Heraldry? I'll Drink to That!

As we have seen many times in the past, many wineries and breweries will use heraldry, or at least something that looks like heraldry, as their logos.

In our walking tour of Ghent, I came across two of these, the first of which we have seen before in Antwerp.

Omer ("Traditional Blond") Beer, which uses an almost heraldic Sable a chevron within a bordure gules as its trademark.

And Tongerlo, a product of Brouwerij Haacht (the Haacht Brewery), which has a shield with three chevrons on it.

I don't have a blazon for Tongerlo; they seem to place the shield with either white or gold chevrons and shield outline on a wide variety of background colors. So, not really heraldry, but a quickly and easily identifiable trademark that looks and acts a lot like heraldry.

So kick back, relax, and have the cicerone, the beer sommelier, pour you a nice big glass of Belgian beer.

Enjoy!

An Amazing Array of Images of the Arms of Antwerp, Belgium

So, wandering about the city of Antwerp, Belgium, I ran across the following depictions of its coat of arms, in an amazing display of heraldry.

Carved into a stone monument:

Here, held by a cast bronze statue:

In stained glass (here, on the upper right side) in the Cathedral of Our Lady:

Painted on interior walls in the Cathedral:

Carved or cast on public buildings:

Underfoot in the street:

And even on a lunchtime glass of beer:

It was a treat to see such a wide variety of uses of the city's heraldry in so many different media.

Speaking of Old Beer

In a thread on the American Heraldry Society forum about heraldry on beer bottles was this one, in which the company claims to be the oldest brewery in the world, established in 1040 A.D., some three and a half centuries before Spaten, the brewery in my last post.

Of course, the Weihenstephaner label is using the achievement of arms of the State of Bavaria for their logo, which they probably really shouldn’t be doing, as it implies that they are an official arm of the State. (Hmm, is the idea of a government-run brewery a good one or a bad one?)

Heraldry Is Where You Find It

We were attending a concert the other night (B.B. King, if you must know, and yes, it was excellent!), and I saw something that once again proved my growing belief that heraldry can be found just about everywhere and anywhere you look.

In this case, there was a display (and a couple of young ladies giving out samples and selling bottles) of a Bavarian beer. I particularly noticed the display because of the large banner (which had the paly-bendy azure and argent field of Bavaria over its entirety) with a coat of arms (the logo of the brewery, Spaten). Not being much of a beer drinker myself, I can’t tell you how good the beer is, but I did manage to acquire one of the coasters with the coat of arms/logo on it.

I later went out onto the internet to see what I could find out about the company. A brief overview of its history can be found here: http://www.spatenusa.com/2_company_service/2_1_history/index.htm

The most important dates in its history, at least insofar as their heraldry is concerned, are the ownership of the brewery from 1622-1704 by the Spatt family, who gave the brewery its present name (thus the canting arms, a pun on the name), 1807, the year Gabriel Sedlmayr (whose initials appear on the arms) acquired the brewery, and 1884, the year that graphic artist Otto Hupp designed the company logo. Many of you will recognize the name Otto Hupp for his impressive work in producing for many years the Kaffee HAG books of coats of arms and the 51 years of Münchener Kalenders where his heraldic style is so gloriously displayed.

So the next time you go to a concert, look around. You just might find some heraldry!