Sir John Ferne, a man of real erudition, was so far carried away by extravagant notions of the great antiquity of heraldric insignia, as seriously to deduce the use of furs in heraldry from the ‘coats of skins’ which the Creator made for Adam and Eve after their transgression. This, independently of its absurdity, is an unfortunate idea; for coats of arms are as certainly marks of honour as these were badges of disgrace; and as Morgan says, ‘innocens was Adam’s best gentility.’[9] The second coat of Adam, says this writer, was ‘paly tranche, divided every way and tinctured of every colour.’ Cain, also, after his fall, changed his armorials “by ingrailing and indented lines—to show, as the preacher saith, There is a generation whose teeth are as swords, and their jaw-teeth as knives to devour the poor from the earth.” He was the first, it is added, who desired to have his arms changed—‘So God set a mark upon him!’[10]
This ante-diluvian heraldry is expatiated upon by our author in a manner far too prolix for us to follow him through all his grave statements and learned proofs. I shall therefore only observe, en passant, that arms are assigned to the following personages, viz.: Jabal, the inventor of tents, Vert, a tent argent, (a white tent in a green field!) Jubal, the primeval musician, Azure, a harp, or, on a chief argent three rests gules;[11] Tubal-Cain, Sable, a hammer argent, crowned or, and Naamah, his sister, the inventress of weaving, In a lozenge gules, a carding-comb argent.
Noah, according to the Boke of St. Albans, “came a gentilman by kynde ... and had iij sonnys begetyn by kinde ... yet in theys iij sonnys gentilness and ungentilnes was fownde.” The sin of Ham degraded him to the condition of a churl; and upon the partition of the world between the three brethren Noah pronounced a malediction against him. “Wycked kaytiff,” says he, “I give to thee the north parte of the worlde to draw thyne habitacion, for ther schall it be, where sorow and care, cold and myschef, as a churle thou shalt live in the thirde parte of the worlde wich shall be calde Europe, that is to say, the contre of churlys!”
“Japeth,” he continues, “cum heder my sonne, thou shalt have my blessing dere.... I make the a gentilman of the west parte of the world and of Asia, that is to say, the contre of gentilmen.” He then in like manner creates Sem a gentleman, and gives him Africa, or “the contre of tempurnes.”[12]
“Of the offspryng of the gentleman Japheth come Habraham, Moyses, Aron, and the profettys, and also the kyng of the right lyne of Mary, of whom that gentilman Jhesus ... kyng of the londe of Jude and of Jues, gentilman by his modre Mary prynce[ss] of cote-armure!”... “Jafet made the first target and therin he made a ball in token of all the worlde.”
Morgan’s researches do not seem to have furnished him with the arms of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but those of the twelve patriarchs are given by him and others. Joseph’s “coat of many colours,” Morgan, by a strange oversight, makes to consist of two tinctures only, viz. black, chequered with white—in the language of heraldry, chequy sable and argent,—to denote the lights and shadows of his history.
The pathetic predictions and benedictions pronounced by the dying patriarch Jacob to his sons, furnished our old writers with one of their best pretences for giving coat-armour to persons in those remote ages. The standards ordered to be set up around the Israelitish camp in the desert[13] are likewise adduced in support of the notion that regular heraldry was then known. The arms of the twelve tribes are given by Morgan in the following hobbling verses:[14]
“Judah bare Gules, a lion[15] couchant or;
Zebulon’s black Ship’s[16] like to a man of war;
Issachar’s asse[17] between two burthens girt;
As Dan’s[18] sly snake lies in a field of vert;
Asher with Azure a Cup[19] of gold sustains;
And Nephtali’s Hind[20] trips o’er the flow’ry plains;
Ephraim’s strong Ox lyes with the couchant Hart;
Manasseh’s Tree its branches doth impart;
Benjamin’s Wolfe in the field gules resides;
Reuben’s field argent and blew bars wav’d glides;
Simeon doth beare his Sword; and in that manner
Gad, having pitched his Tent, sets up his Banner.”
The same authority gives as the arms of Moses a cross, because he preferred “taking up the cross,” and suffering the lot of his brethren to a life of pleasure and dignity in the court of Pharaoh. The ‘parfight armory of Duke Joshua,’ given by Leigh, is Partie bendy sinister, or and gules, a backe displayed sable. The arms of Gideon were Sable, a fleece argent, a chief azure gutté d’eau,[21] evidently a ‘composition’ from the miracle recorded in the Book of Judges. To Samson is ascribed, Gules, a lion couchant or, within an orle argent, semée of bees sable, an equally evident allusion to a passage in the bearer’s history. David, as a matter of course, bore a golden harp in a field azure.[22]
But it is not alone to the worthies of sacred history that these honourable insignia are ascribed—the heroes of classical story, too, had their ‘atchievements,’ Hector of Troy, for example, bore, Sable, ij lyons combatand or.[23] Here again our great authority, Dame Julyan Berners,[24] may be cited. “Two thousand yere and xxiiij,” says she, “before thyncarnation of Christe, Cote-Armure was made and figurid at the sege of Troye, where in gestis troianorum it tellith that the first begynnyng of the lawe of armys was; the which was effygured and begunne before any lawe in the world bot the lawe of nature, and before the X commaundementis of God.”