A Complete Guide to Heraldry

by Arthur Charles Fox-Davies

"As a general rule, it may be stated that the second son bears a plain bordure of the tincture of the principal charge in the shield, and his younger brothers also bear plain bordures of varying tinctures. In the next generation the eldest son of the second son would bear his father's coat and bordure without change; the second son would have the bordure engrailed; the third, invected; the fourth, indented,

and so on, the other sons of the younger sons in this generation differencing their father's bordures in the same way. The junior members of the next generation might have their bordures parted per pale, the following generations having their bordures parted per fess and per saltire, per cross or quarterly, gyronny or compony, that is, divided into alternate spaces of metal or colour in a single trace—this, however, being often in Scotland a mark of illegitimacy—counter-compone or a similar pattern in two tracts, or chequy with three or more tracts.

"You will see that these modifications of the simple bordure afford a great variety of differences, and when they are exhausted the expedient can then be resorted to of placing on the bordures charges taken from other coats, often from those of a maternal ancestor; or they may be arbitrarily assigned to denote some personal characteristic of the bearer, as in the case of James Maitland, Major in the Scots regiment of Foot Guards, who carries the dismembered lion of his family within a bordure wavy azure charged with eight hand grenades or, significant, I presume, of his military profession.

"You will observe that, with all these varieties of differencing we have mentioned, the younger branches descending from the original eldest son of the parent house are still left unprovided with marks of cadency. These, however, can be arranged for by taking the ordinary which appears in their father's arms and modifying its boundary lines. Say the original coat was 'argent, a chevron gules,' the second son of the eldest son would have the chevron engrailed, but without any bordure; the third, invected, and so on; and the next generations the systems of bordures accompanying the modified chevron would go on as before. And when all these methods are exhausted, differences can still be made in a variety of ways, e.g. by charging the ordinary with similar charges in a similar manner to the bordure as Erskine of Shielfield, a cadet of Balgownie, who bore: 'Argent, on a pale sable, a cross crosslet fitchée or within a bordure azure'; or by the introduction of an ordinary into a coat which had not one previously, a bend or the ribbon (which is a small bend) being a favourite ordinary to use for this purpose. Again, we occasionally find a change of tincture of the field of the shield used to denote cadency.

"There are other modes of differencing which need not be alluded to in detail, but I may say that on analysing the earlier arms in the Lyon Register, I find that the bordure is by far the most common method of indicating cadency, being used in no less than 1080 cases. The next most popular way is by changing the boundary lines of an ordinary, which is done in 563 shields; 233 cadets difference their arms by the insertion of a smaller charge on the ordinary and 195 on

the shield. A change of tincture, including counterchanging, is carried out in 155 coats, and a canton is added in 70 cases, while there are 350 coats in which two or more of the above methods are used. From these figures, which are approximately correct, you will see the relative frequency of the various modes of differencing. You will also note that the original coat of a family can be differenced in a great many ways so as to show the connection of cadets with the parent house. The drawback to the system is that heralds have never arrived at a uniform treatment so as to render it possible to calculate the exact relationship of the cadets. Much is left, as I said, to the discretion of the officer granting the arms; but still it gives considerable assistance in determining the descent of a family."

The late Mr. Stodart, Lyon Clerk Depute, who was an able herald, particularly in matters relating to Scotland, had elaborated a definite system of these bordures for differencing which would have done much to simplify Scottish cadency. Its weak point was obviously this, that it could only be applied to new matriculations of arms by cadets; and so, if adopted as a definite and unchangeable matter of rule, it might have occasioned doubt and misunderstanding in future times with regard to many important Scottish coats now existing, without reference to Mr. Stodart's system. But the scheme elaborated by Mr. Stodart is now accepted as the broad basis of the Scottish system for matriculations (Fig. 732).

In early Scottish seals the bordures are to so large an extent engrailed as to make it appear that the later and present rule, which gives the plain bordure to immediate cadets, was not fully recognised or adopted. Bordures charged appear at a comparatively early date in Scotland. The bordure compony in Scotland and the bordure wavy in England, which are now used to signify illegitimacy, will be further considered in a subsequent chapter, but neither one nor the other originally carried any such meaning. The doubtful legitimacy of the Avondale and Ochiltree Stewarts, who bore the bordure compony in Scotland, along with its use by the Beauforts in England, has tended latterly to bring that difference into disrepute in the cadency of lawful sons—yet some of the bearers of that bordure during the first twenty years of the Lyon Register were unquestionably legitimate, whilst others, as Scott of Gorrenberry and Patrick Sinclair of Ulbester, were illegitimate, or at best only legitimated. The light in which the bordure compony had come to be regarded is shown by a Royal Warrant granted in 1679 to John Lundin of that Ilk, allowing him to drop the coat which his family had hitherto carried, and, as descended of a natural son of William the Lion, to bear the arms of Scotland within a bordure compony argent and azure.

The bordure counter-compony is assigned to fifteen persons, none of them, it is believed, of illegitimate descent, and some expressly said to be "lineallie and lawfulie descended" from the ancestor whose arms they bore thus differenced. The idea of this bordure having been at any time a mark of bastardy is a very modern error, arising from a confusion with the bordure compony.