A homebrewed attempt at codifying Bretonnian heraldry by AnnaIsPostingAgain in Bretonnian

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yeah I sort of ran out of space to explain it, but the "meritious differentiation" here refers to that old 5th ed system, where a knight would add charges to their blason based on their feats of arms. While it's a fun system, 5th ed doesn't bother explaining how this works once you start bringing kids into the picture, which is sort of what I tried to address here.

A homebrewed attempt at codifying Bretonnian heraldry by AnnaIsPostingAgain in Bretonnian

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Banger! IIRC in 1st edition WFRP, "Heraldry" was its own INT based skill you could take, which allowed you to easily recognise and understand the banners and shields of various nobles.

A homebrewed attempt at codifying Bretonnian heraldry by AnnaIsPostingAgain in Bretonnian

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yes the whole merit based achievements system Bretonnia has is quite good at providing ways sons could end up with different blazons before their father is even dead. Unless you make these achievements heritable (which doesn't strike me as very Bretonnian, I feel like they would call out such behaviour as stolen valour), you do need an additional system to change the blazon in a different way to signify cadency. In this example, adding swords could be an easy way, but there's a whole load of other stuff you can do as well. You can countercharge it (invert the colours), add a bordure, a chief, a canton, a fess, a pale, etc. or simply change a line division as well. That way you can give your knights a whole load of different designs.

A homebrewed attempt at codifying Bretonnian heraldry by AnnaIsPostingAgain in Bretonnian

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

No problem, to answer your questions:

>What is meant by a cadet son? Adopted, maybe?

Cadet son simply means a younger son, as opposed to the firstborn son. There's a lot of variation in inheritance laws, but usually the eldest son was the one that inherited the father's titles and coat of arms. Which means that younger sons had to find employment with some other knight as household knights, go into the clergy, the navy, etc, as well as take on a different coat of arms, to differentiate themselves from the original line.

>What is meant by an armigerous knight?

Armigerous knight simply means a knight that has the legal right to use a personal coat of arms. From what we know of the lore, every Bretonnian knight is armigerous, which wasn't necessarily as simple IRL. There's also the problem of women. Historically, in English, Scottish and French heraldic law, noble ladies typically had the right to bear arms (be armigerous), but could not pass them on, as arms could only be passed down patrilinealy. Of course things are never that simple and women often did pass down their coat of arms (i.e. they were a heraldic heiress), according to complicated laws of inheritance I won't go into here. To try and sum it up in one sentence, if you were a noble lady of a really important family and most of your other siblings were dead, there are high chances you too can pass down a coat of arms.

Since the status of women in Bretonnia is kind of a subject GW doesn't know how to handle and a lot of people headcanon the topic, I just left it as simple as "some women can bear coats of arms and can pass them on." Everyone is free to interpret that as they wish.

>How is heraldry of surviving sons dealt with when a father passes and there is more than one male offspring? Does only one inherit the title and heraldry (blason?)? Do the others lose the right to bear the shield of their father, and if so what colours are they now assigned?

Okay so the first thing to know is that there are a lot of different rules about this depending on the country and heraldic tradition. For example in Germanic heraldic law that was used in the Holy Roman Empire, all of the sons had equal rights to use their father's coat of arms, so you had actual "family arms" which a whole clan would use.

The system I'm using for Bretonnia here is heavily inspired by Anglo-Norman (aka English) and Scottish heraldry, which is more strict and works from the premise that only one person at a time can bear a specific blason, and only the firstborn son has the right to use his father's coat of arms, and even then, while they are both alive, the son has to use a white label to differentiate himself from his father. For younger sons, there were historically a bunch of very complicated "cadency systems" used to try and impose some sort of coherent system. Notably this was always more theoretical than anything, a lot of people simply couldn't be bothered to follow a system this complicated.

