Some feudal coats of arms
SOME FEUDAL COATS OF ARMS— HERALDIC INTRODUCTION.
Robert Hasstano.
Henry de Tynkeny.
John de Kingeston.
Vill;am ue Leyburn.
OHN de (jREVSTOK.
Will. Touc-het.
"These great commanders in the wars in France and Scotland, who held of the King in capite, had numerous tenants who served under them, and, for the regular marshalling of their marks and badges, had each a peculiar Herald to see that each (tenant) had a full and clear distinction from the other. These heralds had their titles either from some of the great seigniories belonging to the crown or from those unto whom they were retained." See also the "Com- plete Peerage," by G. E. C., vol. ii. p. 270, note h.
Notwithstanding these precautions some heraldic improprieties seem to have occurred subsequent to the battle of Agincourt, for in 5 Hen. v. it was pro- claimed that " all such who had taken ye liberty of wearing cotes of amies in any former expedition where neither they nor their ancestors had ever used any were thenceforth prohibited y" farther enjoyment of them unless they could produce a title thereto by Grant from some person who had authority for that purpose, excepting those only who had been with that warlike King in battell of Agin- court (1415), did then bear them in that memorable service." Close Roll 5 H. V. (141 7), in dorso m. 15.
This brings us within measurable distance of that ill-starred incorporation of the Heralds' College by Richard in., six months after he was crowned. The King gave the Heralds a sometime royal residence, Pulteney Inn or Cold Harbore in Thames Street, built by Lord Mayor Pulteney, temp. E. 111. Hardly was the incorporation complete, when Garter Writhe attempted to deprive his brother officers of the advantages of the Royal gift by claiming the house as personal to himself. As a result he resigned his Garter-ship January 4, 14S4-5, and the property once more reverted to the Crown. The battle ot Bosworth sealed the fate of the Heralds as a Corporation, until the reign of Philip and Mary, when it was re-incorporated, July 18, 1555. But this iiiteiregnum Rxiled to allay the spirit of strife inaugurated by Writhe, engendered of personal gain at the expense of his fellows, a spirit which cannot be said to have become extinct.
In "Ancestral Families" I shall incidentally show from the more ancient MSS. in the British Museum that the History of official Heraldry is written and embodied in the petty commercial jealousies of the Heralds, in their utter lack of esprit de corps, as proed by the sale of their records, and in their unscrupulous Heraldic and genealogical work, which seems to have culminated at that time in the person and name of Lee, Clarenceux King of Arms, to whom, according to Segar, Queen Elizabeth said, that " if he proved no better " than his predecessor Clarenceux Cooke, " y' made no matter yf hee were hanged," such is the Heraldry of history, and alas ! the Heraldry of to-day.*
- C,)i,-(i!,'gis/ [N.S.], xi. 63 ; the Conlcmporntj Review,
No. 404, p. 258, August 1S99.
Tkick tkmf. II
Nicholas ul Meynil.
John I'av.nkli..'
Harl. MS. 2169, fo. 591^.
