Heraldic Tinctures

Tinctures are the colors, metals, and furs used in HFS heraldry, though the depiction of charges in their natural colors or "proper" are also regarded as tinctures, the latter distinct from any color that such a depiction might approximate. Heraldry is essentially a system of identification, so the most important convention of heraldry is the rule of tincture. To provide for contrast and visibility, metals (generally lighter tinctures) must never be placed on metals, and colors (generally darker tinctures) must never be placed on colors. Where a charge overlies a partition of the field, the rule does not apply. There are other exceptions - the most famous being the arms of the kingdom of Jerusalem, consisting of gold crosses on white.

The names used in English blazon for the colors and metals come mainly from French and include Or (gold), Argent (white), Azure (blue), Gules (red), Sable (black), Vert (green), and Purpure (purple). A number of other colors – including Bleu-celeste, Sanguine, Tenné and Murrey – are occasionally found, typically for special purposes.

Certain patterns called "furs" can appear in a coat of arms, though they are (rather arbitrarily) defined as tinctures, not patterns. The two common furs are Ermine and Vair. Ermine represents the winter coat of the stoat, which is white with a black tail. Vair represents a kind of squirrel with a blue-gray back and white belly. Sewn together, it forms a pattern of alternating blue and white shapes.

In heraldry, tinctures are the colours used to emblazon a coat of arms. These can be divided into several categories including light tinctures called metals, dark tinctures called colours, non-standard colours called stains, furs, and "proper". A charge tinctured proper (also sometimes termed "natural") is coloured as it would be found in nature. One of the few fundamental rules of heraldry is that metals must not be placed upon other metals and colours must not be placed upon other colours, while furs and proper can be placed upon either or both. This is referred to as the rule of tincture. Nonstandard colours called stains were introduced in the late Middle Ages, but have largely been shunned as contrary to the heraldic spirit of bold images and bright colours. A peculiar fad of the Renaissance sought to couple each tincture with an associated planet, gemstone, flower, astrological sign, etc., but this practice was soon abandoned and is now regarded as wildly divergent from the science of heraldry. The 19th century saw the rise of "landscape heraldry" and extensive use of charges tinctured "proper", especially in augmentations (and more often in German heraldry than English), but this practice too has been deprecated as essentially unheraldic.

Basic Tinctures

English heraldry recognises seven principal tinctures, consisting of two "metals", or light tinctures (gold and silver), and five "colours", or dark tinctures (blue, red, purple, black, and green). On the continent, however, especially in German and Nordic heraldry, purple (together with Ermine, discussed below) is not used on the shield, but is reserved for the royal pavilion, the lining of some royal crowns and the caps of some of the high nobility. Some continental heraldic traditions also recognise white as a colour distinct from silver. While some heraldic authors recommend a particular shade for each colour, there is only one red in heraldry, and only one green, one blue, etc. The exception to this is the late 19th century development of "natural" colours, known as stains, which have been largely shunned and are seldom found.

Colors, Metals & Stains

The basic tinctures are classified according to whether they are colors, stains or metals. The Metals are Argent and Or. The Colors are Azure, Gules, Vert, Purpure, and Sable. The Stains, seen uncommonly, are;bleu-celeste, brunatre, cendree, de piedra, Murrey, rose or rouge, terry or amaranth, carnation or buff, Sanguine, Tenné and ochre. Traditionally, the tinctures are capitalized when writing out a blazon.

The Metals
Metal Tincture Name	Common Name
Argent	Silver, gray or white
Or	Gold or yellow

Tincture Name	Common Name
Azure	Blue
Gules	Ruby Red
Vert	Green
Purpure	Purple
Sable	Black
proper	Natural (see proper tinctures below)

Later heraldry introduced some more colours. Only three are of more than exceptional use in British heraldry: Murrey (mulberry-coloured, or reddish purple), Sanguine (blood-red) and Tenné (an orange-tawny colour, though in continental heraldry orange is regarded as different, and South African blazons mention both "orange" and "Tenné," though how these are shown is apparently interchangeable). These were sometimes called stainand colours (or "stains"), as some rebatements of honour were said to be blazoned of these colours. Almost none of these rebatements are found in fact of heraldic practice, however, and in British heraldry the stains find more than exceptional use only for purposes of livery.

