Changes and possible changes to Royal heraldry & vexillology

Pre 1953 Royal Coat of Arms with Tudor Crown.
Compare to variant used by Elizabeth II
 Credit Sodacan CC BY-SA 3.0

 With the sad passing of HM Queen Elizabeth II last month and the accession of HM King Charles III to the throne there will be some changes to royal symbols across the United Kingdom as well as the Commonwealth Realms. Now that the mourning period for the late Queen has passed I think it is appropriate to take a look at some of the heraldic changes. First and perhaps the most important as this will affect all Royal heraldry outside of Scotland is the crown (within Scotland the ancient Scots Crown is used on Royal heraldry). The St Edwards Crown we are all used to seeing on badges, cyphers, coats of arms and other symbols will change to the Tudor Crown. often referred to as the 'King's Crown' this was the crown used by George VI, Edward VIII, George V, and Edward VII. Now it was not a certainty that the crown would change, the choice of crown is up to the King. But when the new cypher of the King was published it featured the Tudor Crown which seems to confirm that the Tudor Crown will be used from now on. 

I confess I was slightly surprised at this as I was half expecting the King to decide to keep the St Edwards crown. Both out of a sense of constancy and practicality as this will be a major change in branding across the Commonwealth, affecting everything from military cap badges to post vans, and courts to passports.

Commonwealth Standards

Another change will be Royal Standards. While the Royal Standard of the UK will remain the same for it is simply a heraldic banner the same is not true of those used in the some of the Commonwealth Realms. The personal flags that the Late Elizabeth II used in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Jamaica all made use of the device used on her personal flag. This was a crowned letter 'E' within a wreath of roses. This was something a lot of heraldry fans disliked as the banner of arms by itself represented the monarch. Perhaps now that we have a new King this will be dropped from the Royal Standards of the Commonwealth Realms. 

If not though these are my proposals for those realms in which the King has his own unique standard. In all these cases I put the flag in an ermine border. My thinking here is that the flags of members of the Royal Family be distinguished by an ermine border. Whereas the Governor General could use a banner without an ermine border. I've also used the full cypher as a crowned 'C' will look an awful lot like the monogram of the Queen Consort. I've deliberately chosen not to use the roses used in the personal flag of Queen Elizabeth II,

Proposed King's flag for Canada.
Like the flags of other Royal Family members the cypher is within a garland of maple leaves

Proposed King's flag for use in Australia 

Proposed King's flag for use in New Zealand 
note use of ferns, around cypher

Proposed King's flag for use in Jamaica

As head of the Commonwealth Queen Elizabeth II used a flag that was designed to represent her as a person rather than the monarch of a realm or nation. As Prince of Wales never used such a flag so I am not sure he will feel the need to use one as King. If he does I thought of one on similar lines to that of his mother.

It is simply a blue flag with his cypher. I didn't use the roses his mother used. Given this is more personal I thought a rope circle symbolising his naval background might be more appropriate.

The Queen Consort

Another change is that as well as a new King we have a new Consort  (the title Queen Consort is used in this post to avoid confusion with the Late Queen and because although used in the past at the time if writing it is unclear if the title 'Queen' will be used). The consort of the monarch is the only royal spouse entitled to use their own standard (other spouses use the Royal Standard for members of the Royal Family without a personal standard). For Queen Consorts this is a banner of their coat of arms which is the arms of their husband  impaled with either their own or their father's arms. Hence the Queen Consorts Royal Standard will be the Royal Arms impaled with the arms of the Shands of Craig, Aberdeenshire. 

Standard of  the Queen Consort
Credit: Fry1989 CC BY-SA 4.0

Will there be seperate flags for Commonwealth Realms?  It is probably unlikely that the Queen Consort will travel to any of the Commonwealth realms without the King and so negating the need to use a unique flag. However I've had ago at throwing together some proposals. First is is the Shand arms impaled with the Royal Arms in right to the appropriate Commonwealth Realm.

 

Proposed Queen Consort's flag for use in Canada

Proposed Queen Consort's flag for use in Australia

Proposed Queen Consort's flag for use in New Zealand

Proposed Queen Consort's flag for use in Jamaica

Another option is to use the relevant Royal Standard and replace the King's Cypher with Camilla's monogram however I think that would be indistinguishable from the Royal Standard itself.  

Personally I think this shows the merits of not defacing the banners with cyphers. 

