Originally every powerful leader had his own herald, and the dual character of minstrel and messenger led the herald to recount the deeds of his master, and, as a natural consequence, of his master's ancestors. In token of their office they wore the coats of arms of the leaders they served; and the original status of a herald was that of a non-combatant messenger. When tournaments came into vogue it was natural that some one should examine the arms of those taking part, and from this the duties of the herald came to include a knowledge of coat-armour. As the Sovereign assumed or arrogated the control of arms, the right to grant arms, and the right of judgment in disputes concerning arms, it was but the natural result that the personal heralds of the Sovereign should be required to have a knowledge of the arms of his principal subjects, and should obtain something in the nature of a cognisance or control and jurisdiction over those arms; for doubtless the actions of the Sovereign would often depend upon the knowledge of his heralds.
The process of development in this country will be more easily understood when it is remembered that the Marshal or Earl Marshal was in former times, with the Lord High Constable, the first in military rank under the King, who usually led his army in person, and to the Marshal was deputed the ordering and arrangement of the various bodies of troops, regiments, bands of retainers, &c., which ordering was at first facilitated and at length entirely determined by the use of various pictorial ensigns, such as standards, banners, crests, cognisances, and badges. The due arrangement and knowledge of these various ensigns became first the necessary study and then the ordinary duty of these officers of the Marshal, and their possession of such knowledge, which soon in due course had to be written down and tabulated, secured to them an important part in mediæval life. The result was that at an early period we find them employed in semi-diplomatic missions, such as carrying on negotiations between contending armies on the field, bearing declarations of war, challenges from one sovereign to another, besides arranging the ceremonial not only of battles and tournaments, but also of coronations, Royal baptisms, marriages, and funerals.
From the fact that neither King of Arms nor Herald is mentioned as officiating in the celebrated Scrope and Grosvenor case, of which very full particulars have come down to us, it is evident that the control of arms had not passed either in fact or in theory from the Crown to the officers of arms at that date. Konrad Grünenberg, in his Wappencodex ("Roll of Arms"), the date of which is 1483, gives a representation of a helmschau (literally helmet-show), here reproduced (Fig. 12), which includes the figure of a herald. Long before that date, however, the position of a herald in England was well defined, for we find that on January 5, 1420, the King appointed William Bruges to be Garter King of Arms. It is usually considered in England that it would be found that in Germany armory reached its highest point of evolution. Certainly German heraldic art is in advance of our own, and it is curious to read in the latest and one of the best of German heraldic books that "from the very earliest times heraldry was carried to a higher degree of perfection and thoroughness in England than elsewhere, and that it has maintained itself at the same level until the present day. In other countries, for the most part, heralds no longer have any existence but in name." The initial figure which appears at the commencement of Chapter I. represents John Smert, Garter King of Arms, and is taken from the grant of arms issued by him to the Tallow Chandlers' Company of London, which is dated September 24, 1456.
Long before there was any College of Arms, the Marshal, afterwards the Earl Marshal, had been appointed. The Earl Marshal is now head of the College of Arms, and to him has been delegated the whole of the control both of armory and of the College, with the exception of that part which the Crown has retained in its own hands. After the Earl Marshal come the Kings of Arms, the Heralds of Arms, and the Pursuivants of Arms.
Fig. 12.—Helmschau or Helmet-Show. (From Konrad Grünenberg's Wappencodex zu München.) End of fifteenth century.
The title of King of Arms, or, as it was more anciently written, King of Heralds, was no doubt originally given to the chief or principal officer, who presided over the heralds of a kingdom, or some principal province, which heraldic writers formerly termed marches; or else the title was conferred upon the officer of arms attendant upon some particular order of knighthood. Garter King of Arms, who is immediately attached to that illustrious order, is likewise Principal King of Arms, and these, although separate and distinct offices, are and have been always united in one person. Upon the revival and new modelling of the Order of the Bath, in the reign of George the First, a King of Arms was created and attached to it, by the title of Bath King of Arms; and King George III., upon the institution of the Hanoverian Guelphic Order of Knighthood, annexed to that order a King of Arms, by the appellation of Hanover. At the time of the creation of his office, Bath King of Arms was given Wales as his province, the intention being that he should rank with the others, granting arms in his own province, but he was not, nor was Hanover, nor is the King of Arms of the Order of St. Michael and St. George, a member (as such) of the corporation of the College of Arms. The members of that corporation considered that the gift of the province of Wales, the jurisdiction over which they had previously possessed, to Bath King was an infringement of their chartered privileges. The dispute was referred to the law officers of the Crown, whose opinion was in favour of the corporate body.
Berry in his Encyclopædia Heraldica further remarks: "The Kings of Arms of the provincial territories have the titles of Clarenceux and Norroy, the jurisdiction of the former extending over the south, east, and west parts of England, from the river Trent southwards; and that of the latter, the remaining part of the kingdom northward of that river. Kings of Arms have been likewise assigned other provinces over different kingdoms and dominions, and besides Ulster King of Arms for Ireland, and Lyon King of Arms for Scotland, others were nominated for particular provinces abroad, when united to the Crown of England, such as Aquitaine, Anjou, and Guyenne, who were perhaps at their first creation intended only for the services of the places whose titles they bore, when the same should be entirely subdued to allegiance to the Crown of England, and who, till that time, might have had other provinces allotted to them, either provisionally or temporarily, within the realm of England.
There were also other Kings of Arms, denominated from the dukedoms or earldoms which our princes enjoyed before they came to the throne, as Lancaster, Gloucester, Richmond, and Leicester, the three first having marches, or provinces, and the latter a similar jurisdiction. Windsor, likewise, was a local title, but it is doubtful whether that officer was ever a King of Arms. Marche also assumed that appellation, from his provincial jurisdiction over a territory so called.
But although anciently there were at different periods several Kings of Arms in England, only two provincial Kings of Arms have, for some ages, been continued in office, viz. Clarenceux and Norroy, whose provinces or marches are, as before observed, separated by the river Trent, the ancient limits of the escheaters, when there are only two in the kingdom, and the jurisdiction of the wardens of the forests.
Norroy is considered the most ancient title, being the only one in England taken from the local situation of his province, unless Marche should be derived from the same cause. The title of Norroy was anciently written Norreys and Norreis, King of Arms of the people residing in the north; Garter being styled Roy des Anglois, of the people, and not d'Angleterre, of the kingdom, the inhabitants of the north being called Norreys,[1] as we are informed by ancient historians.
It appears that there was a King of Arms for the parts or people on the north of Trent as early as the reign of Edward I., from which, as Sir Henry Spelman observes, it may be inferred that the southern, eastern, and western parts had principal heralds, or Kings of Arms, although their titles at that early age cannot now be ascertained.
Norroy had not the title of King till after the reign of Edward II. It was appropriated to a King of Heralds, expressly called Rex Norroy, Roy d'Armes del North, Rex Armorum del North, Rex de North, and Rex Norroy du North; and the term Roy Norreys