme.  |
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THE MANUAL OF HERALDRY: 

Being a Concise Description of the Several Terms Used, and Containing a Dictionary of Every Designation in the Science

Illustrated by Four Hundred Engravings on Wood

Fifth Edition

London: 
Arthur Hall, Virtue & Co.
25, Paternoster Row. 
London: 
R. Clay, Printer, Bread Street Hill.

CHAPTER I.

Origin of coats of arms.

Heraldry is the science which teaches how to blazon or describe in proper terms armorial bearings and their accessories.

Many volumes have been written on the origin of Heraldry and even on the antiquity of separate charges contained in an escutcheon:  it would be filling the pages of an elementary work on Heraldry to little purpose to enter upon an inquiry as to the exact period of the introduction of an art that has existed in some degree in all countries whose inhabitants have emerged from barbarism to civilization.  In all ages men have made use of figures of living creatures, trees, flowers, and inanimate objects, as symbolical signs to distinguish themselves in war, or denote the bravery and courage of their chief or nation.

The allegorical designs emblazoned on the standards, shields, and armour of the Greeks and Romans—­the White Horse of the Saxons, the Raven of the Danes, and the Lion of the Normans, may all be termed heraldic devices; but according to the opinions of Camden, Spelman, and other high authorities, hereditary arms of families were first introduced at the commencement of the twelfth century.  When numerous armies engaged in the