A more remarkable and equally accidental case may be illustrated by the brass of Sir Humphrey Bourchier (1471) in the abbey church of Westminster.
This displays four shields: one has the arms of Bourchier quartering Lovain and impaling the quarterly arms of Berners; and another, the six quarterings of Sir Humphrey's wife, Elizabeth Tylney. In a third shield these are quite properly impaled, with a resultant of fourteen quarters. In the fourth shield these are quartered together, and so produce a dreadful confusion of twenty-eight quarters! It is not necessary here to show how these shields might have been simplified in themselves, but from the artistic standpoint there cannot be any doubt that the two first should at least have been kept separate. The many other examples to be found in the illustrations of this book will serve as useful reminders of the greater advantage artistically of simpler treatment.
It is moreover well to remember that in the majority of cases there is not the least need in actual work to produce a great many quarterings in a shield. In numerous examples, especially in the sixteenth century and later, they were assumed merely for display, and to reduce them to a reasonable few is often a most desirable thing.
It is difficult without knowledge of individual cases to lay down any definite rules for dealing with quarterings, but there can be no question that in general a shield looks best without any at all. In the case of a man with a compound name or title, who represents more than one family or dignity, it would be legitimate to add a quartering on that account, but only of the actual arms of the family or dignity represented. It is however so hard to draw a line or to restrain the wishes of clients that the fifteenth century example of Henry duke of Buckingham should ever be borne in mind.
As soon as the principle of hereditary descent of armorial bearings became established, the necessity arose of making some slight difference between the arms of a father and those borne by his sons. This was usually done by adding to the paternal arms such more or less unobtrusive device as a label, or narrow border, or a small charge like a crescent or a molet.
The lord John of Eltham, son of King Edward II, bears upon his tomb at Westminster a beautifully carved shield of the arms of England differenced by a border of France; and one of the sons of King Edward III, Thomas of Woodstock, differenced his father's arms by a silver border, as at an earlier period did Edmund earl of Kent, the youngest son of King Edward I.
The label is a narrow band with long pendent strips or pieces, usually three, but sometimes four or five in number, placed upon and across the upper part of a shield (fig. [45]). It is now used to distinguish the arms of an eldest son from those of his father, but this was not always the rule, and younger sons of King Henry III and King Edward I, and at least three of the sons of King Edward III, besides the Prince of Wales, bore distinctive labels for difference. Anciently, the label was very narrow, and the pendent pieces of equal or nearly equal width throughout, even when charged with devices, as they sometimes were. The colour was also a matter of choice. The first three Edwards, during their fathers' lifetime, successively bore blue labels, sometimes of three, sometimes of five pieces, while the younger brother of King Edward I, Edmund earl of Lancaster, used a label of France (blue with gold fleurs-de-lis) of four pieces, and Thomas of Brotherton, second son of King Edward I, a silver label of three pieces.
