Crest (heraldry)

“ A crest is never used with a mitre or ecclesiastical hat. Many writers deny the right of any ecclesiastic to a crest. Some deny the right also to use a motto, but this restriction has no general acceptance.
Therefore ecclesiastical heraldry in Britain is summed up in (1) its recognition of the cardinal's hat, (2) the official coat of arms for ecclesiastical purposes, (3) the ensigns of ecclesiastical rank above alluded to, viz. mitre, cross, and crosier. ”

“ A clergyman in this country, however, has never been denied the right of using a crest (if he possesses one and chooses to display it) until he reaches episcopal rank. A grant of arms to a clergyman at the present day depicts his achievement with helmet, mantling, and crest in identical form with those adopted for any one else. But the laws of armory, official and amateur, have always denied the right to make use of a crest to bishop, archbishop, and cardinal. ”

“ The difficulty of dealing with modern crests usually arises from their having been designed with regard only to their representation on flat surfaces, but the problem may be solved to some extent—it is frequently impossible to do so completely—by carefully adjusting the crest and helm to each other and by placing them in the aspect that produces the best effect and at the same time expresses their character most fully ”

“ The differencing of crests for cadency is very rare. Theoretically, these should be marked equally with the shield, and when arms are exemplified officially under the circumstances above referred to, crest, {491}
{492}
supporters, and shield are all equally differenced, but the difficulty of adding difference mark on difference mark when no marriage or heiress can ever bring in any alteration to the crest is very generally recognised and admitted, even officially, and it is rare indeed to come across a crest carrying more than a single difference mark. ”

“ The fan is nothing more than the remains of the original fan-shaped ornament left when the crest, or most likely only the front outline of it, had been cut out in profile from the fan. We have no instance until a very much later period of a crest which could not be depicted in profile, and in the representations of crests upon seals we have no means of forming a certain judgment that these representations are not of profile crests, for the very nature of the craft of seal-engraving would lead the engraver to add a certain amount of relief, even if this did not actually exist. ”

“ In Germany, in cases where the crests reproduce the arms, any mark of cadency with which the arms are distinguished will of course be repeated; but in German heraldry, doubtless owing to the territorial nature of the crest, a change in the crest itself is often the only mark of distinction between different branches of the same family, and in Siebmacher's Wappenbuch thirty-one different branches of the Zorn family have different crests, which are the sole marks of difference in the achievements. ”

“ Another fact is that, except perhaps in the persons of sovereigns, there is no official instance, nor any other authentic instance of importance, in which a crest appears ever to have been used by a woman until these recent and unfortunate days when unofficial examples can be found of the wildest ignorance of all armorial rules. ”

“ The fact that we find comparatively few changes considering the number of crests in existence is by no means a refutation of this theory, because a man had but one helmet, and was forced therefore to make a selection. Unless, therefore, he had a very strong inclination it would be more likely that he would select the crest he was used to than a fresh one. ”

“ The next fact is that we find infinitely more variation in the crests used by given families than in the arms, and that whilst the variations in the arms are as a rule trivial, and not affecting the general design of the shield, the changes in the crest are frequently radical, the crest borne by a family at one period having no earthly relation to that borne by the same family at another. ”

“ John Hope's book, five have no crest. Consequently we have eighty-one examples to analyse. Of these there are ten in which the crest is not attached to the lambrequin and helmet by anything perceptible, eight are attached with fillets of varying widths, twenty-one crests are upon chapeaux, and twenty-nine issue from coronets. But at no period governed by the series is it possible that either fillet, torse, chapeau, or coronet was in use to the exclusion of another form. ”

“ In heraldry (q.v.) a crest is a device, originally borne as a cognizance on a knight’s helmet, placed on a wreath above helmet and shield in armorial bearings, and used separately on a seal or on articles of property.
Cresting, in architecture, is an ornamental finish in the wall or ridge of a building, which is common on the continent of Europe. An example occurs at Exeter cathedral, the ridge of which is ornamented with a range of small fleurs-de-lis in lead.
CRESTON, a city and the county-seat of Union county, Iowa, U.S.A., about 60 m. ”

“ Crests are not borne by ladies, a reigning Sovereign only excepted. (See Panache, Rebus, and Chapter XIV.)
Crest-Coronet. A coronet from which issues, or which supports, a crest. No. 232.
Crest-Wreath, or Torse. In the Middle Ages, of rich materials and costly workmanship; now represented as being formed of two rolls of silk of the principal metal and colour in the arms, which are twisted to show 114 the metal and colour alternately. The earliest examples are about A.D. 1375. No. 233 shows three varieties of representation. ”

“ And knights whose fame for gallantry and prowess was firmly established, had their crests painted over their coats of arms. In two or three generations the bearer of the arms established his right to a new crest, and the heralds, to preserve the memory of the ancient honour of the family, introduced the old crest into the coat of arms, either as a charge upon the principal ordinary, or on an unoccupied part of the field. ”

“ It is merely an exaggeration of the difficulty that we are always in uncertainty whether any given device was merely a piece of decoration borrowed from the arms or crest, or whether it had continued usage as a badge. In the same way many families who had never used crests, but who had used badges, took the opportunity of the Visitations to record their badges as crests. A notable example of the subsequent record of a badge as a crest is met with in the Stourton family. ”

