How do you blazon a coat of arms?

Answer 1

First, you learn all the Anglo-Norman French terms used in heraldry for the different colours, designs, possible divisions of the field, the parts of the shield and so on.

Then you learn the rules of heraldry - and there are many, many rules.

Then you are in a position to be able to blazon any coat of arms, from the simplest original designs to the most complex modern ones.

An example of a complex blazon (the arms of King George IV) looks like this:

Quarterly, I and IV Gules three lions passant guardant in pale Or (for England); II Or a lion rampant within a tressure flory-counter-flory Gules (for Scotland); III Azure a harp Or stringed Argent (for Ireland); overall an inescutcheon tierced in pairle reversed (for Hanover), I Gules two lions passant guardant Or (for Brunswick), II Or a semy of hearts Gules a lion rampant Azure (for Lüneburg), III Gules a horse courant Argent (for Westfalen), the whole inescutcheon surmounted by a crown.