Tincture (heraldry)
Tinctures are the colours used to blazon coats of arms in heraldry.
Basic tinctures
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There are seven tinctures, consisting of two metals (light tinctures) and five colours (dark tinctures).
| Tincture | Heraldic name |
|---|---|
| Metals | |
| Gold/Yellow | Or * |
| Silver/White | Argent |
| Colours | |
| Blue | Azure |
| Red | Gules |
| Purple | Purpure |
| Black | Sable |
| Green | Vert |
* "Or" is usually spelled with a capital letter (Gules, a fess Or) so as not to confuse it with the conjunction "or.")
The names of the tinctures mainly come to us from French. Azure is from the Arabic lazward meaning lapis lazuli; sable is named for the fur of the sable marten; and gules is from the French gueules, which is thought to refer to animal's red throats.
Although the English term vert is also from French, the French themselves use the word sinople to refer to the tincture.
The patterns illustrated are occasionally used to depict arms in a monochromatic context, such as a "hatching" (sketch) or engraving.
Later tinctures
Later heraldry introduced some more colours. Only two are of more than exceptional use in British heraldry: sanguine (blood-red) and tenné (orange or tan). These were sometimes called stainand colours, as some rebatements of honour were blazoned of these colours.
Other colours, particularly those used in Europe, include:
- murrey (mulberry-coloured),
- carnation (the colour of Caucasian human skin - most common in France),
- bleu celeste (also ciel or celeste - sky-blue),
- cendrée (dark grey).
In 1997 the colours rose and copper appeared in Canada.
These are rare - the seven primary tinctures are the most common ones.
The rule of tincture
The first rule of heraldry is the rule of tincture: metal must never be placed upon metal, nor colour upon colour, for the sake of contrast.
The main duty of a heraldic device is to be recognized, and the dark colours or light metals are supposed to be too difficult to distinguish if they are placed on top of other dark or light colours.
The rule of tincture does not apply to furs, nor to charges proper (see below).
Divisions of the field are considered to be beside each other, not one on top of the other; so the rule of tincture does not apply.
This rule is so closely followed that arms that violate it are called armes à enquerre, or arms of enquiry; any violation is presumed to be intentional, to the point that one is supposed to enquire how it came to pass. (For example, such arms are sometimes caused by the addition of honourable augmentations granted by the monarch, which always ignore the rule of tincture.) One of the most famous armes à enquerre was the shield of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, which had gold crosses on white.
On the rare occasions this rule has been violated, the offending charge has been a chief (see Ordinaries and sub-ordinaries), which has led some commentators to question whether the rule should apply to a chief, or even whether a chief should be considered a charge at all, but rather a division of the field. However, this is a radically minorial view. Another violation which is usually not worried about is a green mount on a blue field representing the sky.
Furs
Furs, such as ermine, ermines, or vair, are regular variations of the field that represent various types of actual fur. Any charge may be of a fur.
(Although the name "sable" comes from a kind of fur, the colour sable is not considered a heraldic fur.)
Ermine and its variants
| Ermine spots |
Ermine is a field argent, semé (see variations of the field) of ermine-spots sable. An ermine-spot is a small bell-shaped item, variously depicted, that occasionally figures as a charge in its own right. Ermine represents the white coat of the animal to which tufts of its black tail fur were sewn.
Ermines is the reverse of ermine - a field sable semé of ermine-spots argent.
Erminois is ermine with a field Or instead of argent, and pean is the reverse of erminois.
Other colours may be obtained, but they must be blazoned as, for example, gules, semé of ermine-spots Or.
Vair and its variants
Basic vair is a row of small items shaped like bells with straight edges. The bells on the next row down are placed with their bottoms facing the bottoms of the bells on the row above, and so forth down. The top row has the upright bells being argent, the next row down has them being azure.
Counter-vair is like vair, except that bells with their bottoms facing have the same tincture. The effect is one of vertical columns of bells of the same colour, alternately upside-down and right side up.
Vair is thought to originate from the white and blue-grey fur of a type of squirrel being sewn together.
Potent and counter-potent follow the same rules as vair, except using a T-shaped item instead of the vair bell. (The word "potent" means crutch; it is thought to derive from badly-drawn vair.)
Other tinctures may be used, described as vairy, counter-vairy, potenty, or counter-potenty of (say) Or and gules.
Proper
Objects may also be depicted in their natural colours. In this case, they are described as "proper". Sometimes a colour must also then be given (e.g. a white horse proper).
Some consider it bad form to depict too many charges as "proper," especially when those charges create a landscape. This experienced a vogue during the Victorian period, but came to be deprecated as being excessively difficult to draw from blazon, and somewhat contrary to the spirit of heraldry as favouring bold, clear, and unmistakable designs.
Blazon
The custom in English blazon is to reduce redundancy by only referring to a particular colour once in the blazon.
For example, instead of saying Gules, on a fess Or a rose gules seeded Or, one would say, Gules, on a fess Or a rose of the field, seeded of the second.
Likewise, instead of Vert, a fess Or between two lions passant Or, one would say, Vert, a fess between two lions passant Or.
Counterchanging
When a charge is placed across a division line, variation, or ordinary, it may be blazoned counterchanged.
This means that the charge is divided the same way as the field it is placed upon, with the colours reverse.
A shield which is green on the upper half and silver on the lower, charged at the center with a lion whose upper half is silver and lower half green, would be blazoned: Per fess vert and argent, a lion counterchanged.
In Scots heraldry, a charge may be blazoned as counterchanged of different colours from the field; e.g. Per fess gules and azure, a sun in splendour counterchanged Or and of the first. In English heraldry, this would be described as Per fess gules and azure, a sun in splendour per fess Or and of the first.