SCA - West Kingdom College of Heralds

Heraldic Templates

What This Is
This part of the West Kingdom Heralds' website is aimed at assisting someone attempting to register armory with the SCA. It consists of a set of images that can be viewed and printed, and then traced directly onto the West Kingdom College of Heralds submission forms for devices and badges.

What This Is NOT
This is not a generic "clip-art" library, per se. It is a highly specialized set of artwork. While it is not designed to be clipart, it can probably be used that way. If you wish to use the art here for purposes other than what it is designed for, please be courteous, contact us for permission and credit the artist(s) and the website ... a lot of work went into this, and the artists deserve due credit.

The Templates -- Basic Usage
The heraldic templates given here are literally designed to help you design armory in as simple a fashion as possible. You should be able to print individual items and trace over them to place them on your submission forms. These are designed for the West Kingdom College of Heralds submission forms.

Heraldry is a huge subject, and there are many things possible when designing a coat of arms or badge, and not everything can be done on any one website. We cannot guarantee that you will find exactly what you want here. However, with some clever use of the templates, you may be able to combine items from different charges to get what you want -- you should check with the heralds to be sure what you are attempting is "legal", however.

The use of these templates assumes you understand some basic concepts heraldic concepts and rules, such as the Rule of Tincture, and no discussion of this will occur here. Discussions of the rules of heraldry can be found in many places, including the West Kingdom Herald's Handbook, and other places on the web (such as the Laurel Sovereign of Arms website of the SCA, Inc.).

The items/charges in these templates are specifically items/charges allowed in SCA heraldry, and when information is available about default colors or positions, it is given here. You should not find anything here that cannot be registered with the SCA College of Arms, however, its likely there are items that are legal for SCA armory that have not been included (mostly due to the enormity of the task).

Please remember that the artists are volunteers and work on these templates in their spare time.

To better assist you, these templates are broken down into the categories below. To see more detail for each category, click on the links, and go from there.

Note: This is not a finished project -- there are links for things that are not yet complete -- if you get a "404" error -- a broken link, don't worry -- it will usually mean it's not there yet. If the link is for something that you were told is there and it appears to not be, it's possible we goofed and got an incorrect filename, or some variety of other possible errors. In those cases, please report the problem to the webminister. This is a large project, and it takes a lot of time to do. No estimate can be given for when/if it will ever be completed. Much depends on the amount of time the volunteer artists have available to put in on it.

This project is brought to you by:
Concept and Organization, web page layout, maintanence, etc.: Hirsch von Henford
Consultation and Ideas: Teleri Tawel
Artwork: Vigdís vestfirzka, Naadirah bint 'Ali (aka Ysenda nicAlane), Teleri Tawel, Tusya Tatiana Sudoseva.
With lots of advice from active members of the West Kingdom College of Heralds, see the disclaimer at the bottom of the page.

If you would like to assist with this project, please drop the Golem Herald an email:

Heraldic Template Categories

Fields -- Field Divisions (i.e., Per Pale, etc.), Lines of Partition, and Field Treatments, Furs and Semés. This is complete.
(This could be modified to fit the current submission forms if someone wanted to ...)
Lines of Partition -- This is also referenced from the "Fields" page noted above, it's a way you can change the appearance of a line of division (partition), ordinary, and some simple charges ... This is complete.
(This could be modified to fit the current submission forms if someone wanted to ...)
Ordinaries -- These are major, and usually geometric charges placed on the field, such as a fess. This is complete.
(This could be modified to fit the current submission forms if someone wanted to ...)
Beasts and Monsters -- Beasts are natural creatures such as lions (this category includes those of a reptilian nature -- snakes, etc.), Monsters are "unnatural" creatures such as dragons, mermaids, etc. ... Currently in Progress
Birds -- as you might expect, Eagles, Crows, etc.
Beast, Monster and Bird heads and parts -- jambes, limbs, tails, wings ....
Fish -- Fish and crustaceans ...
Insects -- Bees, dragonflies, spiders ...
Plants and Trees -- Plants, Trees, Flowers, Fruit ...
Heavenly Bodies -- Stars (Mullets, Estoiles), Suns, Moons ... Currently in Progress
Architecture -- Castles, Bridges, etc.
Geometric -- Annulets, mascles, etc.
Crosses -- There are many types of crosses to choose from ... Currently in Progress
Knots -- Knots are usually depicted as rope tied in a specific knot shape ...
Weapons -- As it sounds.
Musical Instruments -- As it sounds.
Other Charges -- Pretty much everything else -- this is a large category ...

Disclaimer: All of these drawings are intended for use in the Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc., specifically for heraldic purposes. However, these pages do not delineate SCA College of Arms or West Kingdom College of Heralds policy. All attempts are made when describing or portraying the elements of armory used in these pages to be as accurate to both medieval and SCA usage as possible, but if you are not sure, you should check with the College of Arms or the College of Heralds. You may use these drawings "as is" for the purpose of designing heraldry for use within the SCA with this understanding. All decisions by the West Kingdom College of Heraldry and/or the SCA's College of Arms regarding the depictions used on your submission forms supercedes anything found here.

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