HISTOEIC
DEVICES, BADGES, AND WAR-CRIES.
BY
MRS. BURY PALLISER.
"Impreses quaikt." — Milton.
LONDON:
SAMPSON LOW, SON & MARSTON,
CROWN BUILDINGS, 188, FLEET STREET.
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6 V^
P R E F A E.
A few papers upon the subject of " Devices and Badges " have
already been published by the Author in the Art Journal, and
the favouiable manner in which they were received, encourages
her to hope that the present volume may be of interest to the
general reader, as well as of use to the archaeologist.
She would not have ventured to publish a work so full of
classic quotations, had she not been fortunate in the assistance
of her kind friend, Mr. W. S. W. Vaux, Keeper of the Coins
and Medals at the British Museum.
Kensington, Jvly 1870.
HISTORIC DEVICES, BADGES, AND WAR-CRIES.
Part I.— DEVICES.
" Here's now mystery and hieroglyphic."
Ben Jonson, The Alchymisf.
" Quaint devices, deftly blazoned."
Kingsley.
Devices and badges ibrni a branch of heraldic study, the importance
of which has not been sufficiently appreciated. It is of the greatest
value to the archaeologist, in helping him to ascertain the origin and
fix the date of an infinity of works of Art. The knight bore his device
upon various parts of his dress ; it was embroidered upon his surcoat
and on the caparisons of his horse ; it was engraved upon his armour
and his arms, inscribed upon his objects of daily use, his books, his
plate, his bed, and his household furniture. On Majolica ware we see
painted the devices of the dukes of Urbino, and those of the Medici
popes appear in the Loggie of the Vatican.
The badge and the device, though often confounded, are essentially
distinct in character.
The badge or cognisance (from the Norman term cognoissance, a
mark, or token, by which a thing is known) was a figure selected
either from some part of the family coat, or chosen by the owner as
alluding to nis name, office, or estate, or to some family exploit ; and
sometimes it was granted by the sovereign as a token of his favour.
It was worn by the retainers of princes and powerful barons, to declare
visibly the liege lord to whose service they were attached. It glittered
on the standard ; was embroidered upon the sleeve, breast, back, or
B
2 HISTOKIC DEVICES, BADGES,
other parts of the dress ; in later times was stamped or engraved on
metal, and attached to the sleeve, just as is the badge of the waterman
or ferryman of the present day — one of the few remnants, iioav
existing, of this once important mark of fealty and vassalage.
Badges were greatly in favour in England from Edward I. to the
time of Queen Elizabeth. In the reign of Edward III. 1 they were
used in profusion, and the principal houses, in imitation of the Koyal
Family, had a distinctive mark for their retainers, a secondary token
of family distinction, no doubt, at the time, better known by their
dependents than the personal arms or crest of the liege lord to whom
they belonged. u Might I not know thee by thy household badge ?"
says Shakspeare. Badges were hereditary in families, and to deprive a
nobleman of his badge 2 was a punishment of the deepest degradation. 3
How many of the most interesting associations of feudal history are
connected with the badge ! The " Broom branch " of the Plantagenets,
the " Eoses " of the rival houses, " the Sun of York," the " Bristled
Boar " of King Richard, the " Rampant Bear chained to the ragged
staff " of Warwick, are all familiar, and identified with history itself.
There are few now of our nobility who retain this ancient ap-
pendage. The Stafford Knot and the Pelham Buckle are among the
rare exceptions ; but we still find the cognisance of many an illustrious
family preserved as the sign of an inn.
