Chair (Period)

Curule chair (Period)

A chair is a piece of furniture that seats one person.  There were several period forms in heraldry.  The default chair has a high, straight back; it’s sometimes explicitly blazoned a “backed chair”.  It’s a period charge, found in the arms of von Döltzky, 1605 [Siebmacher 144].  This form of chair is drawn in trian aspect for better visibility.

There is also the “curule chair”, sometimes blazoned an “antique chair” or “chair of estate”, backless and ornate; it was the badge of the Earls of Oxford, c.1550, in their capacity as Lords Chamberlain [HB 132, Siddons II.2 302; cf. de Bara 157].  The curule chair is affronty by default.

Related to the chair is the “stool”, a low three-legged seat that’s more portable and less formal than a chair.  It too is period, found in the arms of Schöner von Strubenhart, 1605 [Siebmacher 121].

Herjólfr Eilifsson bears:  Argent, a wooden chair bendwise proper.

Raymond the Gruesome bears:  Azure, in pale a sun-wheel bendwise conjoined to a curule chair Or.

Helen of Greyfells bears as a badge:  A wooden three-legged stool proper.