Heraldic Art
Heraldic Art is the science
of arms or coats of arms.
It was born during the Middle Ages during the age of chivalry
in order to permit persons to recognize their friends or enemies
under their armours. The first armorials were painted on shields.
Nobility marked their
possessions with their arms as a method of identification.
They would also have seals made in order to be affixed
to their opinions, judgments, decisions, and their charters.
Their arms would often be engraved on their
chairs, their church pews, painted on the walls of their castles,
worked in stainglass, sculpted on their tomb, etc.
Set aside for nobility
in the beginning, arms and family coat of arms tended to democratize
themselves. From nobility, arms passed to the bourgeoisie
to the landowners to the well-to-do merchants, and finally
to the liberal professions.
In Switzerland, all
persons have the right to own coat-of arms. If a
family does not yet carry arms, he can have one made as long
as the laws of heraldry are respected and as long as the emblem
chosen does not yet exist.
It is the Heraldist who
is expected to know how and where to find the Family coats-of-arms.
To find Family coats-of-arms,
one must know:
- the FAMILY NAME,
- the COUNTRY OF
ORIGIN,
- the PLACE, LOCALITY,
WHERE THE FAMILY ORIGINATED.For Switzerland, one must
also know le Canton et la Commune d’origine, (in
French), Kanton und Heimatgemeinde, (in German),
Cantone e Comuni d’origine (in Italian), the
Canton and the commune of origin (in English!).
Without these exact indications,
one cannot define which arms maybe attributed. There are often
numerous different coat-of-arms for a same name. It is the
origin that makes the difference.
One should be extremely
careful of ANY PERSON or of ANYONE who pretends
to furnish arms of families but who cares little about the
place, locality of your Family’s origins. Some companies
exist who simply pick up a coat-of-arms with a name regardless
of the area where it was found and give it to someone with
the same surname without regard to country, to family, to
lineage. The same coat-of-arms is, naturally, given to people
with the same name. (Imagine the wrong coat-of--arms
on the house walls of thousands of people because of this
sham! (sic))
Actually, qualified specialists
are extremely rare. The institutes which deal with heraldry
often gravitate toward claiming to furnish everything and
to know all. These are to be avoided as their data is generally
false or wrong to begin with.
It is important to know
that all families are not all entitled to arms: only serious
research will bring a positive or a negative answer to this
question.
In his heraldic work,
the artist adheres to precise fundamental rules and the work
must be given to an artist that has worked numerous years
in this art. Beware of artwork which is not guaranteed 100%
hand painted.
A painting of coat-of-arms
achieved entirely by hand (as done in the past), is the final
touch to a house. It is therefore important not to have the
work carried out by just anyone!
Claude-Georges
Brülhart
30 January 1997
translated
by Jacques de Guise
8 February 1997
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