Other Members of the Royal Family

Something that I haven't heard mentioned or read anywhere is what this means for the coat of arms of the children of the King. 

Traditionally children of the Sovereign  and the first heir apparent use the Royal Coat of Arms differenced with a label of Three Points and other grandchildren of the Sovereign use the Royal Coat of Arms differenced with a label of five points. The points of the label being differenced by a heraldic charge usually a charge associated with the maternal line. According to Wikipedia (so take it with a grain of salt) HRH Prince William of Wales is already using the Royal Coat of Arms differenced with a label of three points.

arms currently used by HRH the Prince of Wales
Credit: Lobsterthermidor, CC BY-SA 3.0

This is not the arms used by previous Princes of Wales, which had an inescutcheon of the arms of Wales. The King was quick to announce that Prince William will become the Prince of Wales and he is already being referred to by that title. However he has not yet been formally invested as Prince of Wales or been granted any amendments to his coat of arms and that is not likely to happen until after the coronation. So we will probably see the inescutcheon granted along with the various badges and arms of the prince of Wales and Heir Apparent either before or immediately after the investiture of the Prince of Wales.

Arms of Prince of Wales 1917-2022
Credit: Sodacan, CC BY-SA 3.0

Another change could be in the coat of arms of the Duke of Sussex. Presently Prince Harry uses the Royal Arms differenced with a label of five points with the outer and centre point charged with an escallop (reference to the Spencer Arms). A label of five points is of course traditional for a grandchild of the Sovereign, but the Duke is now a child of the Sovereign. So this could change to a label of three points.  In such a case I would propose charging the outer labels as a single escallop on the central point was used by his brother.

proposed arms for Duke of Sussex

These changes would of course be reflected on the arms of their spouses. 

Seals

The royal seals of the United Kingdom are four things that will change. The royal seals are affixed to legislation when they receive Royal Ascent, these are the Great Seal of the Realm (used for Acts of Parliament), the Great Seal of Scotland (used for Acts of the Scottish Parliament), The Great Seal of Northern Ireland (used for Acts of the Northern Ireland Assembly) and the Seal of Wales (Acts of Senedd Cymru). When a monarch passes away new seals are made and the old ones are decommissioned by being defaced by a hammer. 

All the seals feature an image of the monarch either enthroned or on horseback with heraldry on the reverse.

This is unlikely to change, although in the cases for the Northern Ireland and Welsh seals it would be a good opportunity to update the heraldry. Under George V and George VI (and presumably Elizabeth II)the reverse of the Great Seal of Northern Ireland featured royal arms with an inescutcheon of a red cross of gold field from the arms of Ulster. I would propose a variant of the Royal coat of arms with the heraldry of the Kingdom of Ireland:

proposed NI variant of Royal Coat of Arms

It features the Irish harp in the first and fourth quarters. The historic crest of Ireland on the hem and the Order of St Patrick as well as a compartment of shamrock. The supporters feature an Irish Elk and British lion bearing the flag of St Patrick and the aforesaid red cross on gold field. 

Something similar could be done on the Welsh Seal. The arms of Wales could be given dragon supporters and placed on the reverse allowing the image of the monarch to take up the entire obverse.

proposed coat of arms of Wales
credit: SuperPanetone Reddit

A heraldic walk in Derry

As yesterday was a nice day I decided to take a walk around the city centre of Londonderry, Northern Ireland's second city but in my opinion its capital in terms of history.
It might be useful to read this post before from 2012 before reading here as I will reference a few points in it. Starting in the waterside I walked over the double deck blue and white Craigavon Bridge, the top deck features the city coat of arms every few feet.

Towards the end of the bridge is the plaque commemorating its opening

On this plaque is old arms of Northern Ireland and those of the city:

Moving into the old walled city I passed the courthouse featuring the Royal coat of arms from 1801-1816.

Next to the building you can see behind, St Columb's Cathedral

Before the gates of the Cathedral's main drive and on the gate itself (the pic here was taken from inside the gate in order to avoid the sun) are the arms of the former Church of Ireland diocese of Derry (currently paired with Raphoe) on either side of the gate are the city's arms

 and the arms of the Honourable the Irish Society who originally built the church

Inside the gate is the notice board with times for both worshipers and visitors again featuring the diacoses arms

aswell as the Cathedral's seal still in use:

a quick walk in some of the adjourning streets of the walled city and we notice the street name signs feature the city arms.

