Heraldry in the Vatican / L'Araldica in Vaticano / Heraldik im Vatikan. (Text in English, Italian, & German)

As a record of past glories, nothing delights the student as much as heraldry. The information that a coat of arms can give the serious scholar is considerable, and over the past 800 years rules have been evolved to control what one can put in one's personal arms and how to show one's descent from other armigerous families.One of the most intriguing rules is that one is not allowed to put metal on metal - gold and silver (Or and Argent in heraldic terms) - or next to each other. Similarly one must not put colour on colour. The reasoning behind these rules has long been suspect however, so Archbishop Heim's work on the history of, and rules concerning, this subject is most timely. While many authorities maintain that the rules of heraldry forbid such neighbourliness, the author here provides ample evidence that the rule is broken as often as it is adhered to.This volume contains twenty-four full colour plates containing over 360 coats of arms, with examples from every European country, all of which break this so-called immutable rule, and there are many others in black and white in the text, as well as a bibliography giving the most important authorities. There is a Preface by the Duke of Norfolk, Earl Marshal of England.