Author Topic: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web  (Read 16778 times)

Offline Keith Sherwood

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Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« on: Sunday 22 March 09 11:12 GMT (UK) »
Hi, Everyone,
Could someone tell me whether there is a good website where (for free) one could look up details of family coats of arms.  There seem to be an awful number of firms who offer to make up (in many cases bogus) coats of arms for an exorbitant fee, and I imagine writing to the College of Heralds and asking them to research a family and a particular date  for an award (?) of arms might be costly too.
Any suggestions...?
Very best wishes,
keith

Offline stanmapstone

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Re: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« Reply #1 on: Sunday 22 March 09 14:27 GMT (UK) »
There is no such thing as a 'coat of arms for a surname'. Many people of the same surname will often be entitled to completely different coats of arms, and many of that surname will be entitled to no coat of arms. Coats of arms belong to individuals. For any person to have a right to a coat of arms they must either have had it granted to them or be descended in the legitimate male line from a person to whom arms were granted or confirmed in the past.
See 'Frequently Asked Questions' at http://www.college-of-arms.gov.uk/Faq.htm


Stan
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Offline stanmapstone

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Re: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« Reply #2 on: Sunday 22 March 09 14:31 GMT (UK) »
Apparently if a person behind a stall in shopping arcade selling plaques tells you that you have bought a copy of "your family coat-of-arms" then they are breaking the law and you should report them to your local Trading Standards Office for fraud.  :)

Stan
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Offline Lesanne

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Re: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« Reply #3 on: Sunday 22 March 09 14:44 GMT (UK) »
http://www.uk-genealogy.org.uk/visitations/index.html

Hi Keith, Hows you.... Are you deep in the medi-eval's as well now....

The above site has a few examples of Families with Arms, that were 'registered' at the time the Kings herald went for a visit....   
Berkshire is on line there and shows how lineage and marriages are incorporated to make 'a coat of arms' for individual families....
You would then need futher evidence... (wills, letters, etc) to help confirm that's your ancestor.

I'm working on the Norreys family from Ockwells.  ::) It shows 8 different families bought together in the one 'arms'.   
Just got back from Liverpool, with the Lancastrian part of the family!! Pinpointed the line that the Ockwells family descend from....   all very interesting....

Good luck.   :D  Lesanne.
Census Information is Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk

Berks Bucks Oxon= Norris Coxhead Turner Cox Weston Baston Simpson
Kent= Nicholls Mepstead Watts   Mile End=Craze Wood Bennett
Cork=Howe   NZ=Coxhead   Canada=Fenn Cox Turner


Offline Siamese Girl

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Re: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« Reply #4 on: Sunday 22 March 09 15:04 GMT (UK) »
I have to say that the College of Heralds (although it was a few years back now) were very helpful to us when we approached them about our, as it turned out, bogus Arms and put us on the right path - it was research well worth paying for.

I'm perfectly certain a lot of those fancy C19th &19th church monuments with fancy arms, crests and whatnots on them are bogus - is it too late for Trading Standards to do anything about them?  ;)

Carole
CHILD Glos/London, BONUS London, DIMSDALE London, HODD and TUTT Sussex,  BONNER and PATTEN Essex, BOWLER and HOLLIER Oxfordshire, HUGH Lincolnshire, LEEDOM all.

Offline willow154

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Re: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« Reply #5 on: Sunday 22 March 09 15:08 GMT (UK) »
Hi Keith,
You could try looking at one of the sites mentioned here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coat_of_arms
Hope it helps.
Paulene :)

Offline Keith Sherwood

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Re: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« Reply #6 on: Sunday 22 March 09 16:06 GMT (UK) »
Well! What a good, helpful response on here...
It's just that my mum has been to a course on heraldry and is now pretty clued up about what the descriptive mumbo-jumbo actually means - re colours, symbols, designs, etc.
And in our family papers we have come across a coat of arms described in this way for the GURNER family in Cambridgshire in 1622.  Just trying to check out its authenticity, and who the individual in the family might have been to whom it might have been awarded.
Will check out some of those links now...
Many thanks, keith

Offline behindthefrogs

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Re: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« Reply #7 on: Sunday 22 March 09 16:32 GMT (UK) »
The 1622 coat of arms for a member of the Gurner family is probably genuine although even then there were people using coats of arms which the Heralds refused to confirm.  I would suggest that you try to find a copy of the Harleian (spelling?)Society publication of the Heralds Visitation to Cambridgeshire.  There was one published for most counties around the turn last century.  There is certainly a publication for the 1575 vistation to Cambridgeshire but there may also be a later one.

Most large reference libraries have copies for the counties which surround them.

If you can post the blazon for the crest (which sits on the helmet) and the wording of the motto I might be able to identfy the likely owner.

David

David

 
Living in Berkshire from Northampton & Milton Keynes
DETAILS OF MY NAMES ARE IN SURNAME INTERESTS, LINK AT FOOT OF PAGE
Wilson, Higgs, Buswell, PARCELL, Matthews, TAMKIN, Seckington, Pates, Coupland, Webb, Arthur, MAYNARD, Caves, Norman, Winch, Culverhouse, Drakeley.
Johnson, Routledge, SHIRT, SAICH, Mills, SAUNDERS, EDLIN, Perry, Vickers, Pakeman, Griffiths, Marston, Turner, Child, Sheen, Gray, Woolhouse, Stevens, Batchelor
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Offline Keith Sherwood

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Re: Looking up Heraldry or Coats of Arms on the Web
« Reply #8 on: Sunday 22 March 09 20:24 GMT (UK) »
David,
Here is the description:(bit of a handwritten scrawl, so might misrepresent what it actually says)
Armorial bearings of Gurner of Cambridgeshire 1622
Arms: argent a cross engrailed gules
in dexter canton a cinquefoil sable
Crest: on a chapeau gules, turned up ermine
a lion passant argent, supporting in its dexter paw a cinquefoil or.

There is a motto: Volonta e Lavoro, but I don't know how authentic or relevant it might be.
In the year 1622 the head of the family was a Robert Gurner, born in 1582, a yeoman farmer according to his will of 1655.  He was also church warden in Ickleton for a while.  Not sure whether a man of this status could have applied for and been granted a coat of arms, though...
keith