Instances might be almost indefinitely multiplied; these are amongst the best because the most obvious, others, which are so recondite as to require lengthy descriptions, defeat their own purpose.
The French expression les armes parlantes is more musical than ours, and examples of canting arms are perhaps as common in French as in English heraldry, whilst punning book-plates are numerous amongst modern specimens, especially those belonging to men of arts and letters.
The Gallic cock is naturally a favourite charge, and may be found frequently in conjunction with such names as Lecoq, or Coquebert, or Coquereau, yet it by no means follows that these can be strictly termed canting arms, for, as Salverte remarks in his “Essai sur les Noms,” “Le même usage à été alternativement cause et effet,” so that whilst numerous armorial ensigns were borrowed from the bearers’ names, so also, in many cases, surnames were borrowed from the arms. He, therefore, who bore a cock on his shield may well have become known in the course of time as Jean Le Coq.
One of the funniest bits of canting heraldry ever printed occurred in the “Daily News” (London) of 5th April, 1892. The Paris correspondent, writing of Ravachol, the murderer, said: “His family have a place in the ‘Armorial de Forez,’ the peerage and gentry book of Saint-Chamond, where Ravachol was born. His ancestors are set down in that volume as dating from 1600. Their shield bears argent with a fess azure, three roses or, and a head of cabbage or, with a radish argent. On the maternal side the motto is a canting one, being ‘Rave-à-chou,’ which is doubtless the origin of the curiously striking name of Ravachol.”
It would be amusing to see how the writer would “trick” the shield he has vainly endeavoured to describe; besides, as was proved at the trial, the murderer’s name was not Ravachol, nor was he even a Frenchman by birth.
In 1768 Monier designed a very handsome plate for Louis Vacher, in which not only does a cow appear on the shield, but both the supporters are also cows, in allusion to the owner’s name.
A plate recently found in an old French book bore the inscription: “Des livres de M. Fauveau, avocat au Parlement.” The arms were, Party per fess azure and or, in chief three scythes (faux) argent, and in base a calf’s head (veau) gules.