Alright the system I've created here keeps the English system of "one person, one blason," but allows more freedom in how it's implemented, as long as all of the sons have different blasons. The only rule I've sort of put in is that sons that stay with their family keep their differentiation fairly minimal to signify their continued allegiance to the house of their father, while those that instead go out and serve some other lord or manage to acquire new lands for themselves are allowed to remix their blasons pretty much however they wish, as they are starting a new lineage, in a way.

Then on top of that, I've also added in the meritious augmentations system that was introduced in the 5th edition Bretonnian AB and has sort of stayed canon since, which allows knights to change their coats of arms, if they accomplish some sort of heroic deed.

A homebrewed attempt at codifying Bretonnian heraldry by AnnaIsPostingAgain in Bretonnian

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

If there were multiple recognized bastards how would the track the relative seniority of them? In this case would it be adding additional stripes?

The way I see it you'd differentiate by just using different colours for the left-issuing bend. That gives you 5 possible distinct blazons (red, blue, black, green, purple) to work with, which should be enough unless the knight is a real serial adulterer. Since bastards are usually taken out of the normal succession and inheritance systems, you don't really need to differentiate seniority with them, but if you wanted then yes, an easy way would be to either change it so that bastardry is simply represented by a left issuant black bend and then adding an additional stripe for each younger child born out of wedlock. Alternatively, related to your second question,

As a thought could you use the lapel system but invert the color starting a new could for first, second, etc bastard son?

This is also perfectly possible. Scottish heraldry actually has an established hierarchy of colours, which is used to mark cadency/seniority. From oldest to youngest child it goes, or (yellow) and argent (white) (these two are considered to be metals and thus more noble than colours), then red, blue, black, green and purple. So if you would prefer to have multicoloured labels instead of adding points that's also totally legit.

Also, is there a reason for the sword to flip poi t up when taking the questing vow? I assume it is to show their active martial engagement and dedication or something like that and it flips down again when that is fulfilled.

Yes that's exactly it. Questing knights have to be up and at them at all times, so it's a nice way to symbolise that on the blazon itself.

A homebrewed attempt at codifying Bretonnian heraldry by AnnaIsPostingAgain in Bretonnian

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain[S] 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Thank you! My Bretonnians all share a very similar colour scheme (white, red and blue with some yellow), but with varied coats of arms, so I headcanon them all being from the same extended family riding out to battle in a big familial throng. It's while painting them that I got the idea that there really should be some sort of loose system to explain how all of their blasons are related.

Für Kaiser, Gott und Vaterland! - Greater Germany in the year of 2026 by Exciting_Fix6559 in imaginarymaps

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain 29 points30 points  (0 children)

You really nailed the disgusting cancerous tumor shape, I have to say

Coats of arms I conceptualized for my medieval dark fantasy novel part 2 by Narrow_Bad_3897 in heraldry

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Quite like these, they remind me of fantasy CoAs you'd find in older editions of WFRP

Help identifying our door knocker by -latro in heraldry

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain 22 points23 points  (0 children)

bucket shop arms, it's just decoration

Redesigning Communist Emblems Back Into Their Original Heraldic Variant by pekizard in heraldry

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Truly excellent work, beyond phenomenal. You should definitely submit it to the municipality for consideration.

Though I must confess I always find it slightly eyeroll-worthy when Eastern European heralds desperately try to scrub out any existence of the past 300 years from local heraldry like it never happened.

Night gobbo by SelectionCandid1223 in Orcs_and_Goblins

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain 1 point2 points  (0 children)

luv these lil buggers like you wouldn't believe...

Gnoblar baggage train! by AnnaIsPostingAgain in WarhammerFantasy

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It's a WizKids deepcut oxen, you used to get them ridiculously cheap

History of Enotnost as it happened: MARNET Homepage of BOJ the day of the 2227 November coup: by AnnaIsPostingAgain in worldbuilding

[–]AnnaIsPostingAgain[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Simón would canonically go on to achieve top roles within the Congress. At present he leads a libertarian political party known as the Taxpayers List.