Personal Arms

[imbrius]

I've come up with an idea for my personal arms.

Emblazon:


Blazon: Per fess gules and sable on a fess argent three weasels of the second.


Black, red, and white (Sable, Gules, and Argent) are the combined colors of the arms of at least two of my known (or suspected) ancestors on my father's side. Likewise, the colors of the German Empire, during which the other half of my ancestors, my mother's side, emigrated to the United States. The weasel is an animal to which I relate closely and I tend to think of myself in terms and motives befitting a ferret, which is of the weasel family.

Opinions, thoughts?

[imbrius]

Variation: Bends instead of fesses:



Banner:

[imbrius]

Going with the same motif, here are two emblems I came up with.



A weasel sable.



A weasel sable semy of weasels gules.

[Tarheel]

Too busy here. Keep it simple for greater effect.

[imbrius]

Too busy here. Keep it simple for greater effect.

Heh, I thought so too. Mostly I did that one for teh lulz. It also violates the rule of tincture by putting one color on another.

[Taskr]

Your design is quite nice.

Simple curiosity: My understanding is that in the USA there is no official regulation on arms, except that for seals, badges, medals and such for the Executive office and States of the country with a heraldic authority within the US armed services forming the nucleus of heraldic support to government. My curiosity, then, is how does a person in the USA arrive at an authenticated personal arms. Or, do people assume arms if not inherited? Without a USA heraldic authority, could someone else take imbrius's arms as their own?

[Baeau]

....Without a USA heraldic authority, could someone else take imbrius's arms as their own?...

Think of it as his personal logo. Submit it for copyright (?), then he could legally go after anyone that uses it.

[imbrius]

Your design is quite nice.

Simple curiosity: My understanding is that in the USA there is no official regulation on arms, except that for seals, badges, medals and such for the Executive office and States of the country with a heraldic authority within the US armed services forming the nucleus of heraldic support to government. My curiosity, then, is how does a person in the USA arrive at an authenticated personal arms. Or, do people assume arms if not inherited? Without a USA heraldic authority, could someone else take imbrius's arms as their own?

Yeah, I'm fuzzy on those details, too. I know one of the ways of "proving" that it belongs to you is through consistent use of it. I know there are private registries and I did a bunch of searches to see if there was anything like what I was thinking so I wouldn't encroach on someone else's identity. I found several in the SCA Roll of Arms that were similar enough to the first design (that with the fess argent) that I decided to switch to a bend argent instead.

[Madadh]

Actually, your posting it here has set a time that you have first used it. A poor mans copyright is to send a registered mail copy to a friend that will not open it. If a copyright question comes up the USPS registered mail sets a formal date. Posting it here should do close to the same thing.

Have fun with your arms.

[FossilHunter]

Your design is quite nice.

Simple curiosity: My understanding is that in the USA there is no official regulation on arms, except that for seals, badges, medals and such for the Executive office and States of the country with a heraldic authority within the US armed services forming the nucleus of heraldic support to government. My curiosity, then, is how does a person in the USA arrive at an authenticated personal arms. Or, do people assume arms if not inherited? Without a USA heraldic authority, could someone else take imbrius's arms as their own?

One option used by Americans assuming arms is to register them with the South African heraldic authority which is open to anyone with the time and money to do it. My understanding is that arms registered in this manner are recognized by most European heraldic authorities.