Portal:Heraldry

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Welcome to the Heraldry and Vexillology Portal!

Vexillology (from the Latin vexillum, a flag or banner) is the scholarly study of flags, including the creation and development of a body of knowledge about flags of all types, their forms and functions, and of scientific theories and principles based on that knowledge. Flags were originally used to assist military coordination on the battlefield, and have evolved into a general tool for signalling and identification, particularly identification of countries.

Heraldry encompasses all of the duties of a herald, including the science and art of designing, displaying, describing and recording coats of arms and badges, as well as the formal ceremonies and laws that regulate the use and inheritance of arms. The origins of heraldry lie in the medieval need to distinguish participants in battles or jousts, whose faces were hidden by steel helmets.

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The seal of Indiana is used by the Governor of Indiana to certify official documents. The seal has gone through several revisions since the region was a part of the Northwest Territory. It is likely the original seal, which is similar to the current one, was created by William Henry Harrison during his administration of the Indiana Territory. The current design of the seal was standardized by the Indiana General Assembly in 1963.

The sun rising in the picture represents that Indiana has a bright future ahead and is just beginning. The mountains it rises over are a representation of the Allegheny Mountains showing that Indiana is in the west. The woodman represents civilization subduing the wilderness that was Indiana. The buffalo represents the wilderness fleeing westward away from the advancing civilization. (more...)

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Red ensign of Singapore

The Red Ensign of Singapore is a civil ensign used by privately-owned, non-military ships that are registered in Singapore. The overall design of the ensign is a modification of the national flag, with the ratio of the width to the length extended to 1:2. The ensign was created by law in 1966. The use of this ensign is regulated by the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA). According to the MPA, the Red Ensign is the only ensign to be used on Singaporean civilian ships, and the national flag is not an acceptable substitute. The ensign must be hoisted on all Singaporean ships on entering or leaving port. (more...)

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The Shield of the Trinity or Scutum Fidei is a traditional Christian visual symbol which expresses many aspects of the doctrine of the Trinity, summarizing the first part of the Athanasian Creed in a compact diagram. In medieval England and France, this emblem was considered to be the heraldic arms of God (and of the Trinity). The precise origin of this diagram is unknown, but it was evidently influenced by 12th-century experiments in symbolizing the Trinity in abstract visual form, mainly by Petrus Alfonsi's Tetragrammaton-Trinity diagram of ca. 1109.

The Shield of the Trinity diagram is attested from as early as a ca. 1208-1216 manuscript. The diagram was used heraldically from the mid-13th century, when a shield-shaped version of the diagram (not actually placed on a shield) was included among the heraldic shields in Matthew Paris' Chronica Majora, ca. 1250. Allegorical illustrations ca. 1260 show the diagram placed on a shield. The period of its most widespread use was during the 15th and 16th centuries, when it is in found in a number of English and French manuscripts, books, stained-glass windows and ornamental carvings. (more...)

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The town hall of Gouda, a city in the Netherlands, displaying heraldic banners of the arms of (left to right) the Dutch Republic (1581–1795), the County of Holland (1198–) and the Kingdom of the Netherlands (1815–).

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Did you know...

...that Johan Teterisa was sentenced to life in prison for waving the banned secessionist flag (pictured) of the so-called Republic of the South Moluccas in front of Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono during a nonviolent protest?

...that the seals of the graduate schools of Harvard University were designed by Pierre de Chaignon la Rose?

...that a bumerke is a house mark with relation to coats of arms as it was frequently used instead of them and used with a shield as a frame work for the mark?