An Ordinary of Arms, Vol. II, 1902-1973 Index? Register? Table? Vivien Wilson A succinct definition of An Ordinary of Arms, Vol. Register as and when the Arms are granted. Nowadays II, 1902-1973 compiled in the Court of the Lord Lyon, photostat copies are made as well. Edinburgh, may perhaps vary according to the bent of Accuracy, together with easy, speedy perusal was the reader. therefore important for the new work. Efforts to The book was to have been a combined operation discover the method used for the compilation of Vol. I with the Glasgow University Archivist and then Carrick were fruitless. The system devised for Vol. II incor Pursuivant of Arms, David Reid of Robertland, but he porated as many cross-checks as practically possible. sadly and suddenly died eighteen months after work Consequently, it was a draft index which I typed first, began, and I was asked to carry on. extracted from the master index of Lyon Register. This new Ordinary runs to 540 pages, and contains all the Coats of Arms assigned by the Lord Lyon King of The constitution of Coats of Arms Arms of the day during the seventy years specified. After Readers may or may not be aware that in Scottish classification by their first mentioned charge the Arms heraldry a Coat of Arms may be made up of several are listed alphabetically. Their owners are also listed different Coats to form one individual Coat which alphabetically under the heading 'Index', the latter belongs to that particular individual and no one else. taking up 100 of the 540 pages. A list of the headings For example, the present Duke of Edinburgh's second used for the classified text is also included. recording is a quartered Coat of Arms (the first one, I There were two important reasons for rearranging the suspect, proved too complicated and costly to reproduce Arms in the Public Register of All Arms and Bearings in satisfactorily). It is made up of the Arms of Denmark, Scotland from the order in which they are recorded into Greece, Battenburg and Edinburgh. The Duke of classified and alphabetical form. The first was to facili Buccleuch's 1929 matriculation was made up of eleven tate checking that no Arms were duplicated. The second different Coats to show his lineage. Impaled Arms, i.e. was to enable unnamed Coats of Arms to be identified the marshalling of two Coats side by side on the same when found, be it on a silver salver, gable end, lintel or shield, need also to be taken into account, especially elsewhere. since such marshalling is used, not only for armigerous Sir James Balfour Paul, Lord Lyon King of Arms married couples, but also bowling clubs, hospital from 1890 to 1926 and at least 29th holder of the office boards, masons' lodges and similar organizations believed to date from 1318, compiled An Ordinary of comprising an over-all body with self-contained but Arms in 1893. A second edition published in 1903 affiliated subsidiaries. contains all Arms recorded in Lyon Office from 1672 to One of the earliest points to be decided, therefore, 1902, and is now referred to as Vol. I. was the interpretation of the unum quid. If entries were Compilation of Vol. II necessitated extraction of all long, it would hinder speedy perusal. At the same time it relevant material from some forty of the sixty volumes of had to be borne in mind that if entries were excessively Lyon Register, as it is commonly called. In other words, fragmented, readers might have difficulty in visualizing more Arms were devised and assigned between 1902 and the Arms in their entirety. For the new Ordinary, it was 1973 than were recorded in the previous 230 years. Prior decided to continue, so far as practicable, on the same to 1672 when the Public Register of All Arms and lines as those used by Sir James Balfour Paul in his Bearings was created by Statute, Arms were not legally proven work. Crests, supporters and other heraldic protected as they have been since that date. additaments are likewise excluded. Each volume of the Public Register is leather bound Thus, continuing with the examples already quoted, and measures 17" x 11". The majority each contain 120 there are four text reference numbers against the Duke interleaved sheets of vellum. Every assignee—any of Edinburgh's name in the index, and eleven against the 'virtuous and well deserving person' may petition for a Duke of Buccleuch's, and the text entries are much the Coat of Arms—receives an illuminated vellum depicting same length as in Vol. I. There is also the Lyon Register his/her Arms together with written genealogy and number against the name in the index and at the end of blazon. A duplicate is painted and written in the the text entry, a reference not included in Vol. I. Added The Indexer Vol. 12 No. 4 October 1981 195 to this, all reference numbers for entries such as the classification was a most useful check for mistakes. Duke of Bucclcuch's had to be inserted against the name The draft index was in need of retyping by this time, of his second dukedom (Queensberry) since it is fre which provided a relatively easy interlude before I quently used, and each of the three surnames which embarked on the numbering of the slips. I did this in comprise his family name, i.e. Montagu, Douglas and black on the slip itself; and in either black, or green to Scott. denote italics with its further connotation, both over the pencilled entry in the first index and in the retyped Mechanics of compilation index. All numbers were prefixed with 'O' to differ Maintaining Balfour Paul's definition of the unum entiate entries from Vol. I should amalgamation of the quid meant that the relevant material for each entry two volumes be attempted at some future date. If the could, with few exceptions, be included on a slip of individual possessed a triple-barrelled surname and two paper 2" wide—five slips to an A4 sheet of paper. titles of nobility in common use, five names could be Sufficient indent was made on the first line for the involved in the index with, say, twelve sets of numbers eventual insertion of the slip's number. A twinlock against each. Subsidiary titles were ignored. Coats of punch specially marked, and garden wire, enabled the Arms with grand quarters and even smaller divisions slips (over six thousand of them to a set) to be secured in required several sets of numbers as well. Her Majesty's Stationery Office files; twelve of them. When all the slips had been numbered, perusal and There were six files to a set as the slips were typed in comparison of the two indexes revealed any omissions duplicate. through pencil entries not being covered by an ink With these points in mind, I typed the material direct number, and such omissions were investigated. from the Register volumes onto sheets of A4 paper, A further reassuring check was made to see if the basically classified each entry, tore the sheets into the numbers against the names in the index emerged in likely strips and filed them under the basic headings at the end sequences, after the classification. For instance, the of each day's work. The classification was entered in County Council of Banff had two recordings for the pencil—black, or green to denote italics—on the slip same Coat of Arms, one in 1953 and the other in 1971. and also against the relevant name in the already typed Fifteen volumes of Lyon Register and eighteen years draft name index. This provided a cursory check on the intervene. It is a quartered Coat, and the numbers for material as it was extracted, and also checked that the each entry emerge sequentially. It seemed reasonable, in names and Lyon Register numbers were correct. (I had these circumstances, to assume the positions were spent the previous year re-writing the master index, so correct. The differencing system employed in Scottish was glad of the opportunity to check it as well.) The heraldry at the present time makes it a simple matter to method also provided a safeguard against inadvertently check the position of various sons in the family as well. turning over two pages of a Register and consequently Finally, when in doubt, at the end of the operation, I omitting an individual's Arms altogether. Italicized remarshalled the complicated Coats from the numbers. numbers against a grantee's entry in the index were used This ensured that some quartering or smaller fragment to denote an allusion was specified in his/her Arms. of a Coat had not got mislaid or wrongly positioned. I Italicized names in the index refer to a quarter only of felt the checking was necessary because the omission or the unum quid of which they form a part. erroneous addition of an 's', or substitution of a semi All the relevant material having been extracted, the colon for a colon can render the interpretation of a next check was with the material supplied to the Edin written blazon wrong both in colour and design. burgh Official Gazette to ensure that the Scottish terri Whereas 'Ermine' is depicted as a white fur with black torial designations had been correctly included where spots, 'Ermines' is represented by white spots on a black appropriate. field, for example. The foregoing kept me busy on my part-time basis in Classification and checking Lyon Office for three and a half years.