Scotland's Heraldry

by Gordon Casely, Herald Strategy Ltd
The Quest for Identity
Heraldry is an ancient and exact science, a straightforward method
of identifying individual people and the communities they live and
work in. Systems of this formalised identity are used worldwide by
nations and individuals. In Scotland we live among one of Europe's
larger sources of coats-of-arms. Heraldry identifies people and
organisations - and in doing so, heraldry marks, decorates and
informs. From the dawn of civilisation, people have used symbols to
explain their existence, beliefs and culture. The armies of the
Romans carried symbols and marked flags to identify themselves and
their various legions, while the 9th-century forces of Charlemagne
showed equal enthusiasm for icons of identity. The Bayeux Tapestry
of the Battle of Hastings in 1066 shows that specific forms of
personal symbols were evident at the time of the Norman Conquest,
and there is speculation that the tapestry points to the earliest
notion of heraldry as we would accept it today.

Forward with the Past
Heraldry is a 21st-century growth business. There has never been a
greater number of people and organisations pursuing arms as
identity. According to the number of participants in the Olympic
Games, there are some 197 countries in the world. Few of these
nations do not possess heraldry of some sort along with a presiding
heraldic authority. Here in Scotland, the number of new
coats-of-arms given by Lyon Office over the past 30 years equals
the number of grants and matriculations over the previous 300
years. There is no indication of any let-up in demand, with the
result that a new coat-of-arms appears every working day of the
year.
Multinational organisations such as British Airways, Tesco, Marks
& Spencer, the BBC, Bank of Scotland and the United Kingdom
Atomic Energy Authority use heraldry for everyday identification.
Bluebird Buses display the Royal Arms on the sides of their
vehicles because they have the Royal Warrant to carry the Royal
family's luggage. Heraldry is positively flaunted by the cities of
Glasgow and Aberdeen, each exuberantly parading their arms on
signs, stationery, street furniture, buildings, badges, banners,
bollards, books, buttons, vehicles, insignia, uniforms, furnishing,
theatre tickets and even litter bins.
Former burghs such as Galashiels in Selkirkshire and Duns in
Berwickshire have gained versions of their old town coats-of-arms,
while community councils in the tiny villages of Aberchirder in
Banffshire and Braemar and Methlick in Aberdeenshire now use
heraldry where previously there was none. Since 1999 the former
burghs of Keith, Peterhead, Kilsyth, Moffat and Ellon have held
major ceremonies to mark the formal handover of their Letters
Patent, with the Royal Burgh of Wigtown following suit in 2003.
Dressed to Kill
For all its colourfulness, heraldry is an ancient and exact
science. A practical function of heraldry was the identification of
friend or foe on the battlefield. Dressed to kill, men in fighting
clothes were virtually unidentifiable. The invention of a method of
marking men and their leaders started the creation of heraldry.
Since the shield was a universal tool of offence and defence, it on
the shield that heraldry first appeared in simple charges such as
colour, cross and creature.
The origins of Scotland's system of heraldry are more definite,
for we can both date and identify our oldest extant example. This
is the seal of Alan, High Steward of Scotland (1177-1204), and it
is shown on a charter dated at Melrose in 1190. The shield depicts
the familiar fess chequy of the Stewarts, a blue-and-white
chequered band across the middle. These arms, heraldically
described as Or a fess chequy Azure and Argent, are still used to
this day in the 2nd and 3rd quarters of the coat-of-arms of Prince
Charles as Duke of Rothesay. More familiarly, a police hat shows
this fess chequy, remembering that an early Stewart monarch was
closely associated with the pioneering town watch.
That He Who Runs May Read
Heraldry is a method of visual communication, giving
identification without the use of letters. Heraldry creates an
instant message both to the highly informed and the illiterate. To
be effective, heraldry is best used in simplest form. In ancient
times, a banner had to be simple enough to be read by a man astride
a galloping horse. So the Saltire, Scotland's national flag,
incorporating a white diagonal cross on a blue ground, is one of
the simplest heraldic devices anywhere in the world, perhaps
rivalled only by the Rising Sun of Japan or the flag of St. George
of England.
At the Court of the Lord Lyon King of
Arms
The control of heraldry in Scotland is vested by law in the Lord
Lyon King of Arms, currently W. David H. Sellar. He holds an
ancient office descended from the Seannachie of Celtic times and is
34th in line when an unnamed Lyon was inaugurated with the rank of
knight at Arbroath Abbey in 1318 by King Robert Bruce. As Lord
Lyon, Mr. Sellar, is a judge and Scotland's greatest Officer of
State, and controls the granting and use of coats-of-arms. He is
assisted in his duties by three heralds and three
pursuivants.
Arms in Scotland are heritable property. So using the arms of
another person, community, company or organisation is theft, and is
an offence seriously pursued by Lyon Court. Scotland governs its
heraldry by the strictest laws in the world.
Scotland's Lyon Office is a court of law in daily session, one of
only two in Europe with executive power. In granting and
matriculating arms, the Lord Lyon ensures that no one coat-of-arms
is like any other, for in Scotland every coat-of-arms must be
different. Each coat-of-arms is very individual property: there is
no such thing in Scotland as a "family coat-of-arms". Several
people of the same name showing the same coat-of-arms would not
only cause confusion, but their actions would devalue the system,
and dodge identity.
