Coats of Arms

Titonus

Yo. So, I had thought about this before, and, since I've never seen anyone else talk about it ever in life, I figure it's something that's on everyones minds! Anyways, I'm still learning the terms and usages and all that good shit, so bear with me, cause some of this might be wrong(and if it is, tell me. Like I said, I'm learning!) Anyways, here's a quick rendition of what I think the Maldaathi House Arms look like.

 the House arms of the Maldaathi: Per bend sinister Sanguine and Sable, a pair of swords in saltire Argent and a falcon displayed in chief Argent.

Per bend sinister: backwards diagonal split in the field

Sanguine and Sable: The colors of the field, listed in order of appearance

a pair of swords in saltire Argent: two swords - crossed - white

falcon displayed in chief Argent: picture of a falcon-upper quarter to a third of the field-white

Let me know what's up!

Titonus

Interesting little thing I learned while looking this stuff up, swords up means fighting, swords down means peace/not fighting. I thought that was pretty cool.

Adet

I like the idea of seeing what the coats of arms are graphically.  It may help you to know that you can do HERALDRYWHO MODERN to see the CoA displayed in modern language, too.

Eld

Nice idea. I think @Karai or @Ruth might have had one of the Lotus arms at some point.

That combination of a bend and a chief is a bit wierd. I wonder if it would be normal to do it as you've drawn it, with the chief just covering the top part of a normally-drawn bend, or to have the bend just divide that part of the field not covered by the chief. I couldn't find any examples. The designation of the falcon is also ambiguous, as only one tincture is provided, and it's not clear whether it's supposed to be the tincture of the chief (in which case, what color should the falcon be?) or of the falcon (in which case what color the chief?). I wonder if the designer was picturing the full field divided diagonally between red and black, with the top not colored separately, and then crossed swords with a falcon above them, all in white.

Also, sable is black.

In any case, nice work, good thread, looking forward to seeing more.

Titonus

See, I thought the same thing in regards to the chief and falcon. I couldn't find an affirmitive answer when I was doing this, so I just went with what I thought might be right. Also, where did you find that Sable was black? I googled that shit, and it gave me everything from a pale blue, to that color I have up there, which seemed most correct in consideration with the rest of the arms.

Eld

Well, to be honest, I was following wikipedia, but I've never found a reference for sable being anything but black; the first few google hits I got when searching for "heraldic tincture" agree. I guess HELP HERALDRY doesn't specify the available tinctures or what they look like, just says ask an herald, but perhaps someone who does heraldry in game can confirm the usage.

Shirszae

I am pretty sure sable means black. No, I am not herald, however

Anaidiana

Sable is black. Hit me up IG for a crash course in heraldry. 

Nellaundra

Very choppily done, but this was made when I was creating Nell's CoA!  I probably have a few details wrong though.

Berenene

I tried doing mine ages ago, but I couldn't find a staff.  Does anyone know or have one?

Karai

Eld said:

Nice idea. I think @Karai or @Ruth might have had one of the Lotus arms at some point.

Lotuses need to be simpler for a CoA so along with that, I might make it less as well. I just wasn't sure if the lotuses were in a triangle or along the diagonal. Looked better this way.

Kresslack

This is a good idea. I'm working on me own...just a small interreuption due to defiling. >.>

Ginmund

A charge being 'in chief' just means it is in the top half of the shield. So, a 'falcon in chief argent' is an argent (white) falcon on the top half of the shield, not a falcon on an argent (white) chief.

Medieval studies minor in college, heraldry geek here.

Kresslack

Here's what I came up with, best as my limited understanding in heraldry is. I did of course add some other details:

Katzchen

http://penguincoder.com/blazons/

Rakon's site has mock ups of the ones he's done.

Kresslack

Anarwaen, wtf? You paid all that for a border? <.<

Katzchen

Kresslack said:

Anarwaen, wtf? You paid all that for a border? <.<

I actually really like that one. I'd try to do a better representation of Katz's COA, but I don't have anything better than paint on my computer right now.

Ruth

Rakon used to have mine, is vanished now.

