[ANSTHRLD] Follow up on Baron Tepesa, part 2

[Thorn]

Why, Daniel,

I know that being displayed straight across is acceptable in the SCA but I
thought that the crosses in chief should follow the chevron since it is
there to be in period.

Am I wrong about this?

? Charles Ó Floinn, ?
Thorn at raf662bravo.com
Herald, Shire of Rosenfeld
Kilgore, Texas

-----Original Message-----
From: heralds-bounces+tons=raf662bravo.com at ansteorra.org
[mailto:heralds-bounces+tons=raf662bravo.com at ansteorra.org]On Behalf Of
tmcd at panix.com
Sent: Wednesday, January 25, 2006 4:11 PM
To: Heralds List, Kingdom of Ansteorra - SCA, Inc.
Subject: RE: [ANSTHRLD] Follow up on Baron Tepesa, part 2

On Wed, 25 Jan 2006, [utf-8] Alasdair MacEogan <alasdair at bmhanson.net>
wrote:
> No rules violation.  A field divided as this is (Per chevron gules
> and sable) is perfectly legal.  It is not color on color, but as you
> said color "next to" color.  That is perfectly within the rules of
> heraldry and done all of the time.

To clarify Alasdair's meaning: note that he wrote "divided as this is
(Per chevron".  There are other divisions of the field that, like per
chevron, can have color next to color or metal next to metal, but
there are many others that cannot.  The full list is in Rules for
Submission VIII.2.b, Contrast Requirements.  (The RfS are quite useful
for answering such questions: having a copy stashed on your own hard
drive, along with the College of Arms Administrative Handbook, can be
of great use.)

> Hmm, let me try:
>
> Per chevron sable and gules a chevron argent between in chief
> three crosses crosslet fitchy in fess and in base a pheonix Or.
>
> Hmm, that does not look right either.  I have to run though and
> cannot figure out where it is wrong right now.  :-) I am not sure
> that the "in chief" and "in base" need to be there.

In fact, they don't.  If you have "Per chevron this and that", or "a
chevron between this and that", it is assumed (unless the blazon says
otherwise or it gets too complicated) that "this" is in chief and
"that" is in base.  It's similar to how we handle "fess" (chief then
base), "pale" (dexter then sinister), "bend" (sinister chief then
dexter base), and such.

We also put a comma after the field.

As for the flames: later.  The flames may have to be blazoned just to
get the tincture specified.

    Per chevron sable and gules, a chevron argent between three
    crosses crosslet fitchy in fess and a phoenix Or rising from
    flames [something].

> Design wise it does not violate any construction rules

Wellllll ...

As the Pic Dic correctly points out, "The flames need not be blazoned;
without flames, it wouldn't be a phoenix".  BUT as drawn on the Web
page, <http://www.bonwicke.org/KaininHeraldryGB.gif>, it looks
extremely modernistic in style.  Furthermore, a heraldic phoenix sits
on a sort of nest of flames (sort of the first second of "we have
liftoff"), and there's no room for that here.  There's tongues of red
coming up over the phoenix, which would make gules flames with a gules
field, which is at best hard to decode, but there's no outlines to
help show what's going on.  Basically, I can't figure out what
tincture(s) the flames are.

I wondered about flames proper (alternating tongues of gules and Or)
on a gules background and Or charge -- that is, no contrast at all.
But there's

    Caid, Kingdom of (9407C), Gules, on a phoenix Or rising from
    flames proper a Roman numeral V gules, in chief a crescent, a
    bordure Or.

And Astrid of Flanders too, from 1992.  And 8/02, Artemisia,
registered without comment from Laurel or commenters:

    Magn{u'}s Slembidj{a'}kn. Device. Gules, a phoenix argent rising
    from flames proper and in chief a compass rose Or.

So I guess flames proper on a gules field and Or phoenix is not
necessarily an "instaboing" (to use the formal heraldic term; don't
try this at home).

Enough rambling about.  He wants a phoenix.  A phoenix gotta flame.
What tinctures does he think the flames are?  They would have to be
depicted as flames in the armory.  Does he like the notion of, say,
flames being all Or, so questions of contrast go away?  Or perhaps
argent?  (Ermine?!  Vair?!)

> Now asking if it is a period style

Not really.  "Per X an X between this and that" is typical SCA but
quite rare in period (though not utterly unknown).  Per chevron /
a chevron divides the field more naturally into three zones, so it
would be more common to see two charges in chief than three.
Crosses crosslet fitchy are fine period charges, and the phoenix is
not at all unknown, so I think they're good.

Danihel de Lindo
--
"Me, I love the USA; I never miss an episode." -- Paul "Fruitbat" Sleigh
Tim McDaniel; Reply-To: tmcd at panix.com
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