Heraldry
Heraldry’s charges, colours and their meanings: the fleur-de-lis, the lion rampant, the tinctures, the ordinaries and the rest, and what the heralds and the heraldry books say each one meant.
Test yourself: Heraldry quiz
Coats of arms
- Coat of armsWhat people call a coat of arms is properly an achievement: a shield of arms with a helmet, mantling, a wreath and a crest above it, and sometimes supporters, a motto and a compartment. The shield is the essential part; the rest are accessories.
- Family crestThere is no such thing as a family crest or a coat of arms for a surname. Arms are granted to one person and pass to that person’s descendants; the crest is only the part of the arms that sits on top of the helmet.
Colours and shapes
- Tinctures (heraldic colours)The colours of heraldry: two metals, or (gold) and argent (silver), five colours, azure (blue), gules (red), sable (black), vert (green) and purpure (purple), and furs such as ermine and vair. The rule of tincture forbids metal on metal and colour on colour.
- OrdinariesThe ordinaries are heraldry’s simplest charges, broad bands across the shield: the chief across the top, the fess across the middle, the pale down the middle, the bend corner to corner, the chevron, the cross and the saltire. They are among the oldest bearings.
- Marks of cadencySmall marks added to a coat of arms to show a son’s place among his brothers. In England a label marks the eldest son, a crescent the second, a mullet (a star) the third, and so on to the ninth. Scotland differences arms with borders instead.
- Crosses in heraldryHeraldry names dozens of crosses. The commonest are the cross moline, its ends split and curled back; the patonce and the fleury, ending in flared or lily-shaped tips; the crosslet, with each arm crossed; and the botonny, with trefoil ends. A cross with a pointed foot is fitchy.
Beasts and monsters
- Lion rampantA lion standing on one hind leg with its other three paws raised: the commonest beast in heraldry. Passant means walking; guardant means looking out at the viewer. The three lions of England are passant guardant.
- Eagle displayedAn eagle seen from the front with its wings and legs spread, the way heraldry usually draws it. It was the bird of the emperors, from Charlemagne’s badge to the arms of the Holy Roman Empire.
- Double-headed eagleAn eagle with two heads turned opposite ways, drawn with its wings spread. It was the arms of the Holy Roman Empire and of the tsars of Russia, and is on the arms of Serbia and the emblem of the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry.
- Griffin in heraldryIn heraldry, a monster with an eagle’s head, wings and forelegs on a lion’s body, hind legs and tail, and with ears. Rearing on its hind legs it is called segreant. Fox-Davies thought it the most popular heraldic beast after the lion.
- Red dragon of WalesThe red dragon of Wales, Y Ddraig Goch: a red, winged, four-legged dragon on the Welsh flag of white and green. It was a badge and supporter of the Tudor kings and became the official flag of Wales in 1959.
- Unicorn in heraldryIn heraldry, a horse-like beast with a long twisted horn, a beard, a lion’s tail and cloven hooves. Two unicorns supported the royal arms of Scotland; since 1603 a unicorn faces the English lion on the royal arms. It is Scotland’s national animal.
Royal emblems
- Fleur-de-lisA stylised flower of three petals bound by a band: the emblem of the kings of France, and from them a charge in heraldry. Today it is also the badge of the Scout movement and the emblem of New Orleans.
- Tudor roseA double rose, red outside and white within: the badge of the Tudor kings. It joins the red rose of Lancaster and the white rose of York, the badges of the two houses in the Wars of the Roses.
- Crown and coronetsA crown or coronet above a shield shows rank. The royal crown has arches, an orb and a cross; the coronets of British peers are told apart by the strawberry leaves and silver balls, or pearls, on their rims.
About heraldry
Heraldry is, in the Heraldry Society’s definition, the systematic use of hereditary devices centred on the shield, and the first known heraldic shield dates from the second quarter of the twelfth century. These pages take the charges people most often ask about, from the Fleur-de-lis and the lion rampant to the red dragon of Wales, and the conventions every coat of arms is built from: the Tinctures (heraldic colours), the Ordinaries, the marks of cadency and the many crosses.
Do heraldic symbols have meanings?
Not fixed ones. The Heraldry Society says there are no fixed meanings for the metals, colours, furs, lines or charges of heraldry: whoever designed a coat of arms may have meant something by a lion or a colour, but that meaning stays with that coat and does not pass to another. Some elements do show status, it adds, such as a peer’s coronet above the shield, which marks a rank of the peerage. So each page here says whose meaning it gives: a king’s, a nation’s, a legend’s, or a heraldry writer’s.
Arms belong to people, not surnames
The College of Arms is plain that there is no coat of arms for a surname, and the Court of the Lord Lyon that in Scotland a coat of arms can be borne by only one person at a time. That is why the page on the family crest is about a misunderstanding, and the page on the coat of arms names its parts.
A living practice
Heraldry is not finished. The Kings of Arms at the College of Arms still grant new arms on behalf of the Crown, the Lord Lyon grants arms in Scotland, and Canada has had its own Canadian Heraldic Authority since 1988. The Heraldry Society notes that grants are issued on an almost daily basis.
The books behind these pages
Beside the heraldic authorities, these pages draw on three old reference works that are out of copyright, and they do not always agree. Arthur Charles Fox-Davies’ A Complete Guide to Heraldry (1909) and Charles Boutell’s Handbook to English Heraldry, in the edition Fox-Davies revised, set out the rules as the heralds of their day kept them. Oswald Barron, writing on heraldry for the Encyclopaedia Britannica of 1911, took his armory from medieval seals and rolls and mocked “the pedant herald”. Where they disagree, the pages say so. Britannica today calls the heraldic art of the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries “the Decadence”, and dates the recovery to the twentieth century.
Sources
- About Heraldry, About Heraldry, The Heraldry Society, About Heraldry
- Frequently Asked Questions, Carlisle Transportation Products (The Carlstar Group), Where can I find a list of the meanings associated with heraldic symbols?
- FAQs: heraldry, Resources (Internet Archive copy, 17 May 2026), College of Arms, Q. Do coats of arms belong to surnames? Q. How do I seek a new coat of arms?
- FAQs, Sistema Plastics, What is my family coat of arms?
- Petitioning for a coat of arms, Coats of Arms, Court of the Lord Lyon, Coats of Arms
- Canadian Heraldic Authority, Heraldry, The Governor General of Canada, page text
- Heraldry: The beginnings, About Heraldry, The Heraldry Society, page text
- Heraldry (1911 Encyclopædia Britannica), Encyclopædia Britannica, 11th edition (1911), vol. 13, article by Oswald Barron, Encyclopædia Britannica, via Wikisource, Beasts and Birds
- Heraldry, Britannica (Internet Archive copy, 1 October 2026), Encyclopaedia Britannica, article text
- A Complete Guide to Heraldry, Arthur Charles Fox-Davies, 1909 (Project Gutenberg ebook 41617), T. C. & E. C. Jack, via Project Gutenberg, title page
- The Handbook to English Heraldry, Charles Boutell, 11th edition, revised by Arthur Charles Fox-Davies, 1914 (Project Gutenberg ebook 23186), Reeves & Turner, via Project Gutenberg, Project Gutenberg header
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 10, 2026. How we research