Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 147

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 147

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/147

This is one of the Academy's earliest reports. We are not confident that these early reports are accurate. Please use it with caution.

Greetings,

Here's the information we have on your arms.

Since your persona is a middle-class English townswoman from the 14th century, we looked for records of heraldry from these groups. Our comments are based on "A Dictionary of Heraldry" by Foster, which contains 14th- and 15th-century medieval arms, and a section of "Heraldry: Symbols, Sources, and Meaning" by Neubecker which discusses the arms of medieval artisans and merchants.

Heraldry in your period generally used, at most, no more than one type of charge and one ordinary. One of the components of your arms could be used as the basis for your design--"Sable, a hammer argent" or "Argent, in chief three escallops gules" would both be excellent examples of 14th- century arms.

Medieval arms were rarely designed to tell the life story of the owner. They did sometimes convey some information about the owner, perhaps by including a tool of her trade, but that was about as far as it went. Our research showed that merchants were especially likely the tools of their trade in their arms, so that might be a good idea for you to pursue. However, you may want to consider choosing a tool of your persona's trade, rather than your modern profession. That would tie your arms more closely to your persona and thereby contribute to your re-creations.

All of the charges you've picked were used in the 14th century, and could be used in your arms. We would suggest that you look for arms based on your persona, not on your mundane life history. Although there's nothing wrong with using escallops or hammers, medieval people didn't associate hammers with paleontology.

We didn't find any examples of a "passion cross" from the 14th century, but there are many examples of other forms of crosses.

Scallops are also common charges. In period, scallops were a symbol used by pilgrims, especially pilgrims to Compostela in northwest Spain. As such the scallop often has a religious connotation.

Hammers are also found in period heraldry, and could be used as charges.

We would suggest some of the following designs. Of course there are many more that you could use, but these can be a starting point:

Argent, in chief three escallops gules.

Argent, a cross fleury between four escallops gules.

Vert, three crosses fleury Or.

Quarterly sable and Or, four hammers counterchanged.

We've checked all of these for conflict and found none.

There are plenty of ways to develop a name. For English, the best name book is "The Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names" by Withycombe, which can be found in many libraries. It includes variant forms for most common English names and dates all forms from primary sources. It also includes modern names, but it dates all the names. If you find a name which is dated to your period, you can be confident that it's a reasonable medieval name. The introduction to this book gives a good summary of English naming practices.

There are any number of ways to form a surname. Because of your middle name, we researched "atte Lea," which means "lives by the woods or clearing," in the "Dictionary of British Surnames" by Reaney and Wilson. If you're interested in having a "place name," you could start by looking at a map of England. Most (though not all) British cities existed in the Middle Ages. If you find the name of a city that you like, there's a good chance you'll be able to date it by looking in a geographical dictionary or the Encyclopedia Britannica-- if you can't find a reference, we can look it up as well. After London, the largest towns in England were Bristol, York, Norwich, and Lynn. If you're developing a persona story, remember that a person who lives in Bristol wouldn't be called "Anne of Bristol," since everyone around her could be identified in the same way. A good, and fairly short, discussion of English surnames can be found in the introduction to "The Dictionary of British Surnames."

Arval D'Espas Nord, Rouland Carre, Lindorm Eriksson, Walraven van Nijmege, Elsbeth Anne Roth, Zenobia Naphtali, Evan da Collaureo, Alison Macdermot, and Ivanor of Sighty Crag all contributed to this letter.

We hope this has been helpful. If we can assist you further, please let us know.

In service,
Alan Fairfax
Academy of S. Gabriel