SR - Heraldry & Names

[Timothy A. McDaniel]

I was looking thru a book called _Anglo-Norman Armory II_
last night.  It's a compilation of the earliest English
armorial rolls, from around 1300.  The early style tends to
be "portable" -- to be appropriate to most time periods and
places.  I looked at lions in particular.

Common motifs:
- *Scads* of crowned lions.  A few were gorged, but of a
  collar.
- Those crowns were sometimes metal (light) and sometimes
  color (dark), so we may have freedom in choice of colors.
- Some cases of strewn charges (6-10 identical thingies) on
  the field around a lion.  They were simple thingies:
  crosses, drops, and the like.
- Some cases of one thingy on a lion, always shown as being
  on his shoulder.  The most common was a fleur-de-lys.

The most interesting one, I thought, was a crowned lion
rampant and in base a "mount".  He has one foot on the
mount, but that's a detail.  A mount is not a craggy
mountain, but a smooth rounded hill.  A period coat close to
my suggestion.  The name: Lowenstein, "lion stone".  So the
arms are a pun (a "cant") too!  Having seen the name and the
arms, it's hard to remember one and forget the other.

Pug, please add this proposal to the web page:

Loewenstein: Literally, "lion stone".  "Loewenberg", "lion
mountain", is also close in meaning.  Both names are known
from Germany in the Middle Ages.  (O-umlaut could be used
instead of "oe".)  Arms proposal: Gules, on a lion Or
crowned azure a mullet sable, on a mount Or a laurel wreath
gules.  A red background with gold lion rampant.  The lion is
wearing a blue crown (shows up very well against the red and
gold).  He has a black star on his shoulder, showing his
link to Ansteorra.  There is a golden rounded hill at the
bottom, and in the middle of it is a laurel wreath (required
for SCA branches), and the wreath is red.  Note: neither the
name nor the arms have been checked for SCA conflict.

Daniel "of course, what we'll *get* is 'The Mystyck Keepe of
the Dustie Unycorn Glen', where the yellow spots on the
purple unicorn (holding a rose in its teeth) represent the
dust ..." de Lincolia
-- 
Tim McDaniel.   Reply to tmcd at crl.com;
    if that fail, tmcd at austin.ibm.com is my work account.
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