Fig. 85.—The crest and surcoat of Henry, first Duke of Lancaster, A.D. 1347. From the brass to Sir Hugh Hasting at Elsyng, Norfolk (after Charles Boutell).
Armorial bearings are still used to a considerable extent in architecture, but otherwise they are chiefly confined to notepaper, carriage panels, and harness. Occasionally hatchments, or more properly achievements, are put upon the fronts of the houses of important people on the death of a member of the family, and afterwards transferred to the church in which the body is buried. The hatchment consists of the arms of the deceased person, painted on a lozenge-shaped field, which is surrounded by a black frame, and if it indicates the death of a husband, the right half of the field is sable (black), the left, argent (silver). If it is a wife that is dead, the colours on the field are reversed. When a widower, widow, or unmarried person dies, the whole of the field is made black.
In olden times the actual helmet, surcoat, and shield were carried at the funeral, and in some instances these were deposited over the tomb of the deceased. Examples survive to the present day, and one of the most interesting cases is to be found in Canterbury Cathedral, where the shield, helmet, and surcoat of Edward the Black Prince are still to be seen. (See Figures [86], [87], and [88].) The Black Prince left most careful instructions in his will with regard to his funeral, and the accoutrements which we are able to figure through the kindness of the Society of Antiquaries, were the “arms of war,” as he called them, that were to be carried at the ceremony. His “arms of peace” consisted of his ostrich feather badge, of which we shall again speak. There are traces on the crest and surcoat of a label to distinguish them, but this is absent from the shield, though it occurs on the arms many times repeated on the tomb, alternately with the feather badge already mentioned.
Fig. 86.—The helmet and crest of the Black Prince. From “Vetusta Monumenta” (after St. John Hope).