The White Hart of Richard II., the Antelope of Henry IV., the
Beacon of Henry V., the Feathers of Henry VI., the Star of the Lords
of Oxford, whose brilliancy decided the fate of the battle of Barnet, the
Lion of Norfolk, which shone conspicuous on Bos worth Field, and
1 "This age did exceedingly abound 3 Family decorations, called Livery
with impreses, mottoes, and devices, and Collars, were sometimes formed of the
particularly King Edward III. was so badges of a house, with one of the most
excessively given up to them, that his important as a pendant, such as—
apparel, plate, bed, household furniture, The collar of Broom pods, with the
shields, and even the harness of his White Hart pendent, in the portrait of
horses, and the like, were not without Richard II. at Wilton.
them."— Ashmole, History of the Order The collar of SS, with the Swan of the
of the Garter. De Bohuns appendent, round the neck of
2 " For the thirde offence . . ^ you the poet G'ower, in St. Saviour's Church,
shall openly make recitall of all his Southwark ; and the constantly recurring-
offences, and take away from him his collar of Suns and Roses, badges of the
livery, or at least his badge."— Some House of York, with the pendant of the
rules and orders for the government of White Boar of Richard III., the Black
the House of an Earle, set down by B. Bull of the Duke of Clarence, and the
Braithwaite. Temp. James I. White Lion of March.
AND WAR-CKIES. 3
many others too numerous to mention, may yet be seen as signboards
to village inns contiguous to the former estates of families whose
possessions have passed into other hands.
Again, turn to the Salamander of Angouleme, the Porcupine of
Orleans, the Ermine of Bretagne, hereditary badges of France's
sovereigns ; the Plane and the Knotted Staff of Burgundy and Orleans,
the "Wallet of the Gueux, the " Biscia " of Milan, — to periods fraught
with what stirring historic recollections do they not all carry us back !
The object of the badge was publicity ; not so the device or
" impresa," which, with its accompanying legend or motto, was assumed
for the purpose of mystification — was, in fact, an ingenious expression
of some particular conceit of the wearer, containing a hidden meaning.
Devices became general in the fourteenth century, but it was during
the French wars in Italy that they attained their full development, and
the ingenuity of the learned was called forth to invent devices express-
ing the dominant feeling of the wearer, in love, war, arts, or politics.
Giovio, 1 Ruscelli, Paradin, and a host of literati were enlisted in this
cause ; even sovereigns did not disdain to compose their own devices.
Mary Stuart solaced the hours of her captivity by inventing devices
which she executed in embroidery ; 2 and she appeals to her astute
uncle, the Cardinal Lorraine, to compose a device for a mirror, 3 as to
one well versed in the art.
In England they were never very popular, but, on the Continent,
to such an extent was the fashion carried, that devices departed from
their original character, and degenerated into senseless and puerile
subtleties.
The device required certain conditions. It was composed of two
parts, the picture and the motto — the '• corpo " and "animo," as they
were styled by the Italians. No device was perfect without the two.
There was to be a just proportion between the corpo and animo. The
corpo, or painted metaphor, was not to represent the human form, but
1 Giovio, Paolo, Vescovo di Nocera, 2 There were no fewer than thirty
1 Delle Imprese Militari et Amorose,' 8vo. devices embroidered on a bed by Mary
Lyon, 1555. Ruscelli, Jer., Imprese and her ladies when at Tutbury.
lllustri, 4to. In Venetia, 1556. Paradin, s " I pray you to have made for me a
Claude, ' Devises Heroiques,' 12mo. beautiful golden minor to suspend from
Paris, 1557. The later editions were my girdle,- . . . with some appropriate
' Augmente'es par Messire Francois device, wbich the Cardinal, my uncle,
d'Amboise.' and Ihe ' Discours' of Adrian can compose." — Labanoff, Recneil de
(l'Amboise added. Lettres de Marie Stuart.
n 2
4 HISTOKIC DEVICES, BADGES,
was to be pleasing in appearance ; the animo was to be short, and in
a foreign language, the object of the two being that they should not
be so plain as to be understood by all, nor so obscure as to require a
sphinx to interpret. 1
In the middle of the sixteenth century books of devices formed a
distinct class of literature, and the number published would form a
library of themselves. Art was inexhaustible in the variety of devices
and symbolic images by which it sought to typify moral truths and
doctrines.
But it is of devices adopted by persons of eminence either in art,
arms, literature, or station, that we propose to treat — devices, strictly
historic, the study of which, alone, can lead to any useful result.
