Heraldry

Heraldry, also known as armory, is a discipline concerned with the design, display, study and transmission of armorial bearings, a full heraldic achievement of which may include a coat of arms on a shield, helmet and crest together with supporters, badges, banners and mottoes, all formally described in a blazon. Devices used to signify individuals and groups go back to antiquity, but the regular, hereditary designs that define heraldry proper did not develop until the High Middle Ages, and while it is often claimed that face concealing helmets made it hard to recognize commanders in the field and so necessitated a symbolic language of identification, there is little real support for that explanation. The perceived beauty and pageantry of heraldic design let it survive the gradual abandonment of armor on the battlefield during the seventeenth century, and it has been described poetically as the handmaid of history, the shorthand of history and the floral border in the garden of history; in modern times individuals, public and private organizations, corporations, cities, towns and regions all use heraldry and its conventions to symbolize their heritage, achievements and aspirations. Heraldry is closely related to vexillology, the study of flags and already a live hobby on this atlas, as well as to genealogy and to the study of ceremony and rank.