20G

HERALDRY.

than military men, as Mr. Selden, in his “ Titles of Honour,”hath fully proved. Sir Henry Spelman is of opinion, thatthe title of king at arms was attributed to such officers inEngland as belonged immediately to the king’s majesty,•whilst those attached to princes of the blood-royal or to thenobility were simply sty led heralds.

Of the six heralds of England who have bad a long suc-cession, and continue to receive salaries from the public,Windsor has its denomination from the royal castle orpalace ; Chester, .ftancasler, Richmond , Somerset, and York,from counties or shires which have at sundry times, as SirHenry Spelman observes, been the honours ov appendagesof the younger sons of the crown. And, indeed, we tindthe heralds with most of these titles belonging to the Sove-reign, and sometimes to the nobility who had those honours.It should be observed, however, that though their titles aretaken from territories or earldoms, yet these officers are notlocal or conlined to any particular district, their jurisdictionnot being circumscribed to those places, for no one heraldis either conlined within any province, or excluded fromofficiating within the precincts of those counties whosetitles are borne by others. The titles being merely nominal,the offices are offices at large.

After the six titles already mentioned, in which a suc-cession hath continued to this lime, there were at variousperiods others, and probably heralds of the nobility; asArundel, Bedford, Buckingham, Carlisle, Cornwall, Cla-rence, Derby, Dorset , Exeter, Gloucester, Huntingdon,Hereford, Hertford, Leicester, Nottingham, Norfolk , Nor-thumberland, Pembroke, Salisbury, Suffolk, Wales , War-wick, and Worcester . Some heralds derived their titlesfrom provinces or territories in distant kingdoms where oursovereigns have had possessions : as Bourdeaux, Brunswick ,Guienne, Guisnes, Hanover, Maine . The arms, quarterings,and badges of the crown have also given to heralds denomi-nations; as Faucon, Fleur de Us, Leopard, Rose, and BlancheCoursier. Places of signal victories have communicatedthe like; as Agincourt and Nazar. Others have been ob-tained from various other circumstances.

It is observed that this distinction of heralds occurred inthe 10th of Hen . VIII. for the first time: it appears fromEdmondson, that such creations took place when there wasa plenarty in all the titles of those in ordinary , and hadbeen adopted sometimes with a design that these new officersshould in preference to the senior pursuivant succeed tothe first vacancy that might happen in any of the titles in