Designers have at times to deal with some matters which are almost common to all the arts, matters which they either know or do not know, and in which the genius they are apt to trust in goes for little apart from knowledge. They must learn lettering for inscriptions much like they once learnt the multiplication table, and they should learn the elements of heraldry in the same way. This it has been difficult to do, as most of the books on heraldry, in seeking to be complete, so effectually muddle up the few important points with the vast number of things unimportant, or worse, that the art student is likely to give it up in despair. Many books on heraldry, which in itself is surely a gay thing, have been made to resemble grammars and dictionaries of a meaningless jargon.
Any student, however, who has become interested in a single shield, or in the look of the thing as seen in a collection of fine examples of heraldry such as are illustrated in this volume, should be able to master the main principles in an hour or two. The curious terms are only old-fashioned; they are used, so far as they are necessary, not of malice, but because it is of the essence of heraldry that everything shall be so strictly defined that a few words may represent a shield of arms as surely as a picture. Hence everything has a name, everything is clear, sharp, and bright, the colours are few, the forms must be large and simple. Even the seemingly arbitrary dictum that 'no colour must be put on colour or metal on metal' may probably have arisen from the fact that when gilding or silvering was used on a shield it would form a perfect foil for colours, but as they reflected light in the same way, they could not be distinguished if used one on the other. Even yellow pigment on white would not tell clearly at any distance; the maxim is merely a rule for the sake of distinctness. Again, the curious vigorous drawing of beasts and birds with the eyes staring and the feet spread out was not the result of a desire to be quaint, but arose naturally from the same need of being clear. A good naturalistic drawing of a lion would be useless on a flag. Granted the special needs of heraldry, it developed in a perfectly understandable way.
On the question of heraldic drawing I should like to caution the student against thinking that it is so easy as it looks. Elementary and exaggerated, it may seem as if any child might do it, but in truth it is terribly difficult. The old shields were designed by experts with great experience; they placed the charge perfectly on the field and so distributed the parts that they were balanced in 'weight'; there were no weak lines and nothing was crowded for lack of room. Much practice made them perfect, and perfection is still difficult.
The present volume seems to me exactly what artists have wanted.
W. R. LETHABY
March 1913