Onto the city walls themselves, and you will notice a fine collection of 17th & 18th century cannon. Most of these were at various stages provided by the City of London livery companies who financed the plantation city. while the later guns of this period were simply inscribed with the company name the earlier ones bore the London coat of arms, which is still recognisable.

Nxt stop along the walls is the Apprentice Boys Memorial Hall. Here there are two versions of the city arms. One on the balcony with the date of the hall's extension

And higher up the arms appear in a roundel with the text "Apprentice Boys of Derry - No Surrender" around it. Note that on this variant of the arms only half of the St George Cross is used.

heading down the walls to between Magazine Gate and Shipquay Gate overlooking the Guildhall are more cannon with the London arms, however two here are significantly older dating from around 1590 and are distinguished by the Tudor rose and crown, although on both this badge is much faded and worn, however the outline of it can still be traced.

The next and last great building we come to is the Guildhall where the council meets and where civic functions are held. From the walls we see that the building is crested with a crowned lion holding the shield of the Kingdom of Ireland. Below this side by side are the city arms and those of the Irish Society

At the base of the adjoining clock tower is the main entrance featuring a very ornate version of the city coat of arms

I confess to not really knowing what the other shields are. The very top one appears to be the arms of the City of London impaled with the Carpenters Guild, the bottom left looks like a variant of the Sherwood arms of which I am not entirely clear on the city connection. The far right is either a cross of St George possibly from the London arms but with the sword worn away or the De Burgh arms who were the Norman Earls of Ulster. 

Along the top of the ground floor windows is a ring of carved oak leaves with three shields, bearing the arms of Ireland, Londonderry and Ulster. 

arms of the city

arms of the kingdom

arms of the province 

I didn't go into any of the buildings mentioned here maybe I'll do that another time as I know they all have heraldry and other symbols on the inside too

UK police badge redesigns Part 1

As far as British police badges go, most are pretty good, but I think some are rather generic. Most feature an eight pointed star generally (but not always) topped with a crown. In the centre of the star is a circular disk, with the name of the police force around it. Most have some sort of local or specific insignia in the centre but lots just have the Royal EIIR cypher. Personally I don't think the cypher is needed as the monarch and state is already represented by the crown. Here are just a few redesigns where I have replaced the cypher with something to represent the local area or region, starting with the largest police force in Britain,London's Metropolitan Police Service.

It uses the Westminster portcullis which appears on the Met's coat of arms.
For the Bedfordshire police I used the Bedfordshire coat of arms:

The Cumbria police badge features the white Grass of Parnassus flower found on both the flag of Cumberland (often mistaken for Cumbria) and the Cumbria flag.

Dorset Police badge design features a Dorset flag shield:

Likewise the Gloucestershire police badge features a county flag shield:

Greater Manchester Police also use the local coat of arms:

The Gwent police badge is slightly different, it is based on the Gwent banner, but with some slight differences mainly the dragon to distinguish it as this police force's jurisdiction expands beyond Monmouthshire. I also kept the Welsh text on the badge:

the Humberside police badge is also based on a coat of arms but differs slightly:

The Merseyside police badge redesign features three mural coronets from the Merseyside flag:

The redesign for the Nottinghamshire police badge featured the shield from the centre of the Nottinghamshire flag:

However I realize that the figure represents Robin Hood and felt it might be a bit ironic for the badge of law enforcement to feature an outlaw! So I also offer an alternative featuring the cross from the flag:

Other badge redesigns are that of the Ministry of Defence Police (not to be confused with the Royal Military Police which is a corps of the army)  and Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary whose job is to police the police.
The MoD police badge redesign simply features the tri-service emblems of the swords (army), anchor (navy), and eagle (air force):

HM Inspectorate of Constabulary's badge redesign features a shield bearing scales of justice, the royal cypher and an olive wreath. However I consent that in this case it might be appropriate to just use the royal cypher as is done in the present badge. 

But perhaps the law enforcement organisation in need most of a badge redesign is the National Crime Agency (NCA) the British equivalent of the FBI. Although their current logo might work well as a logo, it doesn't really work as a badge, so this is my proposal:

It features the eight pointed star common to nearly all UK police forces, the crown and the royal arms to demonstrate its national jurisdiction.