Quote:

Now, about the coat of arms, is it fair to change it sightly to fit your self? A guy I work with changed the elephant trunks to tusks. I thought about changing the flowers to flames in mine. And the helmet to '60's drag helmet. Thoughts?




So about your coat-of-arms. I actually studied heraldry some years back (yeah I'm odd). First thing is that they're not actually regulated in the US like they are in the UK, so you could do pretty much whatever. But to keep in the spirit of the traditions, here's the deal; the helmet above the shield is supposed to represent the social rank of the holder, i.e. knight, earl, duke, etc. Of course one could say the modern knight rides an iron steed so the motorcycle helmet would be extremely appropriate. The "flowers" around the shield represents the "mantle" which was worn over armor in the bearers colors to aid recognition on the battlefield (and help prevent swords from reaching the neck joint of armor), pretty much just extra decoration now. So you could let it represent your riding jacket (armor), though flames would look awesome and wouldn't really break tradition.

SFC, US Army (Ret)