Called in French "Devises" or, when of ancient origin, "Cri de guerre." Menestrier (Origine des Ornemens) traces such to very ancient, even Roman, times. These arose from various circumstances, often accidental and frivolous, and as fresh mottoes were frequently assumed by English families, it is sometimes possible to establish an approximate date by discovering when the accompanying motto was adopted.
Helmets,
sometimes, on early seals and carvings, are valuable as indications of date and examples of the types then prevalent; but, in other and later instances, they seem to be fancifully treated, and so would not be reliable. They form too large a subject for discussion here, and one that has been most ably and exhaustively treated in works on Armour.
I now proceed to consider the [shapes as sketched], taking the several numbers by the groups into which they naturally fall. Many more instances might have been quoted for the various shapes, but I have selected these to show, so far as I have been able to gather them, the extreme range of dates.
Perhaps I may venture here to remark that the search for ancient shapes of shields, with a view to their slavish reproduction, which is now so usual, does not seem to have been so prevalent before about the year 1840. This is the date which seems generally accepted as that when originality in the matter of seals and book-plates ceased, and every variety of old examples began to be sedulously searched out and copied.
All of these shields are subject to slight variations of outline, according to the fancy of the artist and their necessary adaptation to their surroundings.
No. 8 in the accompanying plate of shapes appears in stained glass to the memory of Sir Wm. Berdwell (will, dated 1434), Blomefield's Norfolk, vol. i, p. 203.
An Irish instance, but of very ungraceful proportions, date 1507, is engraved Archæological Journal, vol. xv, p. 188.