If you associate heraldry with pomposity, snobbery, self aggrandisement and vanity this glorious cover should make you think again.
The artist is William Grimmond, born in Manchester in 1884, and he had fun wrapping up horse and rider – only a lion is visible. Heraldry in England (1946) was commissioned by Nikolaus Pevsner as part of the King Penguin series. Seventy-six King Penguins were published between 1939 and 1959 on a wide variety of subjects. British Birds on Lake, River and Stream was the first and Sculpture of the Parthenon the last. Although called King Penguins they are pocket-sized hardbacks with colour illustrations, the size perhaps dictated by a shortage of paper in the war.
Anthony Wagner takes just thirty-five pages to explain the origins and history of heraldry and its ups and downs. He is, perhaps unexpectedly, critical. He was Richmond Herald in 1946, later becoming Garter. “In heraldic art there was a constant decline from Elizabeth’s day to Victoria’s, but growing steeper as the eighteenth century progressed.” He is equivocal about heraldry in 1946. “The best heraldic art today can bear comparison with that of any age, but the general level, more from following bad models than want of technique, lags far behind.” His monograph is illustrated by examples of the best heraldic design, none of it modern.
