Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 681

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 681

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/681

Some of the Academy's early reports contain errors that we haven't yet corrected. Please use it with caution.

Greetings from the Academy of St. Gabriel!

You wrote us regarding the use of the device "Sable, a Bend Sinister Engrailed Or, a Dragon Rampant Reguardant Or, a Mullet of Four Points Gules Fimbriated Or," and of the name "Daniel AEthelwulf" for an Englishman living sometime between the 14th and 16th century.

Your description of your chosen device was not clear; we are assuming you meant "Sable, a bend sinister engrailed between a dragon rampant reguardant Or and a mullet of four points Gules fimbriated Or." Taken together, the device as a whole is probably not good recreation because it combines too many rare elements. To explain further, I will address each element separately.

charges (the dragon and the star) in a balanced arrangement across the bend sinister. This is quite rare in English heraldry of your period; charges in this arrangement are expected to be an identical pair.

armory. Unless you are using it for a particular reason (i.e., to help re-create a member of a historical family that actually used it), we strongly recommend avoiding it. If you are using to imply illegitimate birth, then you should know that the link between this charge and illegitimacy is a myth. A bend sinister carried no particular meaning in period arms.

Engrailing a bend was quite common, so we suggest that you use "a bend engrailed" rather than "a bend sinister engrailed."

armory and were particularly rare in British heraldry in your period. If you use this rare charge, we suggest that you keep the rest of your arms as simple and standard as possible. Further, beasts "reguardant" are a fairly late-period innovation. With a rare beast like a dragon, the head is typically oriented in the same direction as the body. Because four-legged dragons are also characteristic of later period (although more likely in the British Isles than on the Continent), you may want to consider using the two-legged version, a wyvern, which is most common in period.

rare. Mullets were typically drawn with six or five points. Fimbriation is also very rare; we know of no example of a fimbriated mullet in any period arms. We strongly discourage use of a four-pointed or fimbriated mullet.

If you want to use the dragon, then we suggest that you simplify your design considerably. You could use one or more dragons alone on the field, or a pair of dragons on either side of a bend. You may wish to use a combination of dragons with mullets. Having all three elements, bend, dragon and mullet, is probably too complex for armory of the period you've chosen.

Here are some alternatives we suggest, preserving some of the elements in your suggested design:

       Sable, a bend engrailed Or
       Sable, a bend engrailed between six mullets Or
       Sable, a dragon segreant between three mullets Or
       Sable, a dragon segreant, in chief three mullets Or
       Sable mullety, a dragon segreant Or
       Sable, a bend engrailed between two dragons segreant Or

If you would like to replace any dragon listed above with the more likely wyvern, it would be possible, except the posture of the creature would need to be changed. A wyvern's posture is typically "statant" or "sejant" (it's hard to tell the difference with a wyvern). For it to be closer to "segreant," the wyvern would be "erect."

While we came up with the list of suggestions above, we considered some other designs which turned out to be unregisterable because they are too similar to existing arms. Since you might think of them on your own, we thought we'd mention them so you can avoid them:

Your chosen given name is a good choice, particularly earlier in the period you are considering. "Daniel" was popular in the 13th and 14th centuries, declining in popularity during the 15th and 16th centuries before renewed use in the 17th century. The spellings "Danyell" and "Danyll" were recorded in 1379. [1]

"AEthelwulf," on the other hand, is not plausible as a byname in your period. "AEthelwulf" is an Old English ("OE") given name from the Anglo-Saxon period (the AE is written as one letter, as you sometimes see "Caesar"). It is unlikely that an Englishman in the period you have chosen would use an OE given name as a surname. With the defeat of the Anglo-Saxons at the Battle of Hastings in 1066, the use of OE names (which were ordinarily given names) began a rapid decline, with only those few names of notables and saints holding their own. Even those few names underwent significant changes due to the language shifts as OE joined with the Norman French and began turning into Middle English, the language of Chaucer and of your persona. For example, OE "AElfraed" became "Alvred" in the 13th century [2].

"AEthelwulf" does not appear to have survived to your period as a given name. It would not have survived as a "last name" used by the same family since the Anglo-Saxon period; persons did not begin to inherit patronymics until much later.

We can suggest two alternative surnames which you might want to use, "Wolf" or "Ayloff." "Wolf" was a surname derived either from a patronymic based on the given name "Wolf," or from a descriptive byname. In the earliest period in which you place your persona, the descriptive byname was often used with the definite article, "le Wolf"; but by the later part of your period, it was more commonly just "Wolf." "Ayloff" was a surname derived from several different patronymic bynames. [2] It might even have derived from "AEthelwulf," though that is only a hypothesis.

If these suggestions do not appeal to you, you could try the unsupported but plausible surname "Ayolf." "AEthelwulf" appears as the given name "Aiulf," "Aiolf," and "Eiulf" as early as the Domesday Boke (from the survey conducted in 1086), which correlates with other evidence that the original prototheme (the first element of the name, here "AE(th)el-") had already turned into "Ay-" or "Ai-" by c.1100.

By the time we get to Middle English, names containing the original deuterotheme (second name element) "-wulf" had most commonly changed to "-olf." One documented 15th century surname in that category is "Edolf," which in OE would have been the given name "Eadwulf." [3] Therefore, the most likely form of a 15th century surname based on "AEthelwulf" would be "Ayolf."

Putting these name discussions together, we suggest "Danyll Ayolf," "Danyell Ayloff," "Danyll Wolf," "Danyell le Wolf." In period, it was common for the same person to spell his name differently at different times, so you can use both spellings of the given name.

We hope this letter has been helpful. Please write us again if any part of it has been unclear or if you have other questions. Arval d'Espas Nord, Lindorm Eriksson, Tangwystl verch Morgant Glasvryn, Margaret Makafee, Jaelle of Armida, Rouland Carre, Zenobia Naphtali and Talan Gwynek contributed research and comments to this letter.

For the Academy,

AElfwyn aet Gyrwum

[1] E.G. Withycombe, The Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names, 3rd ed., Oxford University Press.

[2] Reaney & Wilson, A Dictionary of English Surnames, Oxford University Press, 1995.

[3] Woodcock, Thomas, Janet Grant, & Ian Graham, Dictionary of British Arms, Vol. II, The Society of Antiquaries of London, 1996.