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Because of the variation in the evenness of pigments and photo quality these are inherently approximate. My admittedly unscientific method was to sample pixels in a section of tincture until it looked about right, then drew a line in the sampled tincture over the section; if the tincture didn’t stand out against its surroundings IContinue reading “Armorial Palettes”

Thirty new armorials have been added, bringing the total up to 545. Highlights start with Wriothesley heraldic collections, volume II, c. 1530 English (London, British Library, Add MS 45132). Many examples of standards, plus a bunch of shields at the end. From c. 1460 Germany, we have Donaueschinger Wappenbuch (Badische Landesbibliothek, Cod. Donaueschingen 496). The manuscriptContinue reading “May Armorials Update”

I’m going to try to do these more frequently so they don’t become daunting, and so I can give a bit of info about the items I’m adding. With that in mind, I’ve found 7 new sources over the last couple days. German Geschlechtsregister der fränkischen Familie von Russaw, 1491-16th C German (Stuttgart, Württembergische Landesbibliothek,Continue reading “2nd April Armorials Update”

65 items added today. Here’s the list of everything that’s been added Great Britain and Ireland Parliament roll of arms, 1515 England (London, British Library, Add MS 40078) The Baronage and Peerage of England, 1580-1599 English (Paris, BnF, ms. Anglais 32) Genealogies of the kings of England, 1592 English (New Haven, Yale University, Beinecke RareContinue reading “April Armorials Update”

Find collections of digitized manuscripts. A decent, if sometimes out-of-date, place to start is https://digitizedmedievalmanuscripts.org/, which is a meta-collection of institutions with digital manuscript collections. If the link to an institution on that site is dead, try Googling the name of the institution – it may just have an updated URL. New collections are beingContinue reading “Iago’s Guide to Finding Period Armorials Online”

Over 30 new items have just been added! First up we have a few Eastern European sources, 3 Polish, and 2 Czech: Kurtzer Auszug der Preussischen Chronicken, 1567 Polish (Biblioteka Kórnicka, sygn.Cim.Qu.2549 ; Mf3525) Tho iest wysławienie panow y paniąt ziem ruskich y podolskich, 1575 Polish (Biblioteka Kórnicka, sygn.Cim.Qu.2175) Herby rycerstwa polskiego, 1584 Polish (BibliotekaContinue reading “December Armorials Update”

I’ve just added over 20 new armorials. The full list is at the end of this post, but first some highlights. In the ‘Great Britain and Ireland’ section there are a couple new ordinaries: Thomas Jenyn’s Book (early 16th C) and a manuscript from the University of Victoria from c. 1580. Also added to thatContinue reading “October Armorials Update”

Human skulls (and death’s heads: skulls lacking the lower jaw) are very rare charges in period heraldry, but they do show up occasionally. The following is a rundown of all the examples I’ve found so far. The earliest examples are the attributed arms of Awil-Marduk, son of Nebuchadnezzar II, which started appearing in armorials inContinue reading “Skulls in Period Heraldry”

I’ve added over 70 new sources today, so I’ll just mention some highlights. In the French section we have the 16th C Blasons de Bretagne, which offers some interesting insight into a regional heraldic style that is generally not showcased. A lot of the French sources I found were collections of the arms of theContinue reading “Another Big Armorials Update”

The full list of the 66 new additions is at the bottom of this post, but first some highlights. Armoriaux et copies de pièces concernant spécialement les Flandres, 16th C French (Paris, BnF, ms. Français 22485) is an unfinished armorial with a lot of uncoloured line drawings that would make for excellent templates. Confréries deContinue reading “Giant Update to ‘Period Armorials Online’”