The Escutcheon

Arms of the Sons of the Prince of Wales

John Horton

September 15th, 2002 saw the eighteenth birthday of Prince Henry of Wales and, with it, arms being granted to His Royal Highness. Unlike other male-line descendants of armigers, members of the Royal Family do not become entitled to arms automatically – they have to wait until the Queen requests that arms be granted to them. Furthermore, they do not difference their armigerous ancestor’s arms with the standard English marks of cadency (label, crescent, mullet and so on). Instead, they use white labels decorated with heraldic devices. The one exception is that the heir apparent always has a plain label:

A label of three points argent.

Thus, to blazon an example of a charged label, the arms of the Duke of Gloucester (of Magdalene College, M.A. 1970) are the royal arms differenced by:

A label of five points argent, the centre and the two outer points charged with a cross gules, and the inner points with a lion passant guardant¹.

These labels are applied not only to the shield but also to the supporters (lion and unicorn) and to the crest (a lion statant). Additionally, the crown found in the Queen’s arms is replaced by a coronet appropriate to the prince or princess in question. There are separate coronets for the heir apparent, for the other children and the brothers and sisters of the Sovereign, for the children of the heir apparent and for the other male-line grandchildren².

In general, labels of the children of a Sovereign have three points and those of grandchildren have five. The one exception is that the eldest son of the Prince of Wales also has a label of three points. (In the example quoted above, the Duke of Gloucester has a label of five points because he is a grandchild of King George V.) Of course, it is relatively unusual for there to be an adult son of the heir apparent alive during a monarch’s reign. The last occasion was just over a hundred years ago when the Duke of York (later King George V) bore:

A label of three points argent the central point charged with an anchor azure.

He did not adopt this three-pointed label, however, until the death in 1892 of his elder brother, the Duke of Clarence and Avondale who had borne:

A label of three points argent the central point charged with a cross gules.

Prior to these examples, we have to look as far back as Prince George of Wales (later King George III) who, according to Velde³ bore the very unusual label:

A label of three points azure [sic] the central point charged with a fleur de lys or.

When his father, Frederick, Prince of Wales, died in 1751, Prince George became heir apparent to his grandfather King George II and accordingly adopted the heir apparent’s plain label. Frederick, Prince of Wales had himself been an adult grandchild of a Sovereign (King George I) and had then used:

A label of three points argent the central point charged with a cross gules.

In 2000, therefore, when Prince William of Wales was granted:

A label of three points argent the central point charged with an escallop gules

the press made much of the break with tradition represented by the escallop. The interest of the iconoclastic media was excited further when it was learnt that this charge was derived from the arms of the late Diana, Princess of Wales. In fact, this grant, with its reference to maternal heraldry, is the revival of a far earlier mediaeval tradition. Edmund, Duke of York, for example, one of King Edward III’s younger sons, married Isabella of Castile and their son Edward (1373–1415) bore a label showing the arms of Castile and Leon.

When Prince Henry was granted arms earlier this year, the maternal theme was continued with:

A label of five points argent, the central and the two outer points charged with an escallop gules.

As already noted, the label of five points is determined by the Prince’s position as a grandchild of the Sovereign. When the Prince of Wales succeeds to the throne, his sons will become children of the Sovereign, a higher rank than simply being grandchildren. Prince William will use the plain label of the heir apparent of course – in effect, he will drop the escallop gules from his present label. Prince Henry will become entitled to a label of three points. Intriguingly, the form of this has already been decided⁴:

A label of three points argent each point charged with an escallop gules.

In effect, therefore, he will dispense with the two blank points of his present label. This “fully charged” label will make an interesting contrast to the labels of Prince Henry’s uncles. Both have labels charged on the central point only: an anchor azure for the Duke of York and a Tudor rose for the Earl of Wessex.

References

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