Embattled, when applied to fesses and chevrons, is confined to the upper line unless the ordinary is blazoned “embattled counter embattled,” in which case both lines are similarly treated. When applied to a chevron the sides of the crenellations are usually kept vertical, as though in the wall of a sloping way, rather than at right angles to the ordinary, though the latter form also occurs.
Raguly, especially when applied to a fess or a pale, is suggestive of stumps of branches that have been lopped from the parent stem, and this probably indicates its origin. Thus the projections on both sides of the ordinary slope the same way, and, in many examples, they alternate. In the case of a cross they point along the limbs outwards from the centre.
Many of the heraldic lines are of very ancient usage, and the popular idea that they are signs of modernity is quite an erroneous one, some of them occurring as early as the reign of Edward I.
A line is Rompu when it is interrupted as in Fig. 62, and an instance of this occurs in the Arms of Allen, which is per bend rompu.
Sub-ordinaries.—The Canton, Gyron, Inescutcheon, Orle, Tressure, Bordure and Flanches are classed as Sub-ordinaries. The fusil or lozenge (q.v.) and some others are also sometimes included in this division, but classification of this kind is of little practical importance.
The Canton (Fig. 73) is frequently a means of displaying an augmentation, a special distinction added to a previously existing coat, as in the arms of the family of Lane and others. It is drawn of any convenient size short of being possibly confused with the Quarter, the latter occupying the proportion of the shield that its name implies. The fact that even in modern coats the canton partially covers, if necessary, a charge near the same part of the shield suggests that it was in its origin an added mark of honour; and also because like the chief, it is mentioned in the blazon only after the main part of the shield has been described.
The Orle (Fig. 69) becomes a Tressure (Fig. 70) by the addition of fleurs-de-lis, and when doubled and decorated with alternating fleurs-de-lis on both sides the beautiful “double tressure flory counterflory” of the Royal arms of Scotland is formed.