Other colours, particularly those used in Europe, include:

• carnation (the colour of European human skin – most common in France),

Bleu-celeste (also ciel or celeste – sky-blue),-*cendrée (dark grey) These are rare – the seven primary tinctures are the most common ones.

Stain Name	Common Name
Bleu-celeste	sky blue
brunatre	brown
cendree	ash gray
de piedra	stone gray
Murry	mulberry / purplish red
rose/rouge	pink
Terry / amaranth	earthy-brown colored
Carnation / buff	flesh colored
Sanguine	blood red
Tenné	tawny orange
ochre	burnt ochre

'Proper' Tinctures

In addition to the aforementioned tinctures, there is a special consideration termed 'proper'. The term is used when a charge is emblazoned in a manner as it appears in nature and is considered heraldic shorthand. Thus, instead of saying A pine tree Vert, trunked brunatre, one blazons it A pine tree proper. Objects may also be depicted in their natural colours, described in blazons as 'proper' (though in some cases what are considered the "natural colours" are determined by convention rather than observation in the wild; for instance, a parrot proper is green, not any of the huge range of colours that parrots are coloured with in nature; and dragons, though never found in nature, are when proper also green). Sometimes when "proper" alone would not give adequate information as to the appearance a colour must also then be given (e.g., a white horse proper). Proper is considered to be a tincture distinct from whatever heraldic tincture the depiction of the item or being in question would most closely approximate.

Proper as the natural colors of a charge must be unambiguous. For example, a robin proper, or a brown bear proper, or a tree proper. If the charge comes in different colors, do not call it proper. Consider a horse. How many different colors and color patterns do horses come in? The words must describe the picture so that a competent artist can recreate the picture without having to do extensive research.

If described as "an American Kestrel proper", most people would have to go scrambling for a bird book to check the colors, even if they recognized that the Kestrel is a falcon. Being more precise and including the species (Falco sparverius ) does help.

One of the examples was "a brown bear proper". Anyone can visualize that. However, consider "a snowshoe hare in summer phase". "A brown rabbit proper" says the same thing in words that anyone can visualize. The fine distinction between a generic "rabbit" and a "snowshoe hare " is insignificant in the heraldic sense.

You cannot use proper to cheat on the rule of tincture. Charges blazoned as proper are still either light or dark, and must be placed on an appropriate tincture. A tree blasted proper is still a dark color (brown) and cannot be placed on a color. As heraldic shorthand, proper has limited application. There are only a few objects, which have a "proper " coloration. They include:

A sword proper... (Argent, hilted and pommelled Or)	A thistle proper… (Purpure, slipped and leaved Vert)
A popinjay proper… (Vert, beaked Gules)	A rose proper... (Gules, barbed Vert, seeded Or)

Proper charges are very frequent as crests and supporters. Overuse of the tincture "proper" is not encouraged.

Furs

Furs, such as Ermine, Vair, and their variants, are regular patterns that represent actual fur. Any charge may be tinctured of a fur, though furs occur infrequently in German and Nordic heraldry. In German heraldry, Kürsch (fur proper) is sometimes used, but this is seldom found elsewhere. Although the name "Sable" comes from a kind of fur, the colour Sable is usually not considered a heraldic fur.

Ermine and its variants

Ermine represents the winter coat of the stoat, which is white with a black tail; many skins would be sewn together to make a luxurious garment, producing a pattern of small black spots on a white field. The conventional representation of the tails (commonly called Ermine spots) is part of the tincture itself, rather than a pattern of charges, though the Ermine spot is also used as a single charge. The Ermine spot has had a wide variety of shapes over the centuries; its most usual representation has three tufts at the end (bottom), converges to a point at the root (top), and is attached by three studs.

Ermines is the reverse of Ermine – a field Sable semé of Ermine-spots Argent. It is sometimes called counter-Ermine (cf. French contre-hermine and German gegen-hermelin). Erminois is Ermine with a field Or instead of Argent, and Pean is the reverse of Erminois (i.e. Or spots on a field Sable). Erminites is supposed to be the "same as Ermine, except that the two lateral hairs of each spot are red;" its existence in actual heraldic practice is doubted, however, and Arthur Charles Fox-Davies describes it as a "silly [invention] of former heraldic writers, not of former heralds."