Kyleath

I figured I'd stop lurking for once to actually post. I really like this idea! Your picture looks great. A couple people have already mentioned the whole Sable thing and Ginmund is spot on about the Chief part. Also, a very minor note: the falcon being displayed means it has its wings spread out.  I put your drawing into the Achaea heraldry proposal system and got this: "Per bend sinister Sanguine and Sable, on a chief Argent, a falcon displayed of the second and a pair of swords in saltire of the third." Looks like the key difference is "on a chief" instead of "in chief."

I tried to take yours and fix it, but I'm pretty terrible at image editing. You can probably make it look a whole lot better. I also made the Argent gray (supposed to be silver) to make it more visible.



This old Wardens web site has some images and visual examples of all the different terms. I hope more people make pictures of Arms!

Edit: What I meant is I put in your interpretation including an Ordinary (the Chief) into the system and that's what it came out as.

Eld

Kyleath said:

I figured I'd stop lurking for once to actually post. I really like this idea! Your picture looks great. A couple people have already mentioned the whole Sable thing and Ginmund is spot on about the Chief part. Also, a very minor note: the falcon being displayed means it has its wings spread out.  I put your drawing into the Achaea heraldry proposal system and got this: "Per bend sinister Sanguine and Sable, on a chief Argent, a falcon displayed of the second and a pair of swords in saltire of the third." Looks like the key difference is "on a chief" instead of "in chief."

I tried to take yours and fix it, but I'm pretty terrible at image editing. You can probably make it look a whole lot better. I also made the Argent gray (supposed to be silver) to make it more visible.



This old Wardens web site has some images and visual examples of all the different terms. I hope more people make pictures of Arms!

Edit: What I meant is I put in your interpretation including an Ordinary (the Chief) into the system and that's what it came out as.

That looks more like how I'd interpret it. I disagree with recoloring the swords, though. While the word argent refers to the metal silver, it's generally rendered as white in heraldry, as far as I know.

Eld

Karai said:

Eld said:

Nice idea. I think @Karai or @Ruth might have had one of the Lotus arms at some point.

Lotuses need to be simpler for a CoA so along with that, I might make it less as well. I just wasn't sure if the lotuses were in a triangle or along the diagonal. Looked better this way.

Along the diagonal is right for the lotuses (they're on the bend). I generally picture them as a stylised top-down view of the flower. At the least, they should be small enough to fit within the main section of the bend. Trying to remember, since I'm not somewhere I can log in to look at the moment, it's something like "Sable, on a bend cotised argent, three lotuses of the first", right?

Titonus

Berenene said:

I tried doing mine ages ago, but I couldn't find a staff.  Does anyone know or have one?

A staff for what?

Also, thank you everyone for your input!

Karai

Yessum, Eld. Got it right.
Hard to find vectors of a top-down view of a lotus. I guess it shouldn't be difficult to make.

Sena

I've never seen a lotus in heraldry depicted as anything but a side view.

Xli

Eld said:

Along the diagonal is right for the lotuses (they're on the bend). I generally picture them as a stylised top-down view of the flower. 

You may be thinking of a rose, usually depicted top down

Eld

Sena said:

I've never seen a lotus in heraldry depicted as anything but a side view.

Yeah, seems I was misremembering from the last time I searched for them.

Valden

I'm trying to make a decent image of the seal of Mhaldor, it's not quite a standard coat of arms but I want something slightly more than a simple rod escarbuncle in a circle.

Amunet

I am not an SCA participant at all, but a friend who is sent me this link when I was bitching about a lack of good visual references for heraldry. Obviously, the rules for SCA and Achaean heraldry differ in a few places, but the images will help you get a better idea of what you are looking at.

I also found this link interesting - there aren't any hard-and-fast rules for symbology in heraldry, but if you are into the idea of adding a bit more depth to your coats of arms, take a look.

What are you guys using to generate these images? I've never found a heraldry program that was any good, and my Wacom tablet has been broken for ages, so I can't draw anything.

Eld

Valden said:

I'm trying to make a decent image of the seal of Mhaldor, it's not quite a standard coat of arms but I want something slightly more than a simple rod escarbuncle in a circle.

Kresslack

@Amunet, I myself was using Adobe Illustrator. I was thinking about doing up a variety of templates and then if people wanted to tell me what charges and colour schemes they want, I can create them. If anyone's interested, just message me here.I'll post some examples later tonight.

Kresslack

As per request by @Nellaundra:

edit: Hmmm..I haven't used Adobe Illustrator in years. I'll have to look into how to get rid of that white fringe.