Tuesday, October 7, 2008

How to Create a Coat of Arms: Part 1

Creating coats of arms for my friends is a hobby of mine. Did you know that you can create your own even if you don't know anything about your family history? In fact, in the early medieval period, a coat of arms was unique to an individual. The symbols did not become associated with family lines until the late Renaissance.

Even after a coat of arms had become hereditary, it was common to have a son add something to his coat of arms so that it would not be identical to his father's. Often a son would add a "mark of cadence," which is a particular emblem to note his birth order. But he could also add any marks of office he may have achieved, or special awards he might have been granted. It was not unheard of to completely change your coat of arms. For example, King Richard I changed his from two lions combatant to three gold leopards.

Creating a coat of arms can become a complicated thing depending on how detailed and how deep you want to go. There are some rules to follow, but there's also a lot of freedom. I plan to break the process down into several steps. Hopefully that will help make everything more understandable, and it will also give you time to work on each step as I present it.

Step 1: Choose Your Symbols

In choosing symbols ("charges") for your own coat of arms, you can take several factors into consideration. You might play off your family name, especially if you know the meaning of it. In my case this was easy, with a married name of Lyons. I could have chosen any number of lion poses or colors, but I chose to go with a historical version of the coat of arms for the Irish Lyons name (shown at right). The red emblem in the center is called a label, and it's the mark of cadence for a firstborn. I added this myself, since my husband is the firstborn of his family.

I had also been given a copy of the coat of arms for my maiden name, Nicodemus (shown at left). I could have gone with the meaning of the name, which is "leader of the people." I could have chosen some symbol to represent that. However, I decided to utilize the historical version, together with the historical Lyons version, for a combined image (shown at top). The lion sitting above the helmet (in the image at top) is the "crest" part of a coat of arms. I chose this because it's an actual part of the historic Irish Lyons coat of arms. One change I made to this crest was to put a cross in the lion's paw instead of a fleur-de-lis.

There are several websites that will show you the symbols in the coat of arms connected with your family name. Not all family names are available, but it's worth looking into. Here are a couple of the best sites that I have found:

Other options you can use, besides your family name, are to choose a symbol that tells something about your profession or something about your character. Here your choices are nearly limitless. A good website with an extensive list of symbols and their meanings can be found here:

There are limitations and rules as to what colors you can use. I will present those rules in my next post.

I welcome any questions you might have, and I would be happy to assist you in finding the historical coat of arms for your family name (at no charge). I have a fairly extensive database that might have more options than what you'll find at any of the sites above. Simply contact me by way of a comment to this blog entry. Along with your last name, give me its nationality, and I'll see what I can do.

19 comments:

  1. My husband's name is Ley, but you won't be able to find it because that's not the original family name. No one knows what it is or what the origin is because his great-grandfather changed his name when he came to the US and never told anyone, not even his wife, who he really was or where he came from. My maiden name is Whinery, which we know is Welsh in origin and means roughly "found in the hay field". My dad's grandfather was found abandoned in a Welsh farm couple's hay field as an infant and they raised him. He came to the US and married an American Indian, one of the Bedias tribe in East Texas. My mother's maiden name is Bourne and her family line goes back 33 generations in a straight line to William the COnqueror. We have all the documentation. So, what can you do with that?

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  2. Wow, Robi! I'll do some research and PM you.

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  3. OK, Robi, here we go.

    Let’s start with your ancestry, since it’s not nebulous like your husband’s. The history of being found in a hayfield is wonderful! Here’s where your coat of arms actually tells a bit of history and becomes a great conversation piece. I would definitely put a sheaf of hay somewhere in there.

    While American Indian symbols were probably nonexistant in European coats of arms, since we’re creating one specifically for you, you could choose to add it. The Bedias Indians were found along the Bedias Creek and other rivers, so you could put in a symbol for a river (often a wavy diagonal bar).

    On your mother’s side, I would definitely put the William the Conqueror link in there. Again, it tells history and sparks conversations.

    As you know, I combined my arms with my husband’s. That’s called marshalling. Technically, marshalling arms was only done by nobility. Some organizations like the SCA do not allow marshalling of arms for they consider all their members to be of the “gentile” class, not nobles. However, I’m not a member of the SCA, and I just do this for fun, thus I went ahead and marshalled my arms!