Academies of Italy. — Among the numerous literary academies
established throughout Italy we give the whimsical devices of some of
the most celebrated.
Accesi. A fir cone placed over a fire (Fig. 1). Motto, Hinc odor
et f nidus, " Hence fragrance and fruit." Fragrance and fruit corn-
Fig. 1. — Accesi Academy
bined ; the heat causing the cone to send forth a sweet odour, and its
scales opening, the fruit or kernels (pignoli) drop out. 2
Affidati. A nautilus (Fig. 2). Motto, Tutus per suprema
per ima, " Safe above and below." Pliny thus describes the habits of
1 " Gravity and majesty must be in it. capacity of the vulgar."— Sir William
It must be somewhat retired from the Deummond.
2 Bargagli, Scipion, Dell' Imprese, 4to. In Venetia, 1594, passim.
AND WAR-CRIES.
this animal : l — " But among the greatest wonders of nature is that
fish which of some is called nautilos, of others pompilos. This fish,
for to come aloft above the water, turneth upon his backe, and raiseth
or heaveth himselfe up by little and little ; and to the end he might
swim with more ease as disburdened of a sinke, he dischargeth all the
water within him at a pipe. After this, turning up his two foremost
clawes or armes, hee displaieth and stretcheth out betweene them a
membrane or skin of a wonderfull thinnesse ; this serve th him instead
Fig. 2. — Affidati Academy.
of a saile in the aire above water. With the rest of his armes or clawes
he roweth and laboureth under water, and with his taile in the mids,
he directeth his course, and steereth as it were with an helme. Thus
holdeth he on and maketh way in the sea, with a faire shew of a foist
or galley under saile. Now if he be afraid of anything in the way,
hee makes no more adoe but draweth in water to baillise his bodie, and
so pluDgeth himselfe downe, and sinketh to the bottome."
Among the celebrities who belonged to this academy were the
Marquis Pescara, Vespasian Gonzaga, and Bottigella.
Amoeevole or Verona. The hedgehog is said to pull the grapes
from the stalks and gather them into a heap, into which it rolls itself,
to carry the grapes on its prickles or spines to its young. 2
1 Pliny's Natural History, translated
by Philemon Holland. London, 1601.
Book is., ch. 29.
" Learn of the little nautilus to sail,
Spread the thin oar and catch the driving gale."
Pope. '
2 " Hedgehogs make their provisions
beforehand of meat for -winter; in this
â– wise they wallow and roll themselves
upon apples and such fruit lying under
foot, and so catch them up with their
prickles, and one more besides they take
in their mouth, and so carry them into
hollow trees." — Pliny, book viiL ch. 37.
6 HISTORIC DEVICES, BADGES,
" Quand les raisins commencent a meurir en este et en automme,
l'herisson va aux vignes, et s'addresse aux grappes qui touchent terre,
pour en faire toniber les grains avec ses pattes, puis se raettant tout en
une boule se veautre dessus pour ficher ses pointes dedans, et les porter
a sa taniere. Par mesme finesse il emporte a, sa caverne les. pommes
sauvages abbatues du vent, ou tombees d'elles mesmes estans meures." 1
Tbis suggested tbe device of the Amorevole (Fig. 3), a hedgehog
witb its spines laden with grapes. Motto, Non solum nobis, " Not for
ourselves alone."
Fig. 3 — Amorevole Academy.
Animosi of Milan. Stags passing a river resting on the beads of
each otber (Fig. 4). Motto, Bant animos vices, " Mutual help gives
strength."
Fig. 4. — Animosi Academy.
Pliny says that stags " passe the seas swimming by flockes and
1 Matthiole, ' Commentaire sur Diosooride.' Lyon. 1572.
2 For vicls, read vices.
AND WAE-CEIES. 7
whole beards in a long row, each one resting his head upon his fellow
next before him; and this they doe in course, so as the foremost
retireth behind to the hindmost by turnes, one after another." 1
Arcadi. This academy was instituted at Eome, in 1690, by
Crescimbeni, 2 with the view of restoring a better taste in literature.
