Signification of Supporters

 
Jay Bohn
 
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Jay Bohn
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17 June 2011 11:17
 

Fred White;84926 wrote:

I hesitate to say "always and everywhere," but "most of the time and most places" seems pretty airtight. I don’t see how it can be denied.


Fair enough, but if not always and everywhere, then the signification of rank cannot be essential to heraldry.

 
Kenneth Mansfield
 
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17 June 2011 11:21
 

Fred White;84921 wrote:

Supporters did not start as "more exclusive." They started as mere ornament.


:banghead:

 

Yes, they started as mere ornament, but at a time when heraldry was its most exclusive. As the use of coats of arms expanded, the use of supporters did not.

 
 
Wilfred Leblanc
 
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17 June 2011 14:16
 

Kenneth Mansfield;84931 wrote:

:banghead:


Oh, so you want to get animated, do you? How about resolving some of the paradoxes embedded in the AHS Guidelines instead?

 
Wilfred Leblanc
 
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17 June 2011 18:17
 

Kenneth Mansfield;84931 wrote:

Yes, they started as mere ornament, but at a time when heraldry was its most exclusive. As the use of coats of arms expanded, the use of supporters did not.


I think this is a rationalization intended to end a debate you lack the energy to continue but are not certain of winning. What you seem to be saying is that supporters acquired and maintain a fixed meaning, while the meaning of crests and shields continued evolving to the point where they signify nothing in terms of social status. That plainly isn’t the case, regardless of how aggressively or exasperatedly one insists it is.

 
Wilfred Leblanc
 
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17 June 2011 18:36
 

Jay Bohn;84930 wrote:

Fair enough, but if not always and everywhere, then the signification of rank cannot be essential to heraldry.


Fair enough, but if the signification of rank cannot be essential to heraldry in general, then what can the objection be to supporters in particular?

 
Wilfred Leblanc
 
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17 June 2011 18:39
 

Jay Bohn;84928 wrote:

Because heraldry had to be adapted to the prevailing cultural and legal climate. It may be overstatement to say that use of arms was common but it was not as rare as the use of supporters as demonstrated by prior posts.


But on the eve of the founding of the U.S., heraldry had not adapted to anything. It was simply the English system represented by colonial subjects.

 
liongam
 
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liongam
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17 June 2011 20:28
 

Just one small correction.  Apart from any royal hereditary peerages granted since 1964 there have been three hereditary peerages granted.  These were to long standing and distinguished politicians, viz: Viscount Tonypandy (The Rt Hon George Thomas, a former Speaker of the House of Commons), Viscount Whitelaw (The Rt Hon William Whitelaw, a leading Tory cabinet minister) and the Earl of Stockton (The Rt Hon Harold Macmillan, a former Prime Minister).  Out of the three, the Earldom of Stockton is still extant, whilst the Viscountcies of Tonypandy and Whitelaw have fallen into extinction for want of a male heir.

As I understand it Life Peers are granted supporters for their lifetime alone (like KG’s, KT’s and Knight Grand Cross and Bailiffs Grand Cross) as such (naturally) they are not inheritable by their heirs.  I believe at one time it was mooted that the heirs of each subsequent generation to those created Life Peers, should be allowed to inherit the supporters as an augmentation and remembrance that at one time a member of the family had sat as peers in the High Court of Parliament.  It would appear that this idea was never followed through, which was a shame as this would have marginally increased the use of supporters within the British system.

 

John

 
Nick B II
 
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Nick B II
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17 June 2011 20:43
 

Fred White;84954 wrote:

I think this is a rationalization intended to end a debate you lack the energy to continue but are not certain of winning. What you seem to be saying is that supporters acquired and maintain a fixed meaning, while the meaning of crests and shields continued evolving to the point where they signify nothing in terms of social status. That plainly isn’t the case, regardless of how aggressively or exasperatedly one insists it is.


Burgher Arms signify nothing in terms of rank or social status. They include an escutcheon, helm, and crest.

 

Which you know perfectly well, and were arguing a few days ago when you thought you might convince people supporters did not indicate social status. If an escutcheon implies something about your social status having one AND having supporters implies something about your social status. End of debate.

 

This forces me to ask a simple question of the audience:

Is Fred trolling yet?

 

Changing your position 180°, apparently solely so you can continue a debate that stopped being productive days ago, is fairly trollish IMHO.

 

Nick

 
David Pope
 
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17 June 2011 21:13
 

Nick B II;84962 wrote:

Burgher Arms signify nothing in terms of rank or social status. They include an escutcheon, helm, and crest.


I keep seeing references to burgher arms, but I’m having a hard time understanding their relationship to American heraldry.  Is there evidence that heraldic traditions which feature burgher arms (I’m guessing Dutch, German, Swiss???) had any real historical influence on American heraldry?

 
Kenneth Mansfield
 
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17 June 2011 21:55
 

David Pope;84965 wrote:

I keep seeing references to burgher arms, but I’m having a hard time understanding their relationship to American heraldry.  Is there evidence that heraldic traditions which feature burgher arms (I’m guessing Dutch, German, Swiss???) had any real historical influence on American heraldry?


While the term "Burgher arms" I think usually refers to arms assumed by the citizen class in countries like Germany, I believe some people are usung it to include the free assumption of arms by the merchant class (tradesmen and artisans) in England as well—the practice of which Joe has shown us several examples.

 

If that’s not what they mean, I’m just as confused as you are, David.

 
 
Kenneth Mansfield
 
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17 June 2011 22:38
 

Fred White;84954 wrote:

I think this is a rationalization intended to end a debate you lack the energy to continue but are not certain of winning. What you seem to be saying is that supporters acquired and maintain a fixed meaning, while the meaning of crests and shields continued evolving to the point where they signify nothing in terms of social status. That plainly isn’t the case, regardless of how aggressively or exasperatedly one insists it is.


