Fretty (Period)

Fretty is a set of bendlets, interlaced with as many bendlets sinister.  It is considered a charge (or group of charges) in Society heraldry, though in some ways it acts as though it were a field treatment.  Fretty fields are found from the earliest days of heraldry, in the arms of Maltravers c.1240 [Asp2 219]; fretty charges soon followed, as in the arms of Verney, 1304 [ANA2 384].

The medieval form of fretty field has three skinny laths along each diagonal; there should be roughly four lath-widths between laths.  More laths would be used on a fretty charge, or if the field were itself charged.  There are instances in period armory, such as the arms of Verdon, c.1310, of fretty fields “nailed”, i.e., with small roundels at the intersections of the laths [ANA2 456]; the distinction is blazonable but worth no heraldic difference.  For related entries, see fret, grillage.  See also net.

Iago ab Adam bears:  Ermine fretty gules.

Giles of Nablus bears:  Sable fretty engrailed Or.

Cecilia Blythe bears:  Or fretty, a chief azure.

Timotheos Vlastaris bears:  Azure fretty and crusilly clechy Or.