    All of that to say that I would go ahead and add your mother’s line in there. I just wanted to let you know that we’re stepping a bit out of the box here. (But we already did that with the inclusion of American Indians, didn’t we?) The only problem is that there are no records of William the Conqueror ever having a coat of arms. Here’s some info I found on one site:
    http://www.2020site.org/heraldry/family-crest-coat-of-arms.html

    "In England many legends survive of arms borne by William the Conqueror and his companions. But nothing is more certain than that neither armorial banners nor shields of arms were borne on either side at Hastings. The famous record of the Bayeux tapestry shows shields which in some cases suggest rudely devised armorial bearings, but in no case can a shield be identified as one which is recognized in the generations after the Conquest. So far is the idea of personal arms from the artist, that the same warrior, seen in different parts of the tapestry’s history, has his shield with differing devices."

    You might consider creating a symbol that, to you, will represent William the Conqueror. What do we know about him? Well, he was the Duke of Normandy and later King of England. He conquered England during the Battle of Hastings. During that battle, he had to remove his helmet in order to prove to his followers that he was still alive. (Point in fact: This particular episode of William removing his helmet in order to identify himself is one explanation of why knights began to adopt coats of arms.)

    I’ve brainstormed some ideas for representing William:
    --A knight’s head with a helmet pushed back (I have a good visual for this in my head, but I haven’t seen anything like it. I could probably create it, though.)
    --An image of William taken from the Bayeux Tapestry
    --A later emblem used by any of William’s descendents. If you have the records of descendency, you might be able to give me some names that I can research.
    --An emblem, such as a crown, used for the king of England. This would have been developed later, so it wouldn’t really be period.
    --A coronet used for a duke of France. The same goes for this as for the king of England. It’s probably not period. The SCA doesn’t allow anyone to use any symbols of royalty, but do we care about that? :-) It could make a really nice crest to put on top of the coat of arms.

    Now for your father. Since nothing is known of his heritage, you could go with a definition of the word “Ley”:
    --a field or pasture for grazing animals
    --an alignment of ancient sites or holy places, such as stone circles, standing stones, cairns, etc.


    Let me know what particular emblems you’d like to make use of, and I’ll dig up some images and come up with some ideas for arranging them. FYI: I’m going on vacation until the 20th, so I won’t have access to my desktop computer (which has all my heraldry art files), so I won’t be able to create samples until after I get back.

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  4. Hello Mrs. Lyons. My last name is Castillo-Castillo. Yeah, I know it's a bit weird. Hopefully I can explain or at least try. So, in Mexico it's tradition to take one of the two of your parents' last names and combine them. In my case my mother only took one name from both her parents' which was Castillo , and my father took his father's last name of Castillo and one his mother's last names of Perez. So, my father is Castillo-Perez. I took my father's last name of Castillo, and the only name my mother took. If this confuses you as much as it does me let me know, haha.
    I've done some research, but I don't know how to incorporate all of what I've found into the coat of arms. I'm the first born of four kids. Although, I was born in Mexico my mother's line is almost pure Spanish. I know my name is Spanish meaning Castle. The name comes from the Kingdom of Castile in Spain. I also have to incorporate a phoenix into the arms because my mother's family line is tied to St. Ignatius of Loyola. Some of my mother's ancestors were part of an order having something to do with Christ we haven't found the name of it. All we know is that a phoenix was part of their emblem. My father's side has some Spanish too, however all we know of his ancestry is that it goes back to Queen Isabella. I'm hopeful that you could help me out. Thanks for your time.

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  5. HELLO, MY NAME IS MICHAEL. OK SO THIS IS ALL I KNOW. FROM MY FATHERS SIDE OF THE FAMILY GOING BACK TO ENGLAND I BELIEVE. MY LAST NAME IS TANKSLEY, FROM "TANKERSLEY" MY GRANDFATHER'S FATHER CHANGED IT REASON UNKNOWEN. ON MY MOTHERS SIDE,"KASTANOVITCH," POSSIBLY SPELLED "KUSTANOVITCH," MY GREAT GRANDMA, "CHATINOVER" ON MY MOTHERS SIDE IS JEWISH AND ALL HER FAMILY WAS JEWISH. OTHER NAMES ON MY MOTHERS SIDE BEFORE BEING NATURALIZED INTO THE US WERE "MOGILOVKIN" "GERLOVIN" AND "ZELLMAN" ALL WERE FROM RUSSIA. DONT KNOW IF YO CAN DO ANYTHING WITH THE LITTLE THAT I KNOW...I ONLY HAVE NAMES BUT I CAN GIVE FULL NAMES, BIRTH AND DEATH DATES OF ALL THE NAMES LISTED ABOVE. ANY INFO YOU HAVE WILL BE APPRECIATED. I AM ESPECIALLY INTRESTED IN MY FAMILY TREE PRIOR TO,"TANKERSLEY AND KASTANOVITCH" THANKS!