The members adopted the names of the shepherds of antiquity. Their
device was a Pan's pipe, surrounded by a wreath half olive, half
pine. 3
Aedenti or Pisa. Incense burning over hot coals, with the
motto, Nisi ardeat, " Unless it burns," — useless unless inflamed.
Without an ardent desire after great and virtuous things, men can
never arrive at distinction, or leave a name behind them.
Ardenti of Naples. A sacrifice upon the altar, lighted by fire
from heaven. OTPANO0EN, " From heaven,"— every good gift
comes from above.
Ardenti of Viterbo. A bar of gold in a crucible. Donee
purum, "Until clean."
Catenati of Macerata took for device the chain of gold of
Jupiter, described by Homer ; the
" golden everlasting chain,
Whose strong embrace holds heaven and earth and main."
Iliad, book viii.
Motto, AMA OPErOMENOI, " Pulling together."
Chiave of Pa via. On the death of his father, the Marquis
Pescara left Milan and settled at Pavia, where he established an
academy styled " Delle Chiave," composed entirely of noble and
illustrious persons, who wore a golden key suspended round the neck,
and also bore the same impresa, with the motto, Clauditur et aperitwr
liberis, " It is shut and opened to the free." " He that hath the key of
David, that openeth and no man shutteth, and shutteth and no man
openeth." 4
Citv of Casal di Montserrat. The sun rising in the east, and
1 Book viii., ch. 33. letters, I. M. C. P. AEC. C. {Joannes
2 Crescimbeni died in 1729, and was Marius Crescimbenius pastorum Arcadum
buried at Eome, in the basilica of S. custos).
Maria, in a tomb which he had built in 3 See 'Storia del' Accademia degli
his lifetime. On the stone were sculp- Arcadi in Eoma,' da Gio. Mario Cres-
turcd the arms of his family, with the cimbeni. Lond., 1S04.
pastoral flute of the Arcadians, and these 4 Eev. iii. 7.
8
HISTORIC DEVICES, BADGES,
the full moon setting in the west. Motto, Lux indeficiens, " Light
never wanting."
Costanti. The sun shining upon a column ; the shadow moves
with the sun, the column remains unmoved. Motto, Tantum volvitur
umbra, " The shadow only revolves."
Crusca (Accademia della). The Accademia Platonica, founded
in Florence about the middle of the fifteenth century by Cosmo de'
Medici, flourished greatly under the auspices of his grandson Lorenzo,
Fig. 5. — Delia Crusca Academy.
but was supplanted about a century after its birth by another society
called the Sacra Accademia Fiorentina, instituted in 1542 by Cosmo I.
The attention of the academy was wasted on the most fanciful com-
mentaries upon the earlier Italian poets ; and, on the death of Cosmo,
five of the academicians, joined by the famous Leonardo Salviati,
seceded, and formed another society, which professed to cultivate the
Italian language by winnowing the flour {il jiore) from the bran (la
crusca). They chose for their device a boulting-mill (fruUone), and
AND WAR-CRIES. 9
the motto. II pii't bel fior ne coglie, and assumed the title of Accademia
della Crusca, the members taking the appropriate names of Infarinato,
Rimenato, Gramolato, Insaccato, &c. Their sittings were held in
the Palazzo Eicardi : the backs of their arm-chairs were in the form of
winnowing shovels, the seats representing sacks. Unfortunately, the
first undertaking of this academy was the disgraceful war it carried
on against Tasso ; but it afterwards acquired some claim to the grati-
tude of Italy by the compilation of a great dictionary of the Italian
language, of which several enlarged editions have been made under its
care. Fig. 5 is a representation of the device of the academy, taken
from the frontispiece of the first edition of its ' Vocabulario.' The
" Marzocco," or lion of Florence, the city's emblem and its war-cry,
appears at the top of the shield.
