arms of the Queens of Scotland, commencing with "Sanct Margaret," are impaled within lozenges with those of their husbands; and the same arrangement occurs in the portrait of Margaret of Denmark (Queen of James III.) on the interesting altar-piece of Trinity College Church, now at Holyrood Palace, which Mr. David Laing considers to have been painted not later than the year 1484. Two other remarkable examples of lozenges occur on the monument, surmounted by two recumbent figures, within the ruinous choir of the parish church of Dalkeith, supposed to represent James Douglas, first Earl of Morton (who died about 1498), and Johan his wife, third daughter of James I. The lozenge at the head of the male figure

is nearly equally divided by a horizontal line (in heraldic language, "party per fess"), the upper portion being charged with two mullets, the original bearing of the Morton family; while the lozenge at the head of the female figure exhibits the same coat on the dexter side, 1 Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, iii. 8.

ARMORIAL LOZENGES.

211

impaled with the Royal arms of Scotland.' Three or four late examples of the lozenge occur in the curious set of playing cards, exhibiting the arms of the Scottish Nobility, engraved at Edinburgh in the year 1691.2 Thus, on the card representing the Queen of Clubs, along with the escutcheon of the Duke of Lennox within a garter, the bearings of Anne Scott, Duchess of Buccleuch, widow of the Duke of Monmouth, figure on a lozenge surrounded by a cordeliere or silver cord, to be afterwards referred to both the escutcheon and the lozenge, which are placed side by side, being jointly surmounted by a duke's coronet.3 In England, the lozenge appears to have been used by ladies about the middle of the fourteenth century, as on the seals of Elizabeth Darcie (1347) and Maud Fitzpayne (1356). In the first of these examples, five lozenges are curiously conjoined in the form

1 Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, iii. 27.

2 The author is indebted to his friend Mr. David Laing for the loan of a copy of these playing cards. Besides the set belonging to Mr. Laing, there are copies at Abbotsford and Drummond Castle. The first of the set, forming a sort of title-page, exhibits the arms of the City of Edinburgh; and the second, the insignia of the Lyon Office impaled with the bearings of Sir Alexander Erskine, Lyon King-of-Arms. The four Kings (hearts, clubs, spades, and diamonds) bear the arms of Scotland, England, France, and Ireland; the four Queens, those of the Dukes of Hamilton, Gordon, Queensberry, and Lennoxthe last being conjoined, as stated

in the text, with those of the Duchess of Buccleuch. Three of the Knaves (termed Princes) display the ensigns of the Marquises of Douglas, Montrose, and Atholl, the fourth (diamonds) bearing the arms of three Earls--Argyll, Crawford, and Errol. Each of the remaining cards, of which the value is indicated by a number (thus ♡ 7-signifying the seven of hearts) is occupied by three, and in a few instances four, escutcheons, with the arms of the rest of the Earls and the Lords.

3 Plate XIV. fig. 8.

4 Engraved in Dallaway, Plate xxv. See also the curious seal of Nicholas de Canteloup (1359), engraved at p. 36 of Montagu's Guide to the Study of Heraldry, exhibiting a shield charged

of a saltire, the centre lozenge exhibiting the lady's arms (on the dexter side) impaled with her husband's, while the four other lozenges are charged with her ancestral ensigns. In the second, a single lozenge is charged with the arms of Fitzpayne, and surrounded by various heraldic devices within circular compartments.

Reference has already been made, in the preceding chapter, to the custom of placing a smaller escutcheon (parmula) Overall or Surtout, i.e., on the fess point of the shield. The seal of Sir William Hay, previously. referred to, affords the earliest Scottish example of a shield surtout (exhibiting the paternal arms), being appended to the charter of foundation of the Collegiate Church of St. Bathan's, in the year 1421. The earliest instances in Mr. Laing's Catalogue of this mode of marshalling are the seals of Walter Stewart, Earl of Atholl (1430), James, ninth Earl of Douglas (1453), and Alexander Gordon (paternally Seton), first Earl of Huntly (1457), the charges in the shields surtout being a ship (or lymphad), a lion rampant, and three lions' heads, for the Lordships of Caithness, Galloway, and Badenoch respectively.1

with the arms of Canteloup, supported by two lions and surrounded by three lozenges, each bearing the ensigns not of his wife, but of her former husband, whose lordship she

is supposed to have brought to De Canteloup.

1

Laing's Catalogue, Nos. 794, 248, and 361; also Plate Ix. fig. 2.

ORIGINAL OBJECT OF CRESTS.

213

SECTION II.- -THE CREST, MOTTO, AND RELATIVE

APPENDAGES.

Ancient documentary seals afford many valuable illustrations of the mode of bearing Crests, Helmets, Mottos, and other exterior heraldic ornaments. The CREST (Crista), as is well known, was a figure affixed, at an early age, to the warrior's helmet, for the purpose of distinction in the confusion of battle; and there can be no doubt that it was in common use long before the hereditary bearing of coat-armour. In the first instance, crests seem to have been purely personal, and their connexion with the family arms is considered to have been not earlier than the end of the thirteenth, or the commencement of the fourteenth century. They were originally confined to a select few, being given by royal grant; and even at the present day, there are several old English families who have never used them. The assumption of crests (or helmets) by Clergymen-a frequent practice both in England and Scotland-besides being improper in itself, is not sanctioned by ancient

1 At a later period, the same object was served by the Surcoat, which was placed over the armour, and embroidered with the arms of the wearer. Stowe mentions that at the battle of Bannockburn "there was slain Gilbert de Clare, Earle of Gloucester, whome the Scottes would gladly have kept for a ransome, if they had known him; but he had forgotten to put on his coat of armes." Among the Greeks, the helmet

2

214

CLERGYMEN AND LADIES.

precedent, and with the exception of Sovereign Princesses, no Ladies are entitled to bear these exterior ornaments. On many of the beautiful altar-tombs exhibiting the recumbent figures of a "baron and femme," in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the crest of both the husband's and the wife's family are sculptured at the feet of the effigies. This, however, appears to be the only occasion on which crests were associated with the softer sex during the best days of Heraldry. Their use is expressly interdicted, in the following terms, at a Chapter of Heralds, held at Broiderer's Hall, London, in the fourth year of England's "Virgin Queen" (1562):-"That noe inheritresse, maid, wife, or widow shall beare or cause to be borne any crest or cognizances of her auncestor but as followeth. If she be unmarried to beare in her ringe cognizances or otherwise the first coate of her auncestors in a lozenge; and during her widowhood to use the first coat of her husband impaled with the first coat of her auncestor, and if she be married with any that is no gentleman, then soe to be exempted from this conclusion."

A few instances of ladies bearing crests, and occasionally also supporters, occur in the second volume of the Lyon Register, about the year 1814, including Miss William Boyd Robertson of Lawers, sole heiress of her uncle, Archibald Robertson of Lawers; Mrs. Farquharson of Invercauld; and the "Hon. Dame Mary Frederica

1 When a clergyman happens to be a peer or a knight, he is entitled to place a helmet and crest over his escutcheon; and several bishops of

Durham have timbred their shields, in token of their temporal dignity as earls-palatine.-Glossary of Heraldry, p. 162.