The French edition of Slate has published a very interesting article on heraldry’s implications for intellectual property law. It makes frequent reference to Bartolus de Saxoferraro and touches upon a number of questions we’ve energetically discussed here. See http://m.slate.fr/story/117381/armoiries-open-access. If I find time to translate it, I will.
There is a "translate" tab in the document - haven’t read it yet so can’t vouch for how well it does!
I read the article, as translated by the machine :( , at lunchtime. Interesting but partisan - their interest is in overcoming copyright protections, so heraldry was in this case just a convenient horse to ride.
Isn’t the French government considering re-regulating Heraldry? I read somewhere (either here or over at IAAH) that the French had even formed a government committee to consider this. I think this would bring heraldry in France back under the Intellectual Property tent.
IIRC - always iffy! - it’s a registration system, not mandatory. Don’t know how that does or doesn’t affect intellectual property or copyright status.