Not at all. But it is disingenuous to cite the original use of supporters in heraldry without at the same time acknowledging 1) that the only people using heraldry at that time were the same classes of people to whom supporters were later restricted, and 2) that the amount of time that supporters were used as mere decoration has been completely eclipsed by hundreds upon hundreds of years in which they have been primarily limited to a specific subset of armigers.

 
 
Wilfred Leblanc
 
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18 June 2011 01:58
 

Nick B II;84962 wrote:

Changing your position 180°, apparently solely so you can continue a debate that stopped being productive days ago, is fairly trollish IMHO.


Nick, my position has been entirely consistent throughout this debate, and that position is that no coherent argument for Americans to completely eschew supporters is forthcoming, and that Americans therefore should not always be discouraged from using them. You are mistaking my efforts to expose the lack of cohesion in others’ arguments for my taking more than one position.

 

If you’ve concluded that this debate is no longer productive, by all means abandon it. Personally, I’ve found it very interesting to realize just how many competing, irreconcilable narratives there are about what American heraldry is and where it has come from, even among people that I previously assumed were pretty much on the same page. My interest in this subject is sincere.

 
liongam
 
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liongam
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18 June 2011 02:34
 

As I mentioned in a previous comment upon this topic, the free assumption of arms - arms by prescription in England ended many centuries ago.  If arms were adopted after the period when the Crown through its duly appointed officers - the heralds - started to regulate heraldry, these arms would necessarily be without due authority and therefore would be bogus having no recognition under the Crown.  After the period in English history known as ‘The Wars of the Roses’, the bloody internecine struggle between the Houses of York (the White Rose) and Lancaster (the Red Rose) for the English Crown a number of noble, knightly and gentry families were decimated, the rise of a new class from the ‘men who had done good’, primarily from The City (of London), but also from elsewhere in England and beyond.  These men were the leading citizens of London and other cities who were members of guilds and the like. Men who prospered through trade and by dint of hard work and the gradual acquisition of wealth, land and power, as well as gaining the ear of those in the King’s Court.  For many, during the Tudor and Stuart period, knighthoods and peerages came their way for services rendered to the Crown.  This particular group of individuals of ‘new men’ became the life blood of the heralds.  It should be remembered, that today’s Dukes of Bedford stemmed from a Dorset (a county in the south west of England) family who originally made their money from sheep/wool.  In consequence of their wealth made from this endeavour they were able climb ‘the greasy pole’ and gain favours from the Crown.  Consequently, since this time the heralds have always had an eye on the new men (and, today, new women as well) from which to draw a pool of new grantees.  Although this is not totally exclusive.

When I mentioned the concept of self assumed arms in the United States as the equivalence of burgher arms on continental Europe, I meant those arms that are not perceived as being ‘gentle’ (gentry/noble) as in the British Isles, but are arms to be viewed purely as ensigns of identification without any connotation of rank whatsoever.

 

John

 
Wilfred Leblanc
 
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18 June 2011 02:37
 

Kenneth Mansfield;84967 wrote:

Not at all. But it is disingenuous to cite the original use of supporters in heraldry without at the same time acknowledging 1) that the only people using heraldry at that time were the same classes of people to whom supporters were later restricted


I don’t see your point. I believe we see heraldry used by knights and not just their feudal overlords in the Middle Ages. Supporters were later restricted (in a number of traditions, but not by any means universally) only to the latter group.


Quote:

2) that the amount of time that supporters were used as mere decoration has been completely eclipsed by hundreds upon hundreds of years in which they have been primarily limited to a specific subset of armigers.


I bring up the merely decorative origins of supporters as one of the bases for saying that they should be acceptable in American heraldry because doing so would seem to be congenial to an outlook that says free assumption was the original mode of acquiring arms. If heraldry’s origins are the rationale for assuming arms in America today, what can be the objection to supporters?

 

Perhaps you want to emphasize origins sometimes and the durability of patterns at other times, but the durable pattern in heraldry is that armorial bearings of any sort connote or denote membership in an elite, not that armorial bearings are merely a pictorial signature. Burgher and peasant arms have existed here and there, of course, but they are outliers, and there is every reason to assume, in any case, that burghers and peasants were interested in armorial bearings because they saw them as communicating high status. That reality doesn’t seem palatable to you, though.

 
Kenneth Mansfield
 
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18 June 2011 09:35
 

Fred White;84970 wrote:

I bring up the merely decorative origins of supporters as one of the bases for saying that they should be acceptable in American heraldry because doing so would seem to be congenial to an outlook that says free assumption was the original mode of acquiring arms. If heraldry’s origins are the rationale for assuming arms in America today, what can be the objection to supporters?

The origins of heraldry is only one of the examples of free assumption. Arms were also assumed by tradesmen and artisans, guilds, etc. long after heraldry left the (literal) shield and leaped onto stationery and business signs.


Fred White;84970 wrote:

Perhaps you want to emphasize origins sometimes and the durability of patterns at other times, but the durable pattern in heraldry is that armorial bearings of any sort connote or denote membership in an elite, not that armorial bearings are merely a pictorial signature. Burgher and peasant arms have existed here and there, of course, but they are outliers, and there is every reason to assume, in any case, that burghers and peasants were interested in armorial bearings because they saw them as communicating high status. That reality doesn’t seem palatable to you, though.

I no more disagree with your assertion that arms primarily connote elitism than I disagree with the idea that supporters primarily connote nobility. Do we know that burgher/peasant arms are more outliers than supporters? (really asking)