heraldry Heraldry is a discipline relating to the design, display and study of armorial bearings (known as armory), as well as related disciplines, such as vexillology, together with the study of ceremony, Imperial, royal and noble ranks, rank and genealo ...

, an

ordinary Ordinary or The Ordinary often refer to: Music * ''Ordinary'' (EP) (2015), by South Korean group Beast * ''Ordinary'' (album) (2011), by Every Little Thing * "Ordinary" (Alex Warren song) (2025) * "Ordinary" (Two Door Cinema Club song) (2016 ...

componée (anciently gobonnée), anglicised to compony and gobony, is composed of a row of squares, rectangles or other quadrilaterals, of alternating

tinctures A tincture is typically an extract of plant or animal material dissolution (chemistry), dissolved in ethanol (ethyl alcohol). Solvent concentrations of 25–60% are common, but may run as high as 90%.Groot Handboek Geneeskrachtige Planten by Ge ...

, often found as a

bordure In heraldry, a bordure is a band of contrasting tincture forming a border around the edge of a shield, traditionally one-sixth as wide as the shield itself. It is sometimes reckoned as an ordinary and sometimes as a subordinary. A bordure encl ...

, most notably in the arms of the English

House of Beaufort The House of Beaufort ( ) is an English noble family which originated in the fourteenth century as the legitimated issue of John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, by Katherine Swynford. Gaunt and Swynford had four children: John Beaufort, 1st Ea ...

. Like a

baton sinister The baton sinister (alternatively baston) is a charge used in heraldry. Heraldic charge It is a diminutive of the bend sinister and constitutes a narrow strip that runs from the upper right to the lower left of a coat of arms. Sinister (meani ...

, a bordure compony can be used as a

difference Difference commonly refers to: * Difference (philosophy), the set of properties by which items are distinguished * Difference (mathematics), the result of a subtraction Difference, The Difference, Differences or Differently may also refer to: Mu ...

to delineate

cadency In heraldry, cadency is any systematic way to distinguish Coat of arms, arms displayed by Lineal descendant, descendants of the holder of a coat of arms when those family members have not been granted arms in their own right. Cadency is necessa ...

and often indicates an

illegitimate Legitimacy, in traditional Western common law, is the status of a child born to parents who are legally married to each other, and of a child conceived before the parents obtain a legal divorce. Conversely, ''illegitimacy'', also known as ''b ...

son, acknowledged but legally barred from inheritance of the feudal estates of his father. The first

Earl of Somerset Earl () is a rank of the nobility in the United Kingdom. In modern Britain, an earl is a member of the peerage, ranking below a marquess and above a viscount. A feminine form of ''earl'' never developed; instead, ''countess'' is used. The titl ...

was later legitimized (allowed to inherit the feudal estates) by an act of Parliament, yet retained his original arms as also displayed by his legitimate descendants. Certain charges cannot be compony, for practical reasons, for example common charges and the chief as they are generally not long and thin in shape. The alternative for thicker shapes is ''paly'' or ''barry'', as shown for example in the arms of Strangways, featuring lions ''paly argent and gules''. Usually only two tinctures are used, but the arms of

Formia Formia (ancient Formiae) is a city and ''comune'' in the province of Latina, on the Mediterranean , Italy. It is located halfway between Rome and Naples, and lies on the Roman-era Appian Way. Mythology According to the mythology the city was f ...

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

, show an unusual bordure which could be blazoned ''compony of 24 vert, gules, argent, vert, argent, gules''. A variant is ''counter-compony'', with two rows of panes. A bend or fess ''billety-counter-billety'' is, in effect,

chequy In heraldry, variations of the field are any of a number of ways that a field (or a charge) may be covered with a pattern, rather than a flat tincture or a simple division of the field. Patterning with ordinaries and subordinaries The diminut ...

of three rows of stretched (rather than square) panes, as in the arms of Cullimore in Canada: ''Azure; a fess billetty counter billetty gules and argent, between, in chief, two crescents and, in base, a wheel or; a bordure or for difference''. Sometimes compony-like arrangements, such as in the arms of the Duke de Vargas Machuca, are not so described in blazon. The coat of arms of the

108th Aviation Regiment The 108th Aviation Regiment is a unit of the United States Army. It is part of the Kansas Army National Guard and has served with distinction in World War II (under a different designation and configuration), Iraq and Afghanistan. The 1st Batta ...

of the United States Army is blazoned ''bordered gyronny of ten''.

References

Heraldry {{heraldry-stub