The need to guard individual identity was recognised four
centuries ago when Parliament - that is, the Scots Parliament -
passed an Act requiring the Lord Lyon King of Arms and his heralds
to difference the arms of separate persons, and to record them in
their books. This Public Register of All Arms and Bearings in
Scotland has been maintained non-stop since 1672.
A Curious Tongue
Heraldry is nothing if not exact. So a language based on a curious
mixture of English, Latin and Norman French has evolved called
blazon, a form of words which may baffle the uninitiated. In
reality it is no more difficult to learn than, say, staff notation
in music, or the rules of football. Blazon precisely describes a
coat of arms in a way that there is no room for doubt or confusion.
It avoids the near impossibility of trying to describe, for
example, the familiar lion rampant of the Scots sovereign in
concise everyday English; whereas blazon leaves no room for doubt:
Or, within a double tressure flory counter flory, a lion rampant
Gules, armed and langued Azure.
The shield of the Royal Burgh of Peebles is blazoned as Gules,
three salmon counternaiant in pale Proper, heraldically describing
a red (Gules) shield on which there are three salmon in their
natural colours (Proper) seen horizontally, those in top and bottom
facing left, with the middle one swimming to the right. Colour
being the essential part of heraldry, colours or tinctures are
always given capital letters. An item Proper, such as a Peebles
salmon, indicates that it is shown in natural colours.
Heraldry in Use
From prehistoric times, tribes and communities have rallied round
totems embodying their unity and symbolising the authority of their
chiefs. From the ancient earldoms such as Mar and Buchan grew
counties like Aberdeenshire. All of Scotland's ancient 33 counties
and 197 of our 201 burghs had coats of arms.
Companies have been quick to use heraldry as a means of corporate
identity. The Bank of Scotland has employed its arms in daily use
since they were granted in 1701, and is perhaps our oldest
commercial user of heraldry. In 1998, Aberdeen Harbour Board
delineated the boundaries of its property by putting up street
names showing the arms of the Board (and in the process receiving a
commendation from the Heraldry Society in London). Spot the BBC
arms on Breakfast News, where thanks to television, heraldry has a
daily audience of millions. GNER, the Great North Eastern Railway,
displays its coat-of-arms on every carriage.
The hallmark of heraldry gives identity to schools (The High
School of Glasgow and Harris Academy, Dundee); churches (St
Nicholas Kirk, Aberdeen and Lochgilphead Parish Church);
universities (St Andrew's, Glasgow Caledonian); societies (Braemar
Royal Highland Society); learned bodies (Royal Society of
Edinburgh, Scottish Tartans Authority); sport (Scottish Football
Association and clubs such as Hibs and Queen's Park FC; Scottish
Bowling Association and some two dozen clubs); and 30 of our 32
local authorities.
Heraldry, the mediaeval survivor, has become a potent modern
symbol.
Gaining Arms
The process is not complicated. A person petitioning the Lord Lyon
for a coat-of-arms is assumed to be virtuous and well deserving,
and the petitioner can be female or male, for Scotland has always
maintained sexual equality in heraldry.
Since the Court of the Lord Lyon is a court of law, applications
are made by petition or formal request. This can be done by the
person wishing to gain arms, by providing proof to the Lord Lyon
who he or she is and asking for arms to be granted. The petition
sets out the petitioner's ancestry as far as can be proved (as
little as the current generation may be enough), showing each step
of ancestry in the form of certificates of birth, marriages or
certified extracts from documents such as census records or
wills.
A grant of arms is heritable property and will be inherited by the
petitioner's heir, usually the eldest son, and by his eldest son in
turn, and so on. A daughter or younger son inherits the right to
matriculate the arms with a slight difference added (for under
Scots law no two people may bear the same arms), and he or she must
petition separately for this to be done.
The petitioner should carefully consider design and content of the
arms before becoming permanently committed to them, since a grant
of arms is for all time. Arms are based on surname, so if you are a
Campbell, for which a chief's coat-of-arms already exists, then
your personal Campbell heraldry will be visibly based on the
chief's to show that you also bear his name, but with a difference
to indicate that you are the particular Campbell you are, rather
than the chief. It is the Lord Lyon who judges what difference is
appropriate.
When this has been settled, the fee is payable, currently £1285,
and a herald painter from Lyon Office creates the beautiful Letters
Patent. This colourful document displaying your arms is actually a
formal deed from the Crown making you armigerous. The process from
first application to final Letters Patent takes around six
months.
Scotland is a small country, and one of the delights of our
national scale is that Lord Lyon David Sellar and his staff
maintain a tradition of extending a personal welcome to every
petitioner.
Qualifications for gaining a coat-of-arms vary widely throughout
Europe, and frequently depend on family lineage or nobility. In
England, which heraldically is a foreign country, gaining arms may
depend on position achieved within society such as public office or
a military commission. Scotland is the only country where the
system is absolutely egalitarian.
Nor does a petitioner have to be Scots. He or she may be of Scots
descent, resident or domiciled in Scotland, married to a Scot, hold
property in Scotland, or be a graduate of a Scots university. Thus
there are current armigers from North America, the Far East and
mainland Europe.
Gordon Casely is a journalist who runs Herald Strategy Ltd, the
Aberdeen-based corporate communications and heritage consultancy.
An honorary member of the Heraldry Society of Scotland (founder
member 1977), he writes, lectures and broadcasts on heraldry and
takes a particular interest in the promotion of heraldry within a
21st century context.
For more information about heraldry and further links, see www.heraldry-scotland.co.uk