Lion rampant
A 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.
Meaning
Rampant is the lion’s normal posture in heraldry: in Oswald Barron’s words, “touching the ground with but one foot and clawing at the air in noble rage.” It was so much the usual attitude that the word was often left out, and in French and German blazon a lion is rampant unless it is said to be otherwise. Fox-Davies thought heraldic art would not amount to much without the lion, “for no figure plays such an important or such an extensive part in armory.” The other attitudes are named: the Court of the Lord Lyon’s guide glosses passant as walking, guardant (gardant) as facing forward and regardant as looking backward. Barron found the lion passant the only one of the other attitudes commonly met with.
Origin and history
The oldest armorial seal of a sovereign prince yet found, Barron wrote in 1911, shows the rampant lion of Flanders. Richard I bore a lion rampant in 1189; nine years later his seal shows the familiar arms of England. His brother John, as a prince, had sealed with two lions passant. The royal crest, which goes back to Richard I, is a lion statant guardant, standing and facing out; Barron notes that the standing lion belongs on crests, not shields.
Lion or leopard?
The early heralds, mostly French, held that a lion must be rampant, so that a walking beast had to be a leopard. A roll of arms copied from one of about 1250 begins with the king of England’s arms as “trois lupards d’or”, three gold leopards. The two great English writers part company here. Fox-Davies said the English lions passant guardant were always drawn as lions, whatever they were called, and that the term leopard never had much sanction in British heraldry. Barron answered that the leopard was the lion drawn looking sidelong with its whole face showing, and that the English king’s beasts were leopards in blazon, ballad and chronicle: Henry V had a herald named Leopard, and Napoleon’s gazettes always spoke of the English leopards. French blazon still keeps the old distinction, Fox-Davies notes: their leopard is our lion passant guardant.
The lions of England and Scotland
The royal arms of the United Kingdom carry both. The three lions of England fill the first and fourth quarters, Britannica blazons them “gules three leopards or”, and the red lion rampant of Scotland, inside a double tressure flowered with fleurs-de-lis, fills the second. A crowned English lion supports the shield on the left, the Scottish Unicorn in heraldry on the right. A Scottish legend says a French king added the tressure to the Scottish lion for the Scots’ services, to show that the lion had defended the French lilies; Fox-Davies’ verdict was “All this is very pretty, but it is not history.”
The lion passant on silver
The walking lion is also the British sterling silver mark; that mark has its own page on our sister site, the lion passant hallmark.
Where you’ll see it today
whatdoesthissymbolmean.comFlag of SpainSpain’s flag has three horizontal stripes, red, yellow and red, the yellow twice as wide as each red, and on official flags the coat of arms on the yellow towards the pole. Spain’s flag law says the flag symbolises the nation and the sovereignty, independence, unity and integrity of the country; it gives the colours no separate meaning. whatdoesthissymbolmean.comFlag of LuxembourgLuxembourg’s flag is three equal horizontal stripes of red, white and light blue. The flag law gives the colours no meaning; they are the colours of the national arms, a red lion on stripes of silver and blue, used since the 13th century, Store norske leksikon says.Read next
- Next in HeraldryEagle 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.
- The same shape in Chinese mythology and symbolsFlaming pearlThe ball wrapped in flames that Chinese dragons reach for with open jaws, usually called a pearl. What it first stood for is disputed: the sun, thunder or the moon, and for Chinese Buddhists the jewel that grants every wish.
See also
Unicorn in heraldry, Griffin in heraldry, Coat of arms, Family crest, Tinctures (heraldic colours), Ordinaries.
Sources
- Heraldry (1911 Encyclopædia Britannica), Encyclopædia Britannica, 11th edition (1911), vol. 13, article by Oswald Barron, Encyclopædia Britannica, via Wikisource, Beasts and Birds; Origins: the seals of Richard I
- A Complete Guide to Heraldry, Arthur Charles Fox-Davies, 1909 (Project Gutenberg ebook 41617), T. C. & E. C. Jack, via Project Gutenberg, Chapter XI, The Heraldic Lion, pp. 172–174; Chapter IX, The Status and the Meaning of a Coat of Arms: the Scottish tressure, p. 143
- Coats of Arms, Royal Residences, Art and History (Internet Archive copy, 4 October 2026), The Royal Family (royal.uk), article text
- Blazoning: the language of heraldry, Educational sheet, Court of the Lord Lyon, Attitudes of beasts
- Coat of arms, Britannica (Internet Archive copy, 25 August 2026), Encyclopaedia Britannica, caption to the Royal Arms
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from curves and waves.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 10, 2026. How we research
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