Vair and its variants

Vair originated from alternately patterned pieces of fur from a species of squirrel with blue-grey back and white belly. The term Vair was brought into Middle English from Old French, from Latin varius "variegated". Basic Vair consists of rows of small bell-like shapes of alternating blue and white, nowadays usually drawn with straight edges. The bells on the next row down are placed with their bottoms facing the bottoms of the bells on the row above, and so forth down. The old depictions of vair are similar in appearance to bars of azure and argent divided by alternating straight and wavy lines. (An excellent example is the lining of the cloak of Geoffrey Plantagenet as represented on his tomb.) In the past this would simply be blazoned "Vair", but nowadays this is usually (though not always) blazoned Vair ancient. Variations include several different arrangements of the pieces into other patterns. Vairy of [metal] and [colour] is used when a Vair-like pattern is represented of any tinctures other than Azure and Argent. Very rarely, the individual pieces of vair are used as charges.

Potent is like Vair, except using a T shape instead of a bell shape. The word Potent means "crutch"; it is thought to derive from badly-drawn Vair. It is subject to all the subvarieties of Vair, thus counter-Potent and so on.

Other furs

German heraldry recognizes a fur called Kürsch; this is said to be drawn brown and hairy, and there are occasional references in English to "vair bellies", which may be the same thing. Plumeté is a feather-like pattern of exceptionally rare appearance which is, strangely, nevertheless placed under the heading of furs. It can be used essentially (though not technically) as a type of patterned field. "Plumetty d'aigle proper" is distinguished in at least one case, though the tincture in this case is a form of proper. Pappeloné is a pattern supposed to resemble the scales on the wings of a butterly

The Rule of Tincture

The first rule of heraldry is the rule of tincture: no metal must ever be placed upon metal, nor colour upon colour, for the sake of contrast.

The main duty of a heraldic device is to be recognized, and the dark colours or light metals are supposed to be too difficult to distinguish if they are placed on top of other dark or light colours, particularly in poor light. Though this is the practical genesis of the rule, the rule is technical and appearance is not used in determining whether arms conform to the rule. Another reason sometimes given to justify this rule is that it was difficult to paint with enamel (colour) over enamel, or with metal over metal.

This rule is so closely followed that arms that violate it are called armes fausses (false arms) or armes à enquérir (arms of enquiry); any violation is presumed to be intentional, to the point that one is supposed to enquire how it came to pass. The rule of tincture has had an influence reaching far beyond heraldry. It has been imposed on flags, or perhaps it should be put, applied to the design of flags. The rule of tincture has also influenced World Wide Web design with respect to what colour font should be placed on what colour background. Almost all license plates and traffic signs, intentionally or unintentionally, follow it.

Blazon of Tincture

The custom in English blazon is to reduce redundancy by only referring to a particular colour once in the blazon.

For example, instead of saying Gules, on a fess Or a rose Gules seeded Or, one would say, Gules, on a fess Or a rose of the field, seeded of the second. However, this practice has recently been abandoned by the College of Arms because of the difficulty some have had in counting which number a tincture is.

Likewise, instead of Vert, a fess Or between two lions passant Or, one would say, Vert, a fess between two lions passant Or, as all items in blazon appearing after a given tincture are of the tincture next to be named. Given this, the Institute of Heraldry practice of often using the phrase "of the like" in a similar context is out of harmony with the usual heraldic practice and completely unnecessary.

Counterchanging

When a charge is placed across a division line, variation, or ordinary, it may be blazoned counterchanged. However, some patterns, such as chequy, do not permit charges over them to be treated this way. This means that the charge is divided the same way as the field it is placed upon, with the colours reversed.

A shield which is green on the upper half and silver on the lower, charged at the centre with a lion whose upper half is silver and lower half green, would be blazoned: Per fess Vert and Argent, a lion counterchanged.

In Scots heraldry, a charge may be blazoned as counterchanged of different colours from the field; e.g., Per fess Gules and Azure, a sun in splendour counterchanged Or and of the first. In English heraldry, this would be described as Per fess Gules and Azure, a sun in splendour per fess Or and of the first.

A situation similar to counterchanging can be seen in the arms of Brian North Lee: Sable three billets in bend Argent overlapping on a chief Vert three escallops Argent. Here, the parts of the billets that overlap are shown as being Sable, the tincture of the field.