The
House of Plantagenet
The House of Plantagenet () was a royal house which originated from the lands of Anjou in France. The family held the English throne from 1154 (with the accession of Henry II at the end of the Anarchy) to 1485, when Richard III died in b ...
was the first truly
armiger
In heraldry, an armiger is a person entitled to use a heraldic achievement (e.g., bear arms, an "armour-bearer") either by hereditary right, grant, matriculation, or assumption of arms. Such a person is said to be armigerous. A family or a cl ...
ous royal dynasty of England. Their predecessor,
Henry I of England
Henry I (c. 1068 – 1 December 1135), also known as Henry Beauclerc, was King of England from 1100 to his death in 1135. He was the fourth son of William the Conqueror and was educated in Latin and the liberal arts. On William's death ...
, had presented items decorated with a lion heraldic emblem to his son-in-law, Plantagenet founder
Geoffrey, Count of Anjou, and his family experimented with different lion-bearing coats until these coalesced during the reign of his grandson,
Richard I
Richard I (8 September 1157 – 6 April 1199) was King of England from 1189 until his death in 1199. He also ruled as Duke of Normandy, Aquitaine and Gascony, Lord of Cyprus, and Count of Poitiers, Anjou, Maine, and Nantes, and was ove ...
(1189–1199), into a coat of arms with three lions on a red field, formally ''Gules, three lions passant guardant or (armed and langued azure)'', that became the
Royal Arms of England
The royal arms of England are the arms first adopted in a fixed form at the start of the age of heraldry (circa 1200) as personal arms by the Plantagenet kings who ruled England from 1154. In the popular mind they have come to symbolise the ...
, and colloquially those of England itself. The various
cadet branch
In history and heraldry, a cadet branch consists of the male-line descendants of a monarch's or patriarch's younger sons ( cadets). In the ruling dynasties and noble families of much of Europe and Asia, the family's major assets—realm, titles ...
es descended from this family bore
differenced versions of these arms, while later members of the House of Plantagenet would either
quarter or
impale these arms with others to reflect their political aspirations.
Overview of Plantagenet arms
Before Edward III
After Edward III
House of Lancaster
House of York
Non-Plantagenet families
The heiresses of Norfolk and Kent transmitted the Plantagenet arms to non-Plantagenet families:
Henry VI of England
Henry VI (6 December 1421 – 21 May 1471) was King of England and Lord of Ireland from 1422 to 1461 and again from 1470 to 1471, and disputed King of France from 1422 to 1453. The only child of Henry V, he succeeded to the English throne ...
granted differenced versions of the Plantagenet arms to his maternal half-brothers. This was an extraordinary grant, since they were not descended from the English royal family.
House of Plantagenet
Descendants of Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou
Descendants of John, King of England
Descendants of Henry III of England
Descendants of Edward I of England
Descendants of Edward II of England
Descendants of Edward III of England
Descendants of Edward, the Black Prince
Descendants of Lionel of Antwerp, 1st Duke of Clarence
John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster
Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York
Descendants of Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester
House of Lancaster
Descendants of John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster
Descendants of Henry IV of England
=Descendants of Henry V of England
=
House of York
Descendants of Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York
Descendants of Richard of York, 3rd Duke of York
=Descendants of Edward IV of England
=
=Descendants of George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence
=
=Descendants of Richard III of England
=
House of Beaufort
Descendants of John Beaufort, 1st Earl of Somerset
Descendants of
Henry Beaufort, 3rd Duke of Somerset
Henry Beaufort, 3rd Duke of Somerset (26 January 143615 May 1464) was an important Lancastrian military commander during the English Wars of the Roses. He is sometimes numbered the 2nd Duke of Somerset, because the title was re-created for his ...
See also
* Royal arms of England
The royal arms of England are the arms first adopted in a fixed form at the start of the age of heraldry (circa 1200) as personal arms by the Plantagenet kings who ruled England from 1154. In the popular mind they have come to symbolise the ...
* House of Plantagenet
The House of Plantagenet () was a royal house which originated from the lands of Anjou in France. The family held the English throne from 1154 (with the accession of Henry II at the end of the Anarchy) to 1485, when Richard III died in b ...
* Issue of Edward III of England
* House of Lancaster
The House of Lancaster was a cadet branch of the royal House of Plantagenet. The first house was created when King Henry III of England created the Earldom of Lancasterfrom which the house was namedfor his second son Edmund Crouchback in ...
* House of York
The House of York was a cadet branch of the English royal House of Plantagenet. Three of its members became kings of England in the late 15th century. The House of York descended in the male line from Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York ...
* House of Beaufort
The House of Beaufort is an English noble and quasi-royal family, which originated in the fourteenth century as the legitimated issue of John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster (the third surviving son of King Edward III), whose eldest legitimate ...
* War of the Roses
The Wars of the Roses (1455–1487), known at the time and for more than a century after as the Civil Wars, were a series of civil wars fought over control of the throne of England, English throne in the mid-to-late fifteenth century. These w ...
References
Citations
Bibliography
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{{Heraldry of the British Isles
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Plantagenet
The House of Plantagenet () was a royal house which originated from the lands of Anjou in France. The family held the English throne from 1154 (with the accession of Henry II at the end of the Anarchy) to 1485, when Richard III died in ba ...
Plantagenet
The House of Plantagenet () was a royal house which originated from the lands of Anjou in France. The family held the English throne from 1154 (with the accession of Henry II at the end of the Anarchy) to 1485, when Richard III died in ba ...