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Val d'Arno: Ten Lectures on the Tuscan Art Directly Antecedent to the Florentine Year of Victories; Given Before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1873 — John Shaqi

Val d'Arno: Ten Lectures on the Tuscan Art Directly Antecedent to the Florentine Year of Victories; Given Before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1873Ruskin, John

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Val d'Arno: Ten Lectures on the Tuscan Art Directly Antecedent to the Florentine Year of Victories; Given Before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1873

Name: Val d'Arno: Ten Lectures on the Tuscan Art Directly Antecedent to the Florentine Year of Victories; Given Before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1873
Author: Ruskin, John

Ruskin, John

Art -- Italy -- Tuscany

You may as well note at once of this kind of bearing, called 'gagliarda'
by Villani, that these groups of piles, pales, bends, and bars, were
called in English heraldry 'Restrial bearings,' "in respect of their
strength and solid substance, which is able to abide the stresse and
force of any triall they shall be put unto." [1] And also that, the
number of bars being uncertain, I assume the bearing to be 'barry,' that
is, having an even number of bars; had it been odd, as of seven bars, it
should have been blazoned, argent; three bars, sable; or, if so divided,
sable, three bars argent.

[Footnote 1: Guillim, sect. ii., chap. 3.]

This lively bearing was St. Pulinari's.

C. Sesto of Borgo.

             1. Or; a viper, vert.
             2. Argent; a needle, (?) (aguglia)
                sable.
             3. Vert; a horse unbridled;
                draped, argent, a cross,
                gules.


D. Sesto of St. Brancazio.

             1. Vert; a lion rampant, proper.
             2. Argent; a lion rampant, gules.
             3. Azure; a lion rampant, argent.


E. Sesto of the Cathedral gates.

             1. Azure; a lion (passant?) or.
             2. Or; a dragon, vert.
             3. Argent; a lion rampant,
                azure, crowned, or.


F. Sesto of St. Peter's gates.

             1. Or; two keys, gules.
             2. An Italian (or more definitely
               a Greek and Etruscan bearing;
               I do not know how to
               blazon it;) concentric bands,
               argent and sable. This is
               one of the remains of the
               Greek expressions of storm;
               hail, or the Trinacrian limbs,
               being put on the giant's
               shields also. It is connected
               besides with the Cretan
               labyrinth, and the circles of
               the Inferno.
             3. Parted per fesse, gules and
               vai (I don't know if vai
               means grey--not a proper
               heraldic colour--or vaire).


106. Of course Hubert of Lucca did not determine these bearings, but
took them as he found them, and appointed them for standards; [1] he did
the same for all the country parishes, and ordered them to come into
the city at need. "And in this manner the old people of Florence ordered
itself; and for more strength of the people, they ordered and began to
build the palace which is behind the Badia,--that is to say, the one
which is of dressed stone, with the tower; for before there was no
palace of the commune in Florence, but the signory abode sometimes in
one part of the town, sometimes in another.

[Footnote 1: We will examine afterwards the heraldry of the trades,
chap, xi., Villani.]

Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.

Val d'Arno: Ten Lectures on the Tuscan Art Directly Antecedent to the Florentine Year of Victories; Given Before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1873

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