Gules

Gules.

In heraldry, gules (always used in the plural) is the name of the bright red color. Among the heraldic enamels, it belongs to the group of colors, along with azure (blue)., the sable (black), the sinople (green) and the purple.

Synonyms

This enamel has also been called gola, goles, güella, rosicler, blood color , and sanguine or sanguineous (due to the influence of the English enamel sanguine, dark red in color).

Etymology

The term «gules» comes from the Old French goules, '[red] skin collar', plural of gole, guele, 'throat', from the Latin gula, 'throat'. Philologist Joan Corominas attributes the name of this heraldic enamel to the custom of adorning the collars of cloaks with pieces of skin from the throat of the sable, dyed red. Certainly some medieval epic songs describe this type of garment: the Roman de Raoul de Cambrai (10th century), for example, speaks of "gules de sable", and the Aye d'Avignon , gules of ermine; while a Latin text, describing a ermine garment, reads circa collem et circa manus rubris gulis præparatam ('prepared around the neck and wrists with red strips of skin').

Historically, other etymologies have been proposed. One of them suggested that "gules" could come from the French gueules, 'jaws', due to the red color inside the mouths of beasts when they devour their prey; another proposed that it originated from similar terms in various Middle Eastern and Asian languages (Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Hebrew), such as gul, ghiul or gulude , which would directly or indirectly designate the color red.

History

The adoption of the term «gules» in heraldry is linked to the historical development of this discipline. The language of the coat of arms, which makes it possible to properly describe armories (emblazon), began to develop in the 12th century. From that formative stage of heraldry, descriptions of shields where the gules is simply called vermeil ('vermejo') or rouge ('red') are preserved in French romances.. Around the middle of the 13th century, however, the armorials began to typify the heraldic language, and in them the color red is called "gules" with a certain consistency, although the language of the coat of arms would only be standardized in the 16th century.

At the beginning of heraldry, between the 12th and 13th centuries, gules was the most widely used enamel: the historian Michel Pastoureau found that it appeared in 60% of European armories.

The adoption of the term «gules» by the Spanish language dates back to 1603. In the past, color adjectives such as roxo, red and red.

In this engraving, the vertical lines on the back of the shield indicate that the field of the shield is gules. (Armas del marquis de Bréhan, 1883).

Representation

The gules is not exactly defined. Consequently, the tone and shade of red to be used to represent it is at the discretion of the heraldic artist. It is recommended, however, that the red be intense and true to its nature; should not lean too much towards orange, purple, brown or pink.

When colors are not available, the gules can be represented by a very fine hatching of parallel vertical lines, according to the method attributed to the Jesuit Silvestre Pietra Santa. This is the method of representation commonly seen in one ink engravings.

Examples of use

Four ancient and notable examples of the use of ghouls follow.

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  The "Señal Real" or "barras de Aragón", former shield of the Kingdom of Aragon, dates from around 1150.

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  Shield of the former Austrian dynasty Babenberg, now part of the Austrian shield, dates back to at least the thirteenth century.

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  England's shield used between 1198 and 1340; it is currently housed in United Kingdom weapons.

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  Shield of the Swiss commune of Morens, with field and three roses of gules, are on a silver stick.

Corked animal figures

Animals emblazoned as "corked" are represented gules. Scorched, in the case of quadrupeds, means that the animal is skinned, and in the case of birds, that it is plucked.

Names, attributions and meanings in disuse

Towards the beginning of the Renaissance, a system of symbolic correspondences for heraldic colors was developed that is now in disuse. It is noteworthy that around 1828 this system was considered absurd by the English heraldist William Berry, although the Spanish Francisco Piferrer, in 1858, comments on it as if it were still valid.

Although Jean Courtois, Sicilian Herald of the Kingdom of Aragon, mentions in his treatise Le blason des couleurs (1414) that any of these ghoul associations can be used to emblazon, in practice it is It is possible that only the planetary system and the system of precious stones were used. For Alberto and Arturo García Caraffa (1919), the emblazoned with gems corresponded to the titles and the one with planets to the sovereigns. Arthur Fox-Davies cites an example of emblazonment with precious stones dating from 1458.

Below are some of the ancient symbolic correspondences of the ghouls, as well as some of the names attached to them.