the death) of real warfare (when armorial banners were alone displayed),
and in certain pas, emprinses,or imprese(as enterprises of arms were var-
iously called) undertaken by some eminent knights to demonstrate their
prowess (in the manner of the knights-errant of the Arthurian romances).
All three forms of combat were regarded as of value for establishing and
defending reputations, and the various emblems displayed in them came to
be seen as the embodiments of the (primarily military) honor not merely of
the individual knight, but of his whole lineage. This notion was facilitated
by the fact that, by about 1300, the basic form of each coat of arms and
achievement was normally common to all members of a particular patri-
lineage descended from the first to adopt the arms, though each junior
member had normally to add some sort of “difference,” in keeping with
rules developed by heralds. Thus, the interest of the herald in arms and the
deeds and honor of individual knights led to an interest in the genealogies
of all knightly houses and in their collective deeds and honor.
As admission to knightly status was by ca. 1250 generally (and by ca.
1300 universally) restricted to the descendants of knights, and the noble
status even of the descendants of barons, princes, and kings was partially
redefined so that nobility could be associated with the functional status of
knight, the heralds came to be the principal keepers of the honor of the
whole nobility, from emperors to simple gentlemen. A herald in the service
of a prince might produce an armorially illustrated genealogy or even com-
pose a chivalric biography of his lord, recording his deeds in the manner of
the contemporary romances and inserting him into the quasi-historical
mythology of chivalry. Heralds also came to play a leading role in the in-
creasingly elaborate funerals of the greater members of the nobility and
probably in the design of their increasingly elaborate tombs, both of which
were marked by a display of all of the armorial emblems and insignia to
which the deceased had any claim, including those of his immediate ances-
tors and those of his wife. The heralds’ ceremonial functions—which con-
tinued unabated into the nineteenth century—naturally led to their playing
a comparable role in other forms of procession, assembly, and ritual in
which noblemen were arranged in order of rank and precedence, or dis-
played their arms on banners or other flags. These came to include coro-
nations, investitures with dignities, and solemn knightings, as well as the
array of an army preparing for battle.
In keeping with these more exalted forms of function, during the
course of the later thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries heralds were
converted into regular officers of the households of kings, princes, and ma-
jor barons, and from the 1330s officers of arms were increasingly entrusted
with more weighty diplomatic and military duties than those concerned
with tournaments. In consequence the body of heralds throughout Latin166 Heralds