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  6. J. Castillo--I'm sorry I haven't been able to get back to you. You didn't leave me an email address, so I couldn't contact you directly. If you happen to visit this page again and would like me to respond to you, send me your contact info.

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  7. Michael:

    Wow, you have a very interesting background. I wouldn't be able to help with your family tree at all. If you're seriously interested, I suggest Ancestry.com.

    As far as your family crest is concerned, I'll look through my database and see what I can find that will match with as many of your ancestors' names as possible. I'll get back to you.

    And thanks for visiting my site!

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  8. Michael: One more thing

    Re your grandmother changing the spelling of the last name. This was a common thing in the past, and there were many different reasons for doing so. In my own family history, the spelling of Nicodemus varied greatly. This was because there were so many Nicodemuses living in the same town that it became confusing for postal delivery. Often the Nicodemuses would have the same first names as well, so you can imagine the trouble the post office had. So some families changed the spelling to Nikodemus, Nichodemus, and other variations.

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  9. Hi, sorry I didn't leave my contact info. My email is
    jcastillo89@yahoo.com. Thanks again for taking the time.

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  10. Hi I was wondering if you can e-mail and tell me about my family crest, i just got interested in this. My last Name is Gaines from england i do believe thats my dads side. on my moms side her birth name was lewis. also my maternal grandmas last name is covello. can you help me out thanks.
    kgaines1984@hotmail.com

    that is my email address thanks

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  11. Greetings, Mr. Gaines. I've done a little research on your name and found coats of arms for all three names that you gave me. I'll send you a personal email with illustrations.

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  12. Good morning.
    My name is Eric Nicholson. I am looking to design a family crest and would like to get some family history to help.
    Father's parents:
    Nicholson from England (grandfather)
    Brock from ? (assume England) (grandmother)
    Mother's parents:
    Hall from Ireland (grandfather)
    Adams from ? (possible line to John Adams) (grandmother)
    In the research I have done, which is questionable, I have great-grandfathers and/or uncles in almost every war in America, a grandfather who came over on the Mayflower, one who served on the continental congress. My grandfather Hall's oldest brother was killed in WWI and awarded the highest French medal and the second highest US medal.
    I want our crest to reflect our love and fear of God, devotion to family and county, service, honor, humility, courage.
    Thanks,
    Eric
    nicholson.eric@gmail.com

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  13. Greetings, Eric. Looks like you have a rich history to draw from. I'll pull together what info I can find and will email you soon.

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  14. Wow Lisa,
    You are one energetic lady with a gorgeous & inspirational website.
    Found your site when I goggled
    Nicodemus and Medenbach Germany

    My husband also descends from the Nicodemus family via MD and Bedford Co. PA

    We hope to be visiting Medenbach in early Nov. Wondering if you have ever been. I have been researching our family lines for years & years but this will be our first visit to villages of family origin.
    You sparked my interest in creating our own coat of arms.
    Blessings
    D'

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  15. Dear D':

    Thanks for your compliments on my site. I'm glad you found it of interest. No, I've never been to Europe at all. What fun you'll have visiting ancestral locales! Please let me know all about it. And if you want any assistance with creating a coat of arms, I'd be happy to help. I have an extensive collection of heraldry clip art and can give you a nice printable piece. You can email me at castlelyons7@yahoo.com.

    Lisa

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  16. Hi Lisa

    I want to start by saying thank you for this site and your kindness in helping people build a coat of arms.

    I am doing research on building a coat of arms. For the name Sicignano.

    I have found some stuff and on the home page of Sicignano in Italy I believe they have something. Its not impressive and I would like to create a new one. I am looking for your advice on colors, symbols and history.

    Please advise?



    Thank you,


    James


    Wikpedia
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sicignano_degli_Alburni

    Castle
    http://italiangenealogy.tardio.com/coppermine/displayimage/album=36/pos=38.html

    You Tube
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kd9xpL_ghQ

    Map
    http://www.maplandia.com/italy/campania/salerno/sicignano-degli-alburni/

    Home
    http://www.comune.sicignanodeglialburni.sa.it/

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  17. James: I'll check out those sites and get back to you. In the meantime, send me a personal email (castlelyons7@yahoo.com) so we can keep in communication about this.

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  18. I'd like to make Arms with the four creatures, similar to the Book of Kells. What's step 2 in creating a Coat of Arms?

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  19. Anonymous: The creatures from the Book of Kells would make beautiful images to use. There are two ways to find my remaining posts on creating a coat of arms. You could go to the bottom of this post and click on "Newer Post." Or you could find the Blog Archive in the righthand sidebar and go to 2008, October to find a complete listing of titles on creating a coat of arms. Good luck!

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