[ANSTHRLD] Conflict check.

[Tim McDaniel]

On Thu, 24 Jul 2003 PKieferjr at aol.com <heralds at ansteorra.org> wrote:
> In a message dated 7/24/2003 9:55:14 PM Central Daylight Time,
> ravenrux at cox.net writes:
>
> > per chevron argent and azure, two griffins segreant addorsed of
> > the first in chief, a garb in base Or

One thing I forgot to mention in my first reply: "segreant" is the
default posture of a griffin.  So "segreant" can be omitted.  Then
again, it can be kept too, if you prefer.

> > conflict with:
> > per chevron throughout argent and azure, two griffons segreant
> > gules and two quill pens in saltire argent?
>
> First order of business: "Per chevron throughout"?  I don't think
> such is possible, but I could be wrong.

"Throughout" usually means "touching the side(s) of the shield".
You're right that "per <anything> throughout" is meaningless, because
they all touch the sides wherever they can ... EXCEPT for the special
case of "per chevron".  (Or "per chevron inverted", of course --
everything I say about "per chevron" applies to "per chevron
inverted", except for the bottom end instead of the chief side.)

Normal "per chevron" starts at the sides of the shield and slopes up
to a peak that doesn't touch the top of the shield.  In earlier
period, it tended to be steep and the peack almost touched the top of
the shield.  In later period, it tended to be flatter and the peak was
somewhat more below the top of the shield.  As with any other heraldic
art, the shape changes to fit charges and other design elements.  For
example, if there's a chief or bordure, the per chevron comes close to
but doesn't touch *it*.  If there are charges above, the per chevron
tends to flatten out a little.

The same for a chevron (the charge): it slopes upward from the sides
but does not touch the top of the shield (or any chief or bordure).

However.  "Per chevron throughout" means that the peak *does* exactly
touch the top of the shield (or the chief or bordure).  That's where
"throughout" comes in: not saying what the sides are doing (per
chevron always touches the sides) but that the *peak* is touching the
edge of the field.

> Second: We don't say it the same way as RL heraldry.  So, "of the
> first" being the same as the first color mentioned, I assume you
> mean "argent".

That's indeed the meaning of what he wrote.

> Third:  I believe (and someone can correct me on this) it's
> >in base x< and not >x in base<.  Same with "in chief".

They work in both places.
    Per fess gules and Or, in chief three roundels vair.
is the same as
    Per fess gules and Or, three roundels vair in chief.
In this case, there's no confusion.

But consider a sick commaless blazon:
    Gules, two fountains in fess in chief in fess three bezants.
Having three "in" clauses in a row is confusing.  Also, at first
reading, it's not clear what the "in fess" and/or "in chief" stuff are
referring to, respectively.

So I prefer to throw in "and" in there to separate the two charge
groups.  (If it's in a bordure instead, I often use "within" instead
of "and" before the blazon of the bordure.)  Also, I tend to move "in"
clauses towards the ends of the blazon, so that it's clear exactly what
they refer to.  What do I mean by "towards the ends"? For example, in
    Gules, X in fess Y.
"in fess" could refer to X or to Y, as I mentioned above.  With
    Gules, in fess X Y.
(moving it towards the start of the blazon) it's clear that "in fess"
can modify only X, and in
    Gules, X Y in fess.
(moving it towards the end of the blazon) it's clear that "in fess"
can modify only Y.  So I'd reword the confusing example above to be
    Gules, in fess two fountains and in chief three bezants in fess.
making it clear that there are

   bezant    bezant    bezant

       FOUNTAIN    FOUNTAIN

             (blank)

and the fountains are larger than the bezants.

> Now, taking those into account, we compare the two items and we find
> them to be clear of each other for the following reasons:
>
> 1.  Griffons gules vs. Griffons Or.
      (Actually, as you pointed out above, one has gules griffins and
      the other has argent griffins.  Same analysis, though.)
> 2.  Garb vs two quill pens.
>
> That alone is sufficient to call them clear.

True, but you're using more advanced paths -- the shortcuts you take
requires a little more explanation that the full forms I used.  Each
of the Rules for Submission X.4._ rules for changing charges on the
field say that changing at least half the charges in a single group
counts as much as changing the entire group.

So one is
    FIELD1, two griffins addorsed argent and a garb Or.
and the other is
    FIELD2, two griffins gules and two quill pens in saltire argent.
In both cases, the griffins are at least half their charge group.
Therefore, just seeing that the griffins change tincture is enough to
conclude that there's a CD for tincture change for the group -- we
don't even have to consider the garb and pens (if they were all the
same tincture, we'd still get the CD).  Since the garb and pens in
fact have different tinctures too, I preferred to skip explaining
the "change at least half the group" business and just use the base
rule that all of them changed.

> 2.  Garb vs two quill pens.

Oh, you're right!  I'd missed the type change -- thanks for pointing
it out.  It's a third CD.

This requires even more advanced explanation.  The garb is only one
charge, but given two griffins, that's only one out of three charges.
So since one is less than half of three, that's not enough to be worth
a CD, you'd think?  *BUT* there's an early precedent (Da'ud's first
tenure, early 1990s) that says that the bottommost of three charges
alone on the field, or around a central ordinary, is deemed to be half
the group for purposes of X.4._ CD-level difference.  So you get a CD
for change of type of at least half the group (two quill pens are half
their group; the garb is deemed to be "half" its charge group).

I found it simpler to just note that there are three charges in one
armory's group and four charges in the other armory's group, and it is
easy to see that that is the second CD, and I can stop counting at
that point.  For teaching and explaining rules, though, it's best to
keep counting all the CDs you see.

> A note: Since the griffons are of the same color as half the field,
> one of them will probably disappear and create an identifiability
> issue.

Right.  An identifiability issue up there with the proverbial polar
bear in a blizzard.

Daniel de Lincolia
-- 
Tim McDaniel (home); Reply-To: tmcd at panix.com; work is tmcd at us.ibm.com.