Almost every heraldric animal is emblematical of the qualities of the bearer; but as, upon this principle, little honour would redound to the bearers of some species, Guillim tells us that “all sortes of animals borne in armes or ensigns must in blazoning be interpreted in the best sense, that is, according to their most generous and noble qualities, and so to the greatest honour of their bearers. For example, the fox is full of wit, and withall given wholly to filching for his prey. If then this be the charge of an escocheon we must conceive the qualities represented to be his wit and cunning, but not his pilfering and stealing.”
The following list of emblematical animals and their parts may amuse some: those whose taste does not lie this way can easily pass it over.
The wolf, according to Upton, signifies a wrangler in parliament or assembly!
It does not seem to have occurred to these allegorizing worthies that the tincture of a charge may be diametrically opposed to the signification assigned to the charge itself. For example, the coat, ‘Vert, a bull’s head or,’ by the armilogical rules cited above, would signify, as to the tinctures, pleasure and joy, while as to the charge it would mean rage and fury. Again, ‘Purpure, a wolf argent’ would mean “a wrangler with a peaceable disposition!!”
It was my intention to have examined this Language of Arms with more minuteness, but after a little research I find the labour ill-bestowed. He who can relish such far-fetched notions may gratify himself by a perusal of the somewhat rare folio often before quoted, Sylvanus Morgan’s ‘Sphere of Gentry,’ London, 1661; and still further by that of his supplementary ‘Armilogia,’ a small quarto published in 1666. These works, with many others of this and the preceding centuries, contain much useful scientific information on Heraldry, and generally evince some scholarship, but they are most unnecessarily blended with what Mr. Moule justly designates “a cabalistic jargon,”[145] that renders it a matter of utter impossibility for any person of ordinary patience to read them through. Guillim, whose work is on the whole the most readable of the number, is not altogether free from this laboured absurdity.
One feature in many of the early works on Heraldry occasionally renders them exceedingly amusing, and may partly countervail the prosy dulness of armilogy—namely, the fancied attributes of visible objects generally, but of animals in particular. Absurdities in Natural History at which a child would now laugh are gravely advanced, and often supported by quotations from Pliny and other classical authors. A few specimens from Leigh and Guillim are subjoined.
The Hart, saith Avicene, “is never troubled with fevers, because he hath no gall. He hath a bone in his hert, as precious as yvery. He feareth muche the voyce of the foxe, and hateth the serpent. He is long lived. For Aristotle writeth, that Diomedes did consecrate a hart to Diana, with a coller of golde about his necke, which had these wordes, DIOMEDES DIANÆ. After whose tyme, almost a thousand yeres, Agathocles the kynge of Sicile did kill the same harte, and offered him up with his coller to Jupiter, in hys temple, which was in Calabria.”[146]
“The Bore is the ryght Esquier, for he beareth both armor and shielde, and fighteth sternelye. When he determineth to fight, he will frot his left shield the space of halfe a day, against an oke. Because that when he is streking thereon with the tuskes of his enemy, he shal feele no griefe thereof, and when they have fought one day together then they wil depart of themselves, keping good appointment, to meete in the same place, the next day after, yea, and the third day, till one of them be victor.”[147]
Of the Wolf he says. “It is sayde, if a man be seene of hym first, the man leseth his voyce. But if the wolfe be scene of manne first, then the wolfe leseth his boldenesse and hardines. Plinie wryteth, he loueth to playe with a chylde, and that he will not hurt it, tyll he be extreame houngry, what time he will not spare to devowre it.... Avicene telleth that he desyreth greatly to eate fishe. And Phisiologus writeth that he may not bend his necke backewarde, in no moneth of the yere but in May.... He enfecteth the wolle of shepe that he byteth, and is adversarye to them and theyr lambes.... There is nothynge that he hateth so much as the knockynge together of two flint stones, the whiche he feareth more then the hunters. Aristotle sayeth that all kinde of wolves are contrary to all kynde of sheepe. For profe wherof Cornelius Agrippa also affirmed that if a man make a string of the wolves guts and put it on the harpe with stringes made of shepes guttes, it will never bee brought with any consent of harmony to agree with the other.”[148]