“ In the United Kingdom duplication of crests is quite a modern practice. Amongst the Plantagenet Garter plates there is not a single example to be found of a coat of arms with more than a single crest, and there is no ancient British example of more {323}than one helmet which can be referred to for guidance. The custom originated in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Germany. This point is more fully dealt with in the chapter devoted to the consideration of crests, but it may be here noted that in Austria a knight may place two and a baron three helmets over his shield. ”

“ The heraldic mantling was, of course, originally the representation of the actual "capeline" or textile covering worn upon the helmet, but many early heraldic representations are of mantlings which are of skin, fur, or feathers, being in such cases invariably a continuation of the crest drawn out and represented as the lambrequin. When the crest was a part of the human figure, the habit in which that figure was arrayed is almost invariably found to have been so employed. ”

“ Actual crests were fastened to the helmets they surmounted by {336}means of ribbons, straps, laces (which developed later into the fillet and torse) , or rivets, and in Germany they were ornamented with hanging and tinkling metal leaves, tiny bells, buffalo horns, feathers, and projecting pieces of wood, which formed vehicles for still further decorative appendages.
Then comes the question, what did the crest signify? Many have asserted that no one below the rank of a knight had the right to use a crest ”

“ Eve, and it would be impossible to imagine anything finer. Like the rest of the Royal achievement, the Royal crest is of course not hereditary, and consequently it is assigned by a separate Royal Warrant to each male member of the Royal Family, and the opportunity is then taken to substitute for the Royal crown, which is a part of the sovereign's crest, a coronet identical with whatever may be assigned in that particular instance as the coronet of rank. In the case of Royal bastards the crest has always been assigned upon a chapeau. ”

“ The crest of Wales is a dragon passant guardant, gules.—The whole of these crests, with mantlings, &c., are emblazoned on the title-page of this Manual.
Crests are usually displayed upon a wreath as in the annexed example, which is a demi-lion rampant. If a crest this size had been placed upon an helmet of proportionate size it must have occupied a sixth part of this page, and the shield containing the arms to be in proportion considerably larger: in showing the crest without the helmet proportion is of little consequence. ”

“ In time, however, the spirit of imitation led persons of inferior rank to assume those of their feudal superiors; and hence far less regularity is found in the heraldry of crests [Pg 136] than in that of coat-armour. In many cases crests have been borrowed from one or other of the charges of the shield: hence if the coat contain a lion rampant, the crest is frequently a demi, or half lion, or a lion’s head; and should three or six eagles occupy the shield, another eagle often serves as a crest. ”

“ The elephant and castle is seen in the arms of Dumbarton and in the crest of Corbet.
A curious practice, the result of pure ignorance, has manifested itself in British armory. As will be explained in the chapter upon crests, a large proportion of German crests are derivatives of the stock basis of two bull's horns, which formed a recognised ornament for a helmet in Viking and other pre-heraldic days. As heraldry found its footing it did not in Germany displace those horns, which in many cases continued alone as the crest or remained as a part of it in the form of additions to other objects. ”

“ In Germany the crest has an infinitely greater importance than is the case with ourselves, but it is there considered in a large degree a territorial appanage, and it is by no means unusual in a German achievement to see several crests surmounting a single coat of arms. In England the Royal coat of arms has really three crests, although the crests of Scotland and Ireland are seldom used, which, it may be noted, are all in a manner territorial ”

“ It is plainly utterly impossible to depict some crests upon a profile helmet, and equally impossible to display others upon an affronté helmet. In Scotland the crests do not afford quite such a regular succession of glaring examples for ridicule as is the case in England. No need is recognised in Scotland for necessarily distinguishing the crest of one family from that of another, though proper differences are rigidly adhered to with regard to the coats of arms. ”

“ It may here be noted that it has not been customary, nor is it logically correct, for ladies and other non-combatant persons, such as the ministers of the Church, to use crests; arms they have ever been allowed to bear. Examples, however, of the breach of the rule as to crests even by bishops are afforded by several of their privy seals. Thus Henry le Despenser bishop of [Pg 162] Norwich (1370-1406) has his differenced shield of arms surmounted by a mantled helm upon which a mitre, with a griffin's head and wings issuing therefrom, is placed as a crest (fig. 84) ”

“ This Crest is—Out of a crest-coronet a plume of five ostrich feathers per pale arg. and az., the Plantagenet colours—the device (as Mr. Lower observes) being evidently derived from the Prince’s own Badge, and also forming a variety of the “panache,” the Crest then held in such high estimation. The heart charged upon the shield of Douglas (see Nos. 156, 157, p. 74) is another remarkable Augmentation. ”

“ Simply because crests at that period were merely profile representations.
In later days, when tournament crests were made of leather, the weight even of these was very considerable, but for tournament purposes that weight could be endured. Half-a-dozen courses down the barrière would be a vastly different matter to a whole day under arms in actual battle. Now a crest cut out from a thin plate of metal set on edge would weigh but little. But perhaps the strongest proof of all is to be found in the construction of so many German crests, which are adorned down the back with a fan. ”

“ So with two seeming bodies, but one heart,
Two of the first life coats in Heraldry,
Due but to one and crowned with one crest. ”

“ This fillet is the commonest crest support, and the others, chapeau or coronet, are themselves sometimes set upon a torse. It should be stated in the grant.
Crests carry the same cadency marks as occur on the coat-of-arms.
Crests are of very ancient use; marks of dignity worn upon the head are among the earliest signs of chieftainship used by mankind. A savage chief would readily wear a rare bird's feather in his head as a mark of dignity, [Pg 27] or even his own hair matted into particular forms, as the Zulus still do. As for feathers, we still wear them on our heads as indications of rank ”