In 1783 Leopold I. united the academies of Florence, Della Crusca,
and the Apatisti into one, under the name of the Royal Florentine
Academy. Alfieri wrote a bitter sonnet on the occasion :
"L'idioraa gentil, sonante e pnro,
Per cui d'oro l'arene Arno volgea,
Or giace aflitto, mesto e mal securo,
Priva di chi ' il piii bel fior ne coglia.'
Boreal sceltro, inesorabil, dvtro ;
La Madre la spenlo e una Matrigna or orca,
Che un di farallo vilipeso, oscuro.
Quanto caro un di l'altro, e bello il fen.
L'Antica Madre e ver, d'inerzia ingombra,
Avea gran tempo Parte sue neglette ;
Ma per lei stava del gran nome l'ombra.
Oh Italia a quai ti mena infami strette
L'esser da Gote ancor non ben disgombra
Ti sono le nude voce anco interdette !"
Elevati of Ferrara. Device, Hercules and Antaeus. The motto
from Horace, Super at tellus, sidera donat, " Earth conquers us, yet
gives us Heaven ;" in Scripture language, " Our light affliction worketh
for us a far more exceeding weight of glory."
Eterea of Padua. A charioteer in his car in the air, drawn by
a white and a black horse, the one endeavouring to touch the earth,
the other striving to ascend to heaven. Motto, Victor se tollit ad
auras, "The victor raises himself to the sky."
Florimontana. Established at Annecy in 1606. Device, an
10 HISTORIC DEVICES, BADGES,
orange-tree. Motto, Flores fructusque perennes, " Flowers and fruit
perennial."
G-ranelleschi. In 1740, some of the most distinguished literary-
men of the age formed themselves, at Venice, into a society to oppose
themselves to the torrent of bad taste, and to the corruption of the
Italian language. They called themselves the Society of the Granel-
leschi, " granelli" meaning a fool or simpleton, and each member took
for his device two " granelli." Their president, entitled Arci-gra-
nellone, was installed in a chair, on the back of which was an owl
holding in its right claw two " granelli." At each sitting, they began
by the most ridiculous productions, either in prose or verse, and
then passed on to the graver discussions on the literary principles
they wished to develop. These joyous seavans continued for many
years their noisy and puerile sottises, but contributed, at the same
time, to reform the public taste by their useful and profound
labours. 1
Infiammatt of Padua. Hercules upon the funeral pile on Mount
(Eta. Motto, Arso il mortal, al del riandra Veterno, " The mortal
burned, to heaven will go the eternal " 2 — " Then shall the dust
return to the earth as it was, and the spirit shall return unto God
who gave it." 3
Infocati. A bar of hot iron upon an anvil, beaten by two
hammers. Motto, In quascunque formas, " Into what shape he
will " — " Hath not the potter power over the clay ?" — " There's a
divinity that shapes one's ends, rough-hew them how we will."
Insensatt of Perugia. A flock of cranes, arranged in order,
flying across the sea, each with a stone in its foot, and sand in its
mouth. Motto, Vel cum pondere, " Even with this weight,"
implying that its members, even under the weight of business,
private or domestic, yet found time for literary pursuits. Cesare
Gamba used the same device (Fig. 6), with the motto, Iter tutissimum,
" The safest journey," 4 — Le voyage est plus sur. That the cranes
used stones and sand for ballast is recounted by Pliny. In the
23rd chapter of his tenth book he says, " When they mind to take a
1 Guiiiguene.
"Virtue blooms 3 Eccles. xii. 7.
Even in the wreck of life, 4 Contile, M. Luca, Ragionamento
And mounts the skies." soprc le Imprese, fol. Pavia, 1574.
H. K. White. passim.
AND WAR-CRIES. 11
flight over the sea Pontus, they will flie directly at the first to the
narrow streights of the said sea, . . . and then presently they ballaise
themselves with stones in their feet, and sand in their throats, that
Fig. 6.— Cesare Gamba, Member of the Insensati Academy.
they flie more steadie and endure the wind. When they be halfe
way over, down they fling those stones, but when they are come to
the continent, the sand also they disgorge out of their craws."
