ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3249 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3249 ************************************ 10 Jan 2007 From: Ursula Whitcher Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You wrote that you were interested in designing arms for a fifteenth-century Mamluk or Ottoman Turkish persona, and asked whether pomegranates or cups would be appropriate charges. We have not found any evidence that the Ottomans used personal insignia comparable to Western heraldry in your period. However, the Mamluks did use insignia which look similar to heraldry. These insignia were usually personal, rather than inherited, and often incorporated symbols indicating a Mamluk's office or former office, such as standard-bearer or Master of the Robes You can find more information about Mamluk devices in David Appleton's article "Islamic Heraldry: An Introduction": http://users.panola.com/AAGHS/manluk.html We have not found pomegranates (or any other fruit) in Mamluk arms. [1,2] However, cups were quite common charges; they indicated that the Mamluk had held the position of cup-bearer or . [2] David Appleton's article incorporates several images of cups in Mamluk devices (note that the illustrations for "cup" and "penbox" have been switched). [3] We have attached a re-drawing of a Mamluk device incorporating two cups to this letter. [4] We hope this letter has been useful to you. If you have any questions or would like further information, please don't hesitate to write to us again. Arval Benicoeur, Sabine Berard, Aryanhwy merch Catmael, Walraven van Nijmegen, and Talan Gwynek assisted in researching and writing this letter. For the Academy, Ursula Georges 10 January 2007 References: [1] Leo Ary Mayer, "Saracenic Heraldry" (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1933). [2] William Leaf and Sally Purcell, _Heraldic Symbols: Islamic Insignia and Western Heraldry_, (London: Victoria and Albert Museum, 1986). [3] David Appleton, "Islamic Heraldry: An Introduction", (WWW: The Journal for Chivalric, Genealogical and Heraldic Sciences, 2004). http://users.panola.com/AAGHS/manluk.html [4] Leaf and Purcell, p. 81.