Axle bracket (Accepted)
An axle bracket is an iron fixture attached to a wagon that holds its axle in place. Though it may have been a period artifact, it doesn’t appear to have been used in period armory. The ends are to chief by Society default. See also horseshoe.
Maximillian Mühleisen bears: Per pale gules and argent, a U-form axle bracket sable.
Ape clog (Period)
Rylyn Buchanan bears as a badge: An ape clog quarterly vert and sable, chained argent.
Angles palewise (Disallowed)
Angles are of obscure origin, but are supposed to represent a belt fastener [Parker 11], and as a result seem always to be borne in pairs. No examples of their use in period armory have been found; pending such evidence, angles are no longer permitted for Society use. See also chevron.
Albrecht von Swabia, the Clumsy bears: Or, a pair of angles palewise interlaced in fess sable.
Kenneth of Elsinore bears: Azure, a pair of angles fesswise interlaced in pale Or.
Amphora (Accepted)
Jug (Accepted)
An amphora is an ancient Greek storage vessel, with a constricted neck and two handles (Greek amphi, phoreus, “double handles”). Though a period artifact, we’ve no examples of the amphora in period armory. The default form in Society armory has a flat bottom, as in the illustration; this was often a painted luxury item in ancient Greece [Singer, plate 18]. The utilitarian “wine amphora” has a pointed base, instead of a flat base.
Similar to the amphora is the “jug”, usually with a rounder body and narrower neck, and made to be carried by one person. For related charges, see bottle, vase.
The Calontir Waterbearer’s Guild bears: Azure, on a two-handled jug fesswise reversed argent, distilling a gout d’eau charged with a gout de larme, a cross of Calatrava azure.
Alisoun MacCoul of Elphane bears: Or, a black-figure neck amphora, cracked in chief proper.
Lina Hen bears: Per chevron ermine and gules, in base a wine amphora Or.
Claudia Prima bears: Gules, three amphorae Or.
Abacus (SFPP)
An abacus is a device for counting and calculating, consisting of rows of sliding beads. While similar apparati may have been used in Roman times, they’d fallen out of use by the Middle Ages, replaced by the counting table; thus no examples of the abacus have been found in period armory. The abacus used in Society armory is the form found in the Far East, called suan pan by the Chinese, soroban by the Japanese. As a non-European artifact, its use is considered a step from period practice.
The abacus is fesswise by Society default.
Walter Faversham bears: Per chevron embattled argent and vert, two wooden abacuses proper and a thunderbolt Or.
Reinhardt Breitenbach bears: Per pale gules and Or, an abacus counterchanged.
Carwyn O’Hirwen bears: Per pall Or ermined azure, sable and vert, an abacus argent.