Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 195

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 195

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/195

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 is the information we found on your name "Alain fitz Hrolf" and your arms "Per bend sinister argent and vert, a gryphon segreant to sinister sable and a demi-sun issuant from base Or" for use in 11th-century France.

Your name is almost perfect for 11th-century Normandy. "Hrolf" was the name of the first Duke of Normandy, but it was quickly modified to "Rolf" in France. Thus, the correct form of your name for the 11thcentury is "Alain fitz Rolf." If, like most SCA personas, you're a member of the lower nobility, your name would usually have been written in its Latin form, "Alanus filius Rollo."

Heraldry was not invented until the 12th century, so your persona would not have had a coat of arms. As an SCA member, you can attempt to find a design appropriate to your persona and register it, or design arms which are consistent with general medieval style and register that. A longer discussion of the issues is found on our Web page at

http://www.itd.umich.edu/~ximenez/s.gabriel/faq/nonheraldic.html

Since the Norman shield designs were among the ancestors of heraldry, it would not be difficult to find an appropriate design which can be described according to heraldic rules. Unfortunately, any design using just a single griffin segreant on an argent field will conflict with the arms of Pomerania "Argent, a griffin segreant gules crowned Or," but you could register "Sable, a griffin segreant argent," or "Argent, three griffins segreant sable," both of which would be perfectly appropriate designs for an 11th-century Norman.

There is a popular conception that "fitz" and a "bend sinister" imply illegitimacy, but this is not the case. "Fitz" is the Norman translation of the Latin "filius," or "son of." The Normans brought names like "Fitzgerald" into England, Scotland, and Ireland when they invaded those countries. It did not connote illegitimacy--in fact, "fitz <father's name>" was one of the most common methods of surname construction throughout the Norman period.

Similarly, the "bend sinister" did not imply illegitimacy. In fact, it's not clear that the "bend sinister" was even used as a charge during our period. In early heraldry, the heir of a person with arms would place a bend over the arms of his father to show the relationship, just as the label is used in later heraldry.

Arval D'Espas Nord, Margaret Makafee, Pedro de Alcazar, Lindorm Eriksson, and Effric neyn Kenyeoch vc Ralte all contributed to this letter.

We hope this has been helpful. If you need further assistance, please let us know.

In service,
Alan Fairfax
Academy of S. Gabriel