Again, Drayton writes :
" The crane to labour, fearing some rough flaw,
With sand and gravel burthening his craw ;
Noted by man which by the same did find
To ballast ships for steadiness of wind.
And by the form and order of his flight,
To march in war, and how to watch by night."
Drayton, The Owl.
And an old French writer says :
" Pour n'elever son vol ny trop haut ny trop bas,
La grue a des caillous qu'en ses pieds elle porte ;
Et par ce contrepoids elle se rend plus forte,
Pour s'empescber de choir en bas."
The Insensati had also another device, a swallow passing over the
sea with a stick in its mouth, which, it is said, she lays upon the
12
HISTOEIC DEVICES, BADGES,
water to support her when she requires rest (Fig. 7). Motto, Difessa
non diffisa, "Weary not distrusting " — Faint but pursuing — "I bate
no jot of heart or hope " — Toute lasse quest, elle est pleine de
cceur.
Fig. 1 — Insensati Academy.
Intronati of Siena. A gourd for containing salt, with two
pestles over it. Motto, Meliora latent, " The better part is hidden."
Lesina. An awl (Fig. 8). Motto, L' assottigliar la piu meglio
anchefora, " The more it is sharpened the better it penetrates."
Fig. S. — Lesina Academy.
Lincei, Accademia de', founded in Rome in 1603, by Prince
Frederic Cesi, with the object of encouraging a taste for natural
history. It is the most ancient academy in Italy that had not poetry
and literature for its end. The name they adopted was the Lynx
Academy, because the academicians should have the eyes of a lynx, to
penetrate into the secrets of nature. They adopted the lynx for their
device, and wore a golden ring with an emerald, upon which was
engraved a lynx, the name of the founder, and that of the academy.
The number of its members was small; among them were Galileo,
Fabio Colonna, and in the Neapolitan branch was Giambattista Porta,
who used the device of the academy, 1 with the motto, Aspicit et
inspirit, " Looks at and looks into." To this celebrated philosopher
and mathematician we are indebted for the invention of the camera
obscura.
1 See also, ' Empire, Charles IV.'
AND WAR-CRIES.
13
Occulti. A thrush. Taciturnus turdus, " A silent thrush." A
steel striking fire. Exilit quod delituit, " Out leaps what was
hidden " — Opportunity shows the man.
Offuscati. A bear l attacking a hive (Fig. 9), that the stings of
the bees may stimulate and rouse him from the heaviness which
oppresses him. Motto, Aciem acuunt aeulei, " Stings sharpen his
appetite " — Opposition animates — Les oppositions font croitre.
Fie. 0. — Offuscati Acaderu}'.
Ostinati. A pyramid blown from all quarters by the winds.
Motto, Frustra, " In vain" — " It stands four-square to all the winds
of heaven."
Einovati. Three serpents coiled together issuing from the ground,
and rearing their heads towards the sun to revive and invigorate them
after the torpidity of winter (Fig. 10). Motto, Quos bruma tegebat,
" Which winter hid." Thus Ariost o —
TJa gran drappel di bisce,
Che dopo il verao al sol si goda c lisce."
Orlando Furiosn.
1 " Subject they are many times to with their stings make them bleed about
dimnesse of sight, for which cause espe- the head, and by that meanes discharge
cially they seeke after honey-combes, that them of that heavinesse which troubleth
the bees might settle upon them, and their eyes." — Pliny, book viii., ch. 36.
2 For acuent, read acdunt.
14
HISTOEIC DEVICES, BADGES,
" So when in clustering knots a snaky brood,
Reviving joyful with the spring renew'd,
Bask in the sun." — Hoole's Translation.
Fig. 10. — Rinovati Academy.
Sonnachiosi of Bologna. A bear, which animal, according to
Pliny l and Aristotle, sleeps six continuous months of the year. Motto,
Sjpero avanzar con la vigilia il sonno, " I hope by vigils to make up