Field Treatment

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Glossary of Terms:

A repeating pattern drawn in a tincture with good contrast over the field or a charge. Field treatments leave more of the underlying tincture showing than they cover. They are considered a part of the field or charge tincture. The term field treatment is not a standard real-world heraldic description for a class of armorial designs, but is the SCA catch-all term for the few period heraldic designs meeting this description. Field treatments include masoned// and the forms of //papellony// and //scaly// which are drawn as voided scales. Field treatments do not include the ermined furs, fretty or strewn charges. //See also Ermined Tinctures, Semy.

Illustrations:

Period:

c.1558
Fur vs "cartouche-style" plumetty

Modern:

Pictorial Dictionary, 3rd edition:


papellony1-258x300.jpg plumetty-263x300.jpg Scaly-262x300.jpg
Papellony (field treatment) (Period) Plumetty (Period) Scaly (field treatment, not a fur)

Vector Graphics:


Pennsic Traceable Art Project:

SENA

A.3.B.3.

Contrast Requirements for Divided Fields and Charges:

Divisions are categorized in terms of how many parts they create (two, three, four, and many) and whether those parts are equal or not. Equality is not based on literal size, but on the ways in which they were conceptualized in period heraldry. >> a. Elements Divided in Two Parts: >> Elements evenly divided into two parts (per pale//, //per fess//, //per bend//, //per bend sinister//, //per chevron//, //per chevron inverted) may use any two tinctures or furs, as long as the two sections do not have the same base tincture. Elements that further divide one of those two parts must have good contrast between its sections. Effectively, that means that either they must be made up of a color and metal or one half must be evenly split between color and metal, and identifiability must be maintained. >> For example, a field divided per pale// may consist of //azure and gules//, //argent and Or//, //Or and ermine//, or //vert and vairy gules and argent//. No field may consist of //argent and ermine// or //gules and gules masoned Or//, unless the sections are separated by an ordinary. //Per pale argent and vair//, where the //argent// bells of the //vair// were against the //per pale// line, would not be registerable because the line of division would be obscured. However, if the //azure// portions of the //vair// section were against the //per pale line, it would be identifiable and thus registerable. >> For example, both per pale vair and per fess sable and Or// and //per fess azure and lozengy argent and azure// are registerable. //Per pale sable and per fess gules and azure// would not be registerable, because it does not have good contrast between the sections. //Per fess ermine and lozengy argent and sable//, where the //argent// lozenges were against the //per fess// line, would not be registerable because //ermine// and //argent share a background tincture and the line of division would be obscured. >> While we find fields or charges divided into two parts with poor contrast, we do not generally find complex lines of division separating regions with poor contrast. Thus, any pairing of low-contrast tinctures with a complex line of division must be attested in order to be registered. A discussion of currently allowed low-contrast combinations and their designs is included in Appendix H.

Sources:

Academy of St. Gabriel "Medieval Heraldry Archive" - http://www.s-gabriel.org/heraldry/
Archive of St. Gabriel reports - http://www.panix.com/~gabriel/public-bin/archive.cgi
Laurel Armory Articles - http://heraldry.sca.org/laurel/armory_articles.html

New Heraldic Primer (Heraldry for Non-Heralds) - http://heraldry.sca.org/armory/newprimer/
Pictorial Dictionary of Heraldry (PicDic), 3rd Edition - http://mistholme.com/pictorial-dictionary-of-heraldry
Period Armorials

Parker's Heraldry - http://karlwilcox.com/parker/
Riestap's Armorial Général - http://www.euraldic.com/lasu/bl/bl_a_aa.html

Precedents:

Precedents of the SCA College of Arms - http://heraldry.sca.org/laurel/precedents.html
Morsulus Heralds Website - http://www.morsulus.org/ (to search the LoARs and Precedents)
Restatement Wiki - http://yehudaheraldry.com/restatement/index.php?title=Main_Page (restatements of Precedents)
Use the above links to be sure any precedents listed below haven't been superseded by newer precedents.

Definition/Defining Instance:

August 2002 - papellony (vs scaly):

[a sinister gore papellony Or and purpure] The gore was originally blazoned as scaly. Scaly is defined in the Pictorial Dictionary as "a field treatment, consisting of many semi-circles or lunes, covering the field." The overall effect of scaly is of thick lines on a background, as in the field treatment masoned (but with the panes of a different shape than in masoned.) This gore is tinctured in a form of papellony, which is also defined in the Pictorial Dictionary. Papellony has two forms. One form looks much like scaly, functions as a field treatment, and is blazoned as [background tincture] papellony [treatment tincture]. The other form of papellony is a field division and is blazoned as papellony [tincture x] and [tincture y]. The second form is the form found in this submission. It is drawn using solid panes of alternating tinctures, as in the field lozengy, but with the panes shaped like solid scales, rather than like the lozenges in lozengy. See the Pictorial Dictionary for more discussion. [Ailionóra inghean uí Mhurchadha, 08/2002], A-Calontir] *http://heraldry.sca.org/precedents/francois/wreath.html#FIELDTMisc

November 1992 fretty = a fret:

One of this month's submissions required a ruling on the status of fretty: should we consider it a field treatment, or a charge group? If a charge group, was it a semy, or an artistic variation of the fret, or a single charge in its own right?

  • For many years, fretty was considered a field treatment (v. the 1986 Glossary of Terms). Mistress Alisoun specifically overturned this in the LoAR of 25 Feb 90, redefining fretty as "a 'semy of frets' and as such contribut[ing] difference. ...Period treatises make it clear that fretty was seen as placed upon the field in the same way that ...other charges semy were strewn. ...Unlike `normal' field treatments, but like secondary charges, a `fretty' can itself be charged."

... I don't believe that fretty is a field treatment. Lord Crescent has suggested that the very concept of "field treatments" is a Society invention. I'm not prepared to endorse that suggestion: Siebmacher, 1605, gives examples of both masoning and papellony, and the former seems to be considered part of the field, akin to diapering. But even stipulating the existence of field treatments, fretty doesn't seem to be part of the field. The examples of fretty with tertiaries --- e.g. Hemeldene, c.1308, Argent, fretty gules semy-de-lys Or --- strongly suggests that the fretwork is a charge group. ... I am forced to conclude that fretty is an artistic variant of the fret, and therefore a single charge. Partially, this is from the evidence of heraldic tracts: most of those I consulted did not (as the Argentaye Tract did) give a verbal description of fretty, but rather defined it by illustration --- and in so doing, drew no substantive distinction between what we would call "fretty" and "a fret". Legh], 1562, blazons both renderings as a frett; Bossewell], 1572, and Guillim, 1610, follow Legh's lead on this. Bara, 1581, does the reverse, blazoning as fretté what we would call "a fret". Better evidence is found in the actual display of armory using fretty/a fret. Nearly every individual bearing arms with a fret on one roll may be found bearing the same arms fretty on another roll: e.g. John Maltravers, late 13th Century, who bore Sable fretty Or on the St. George's Roll and Sable, a fret Or on the Parliamentary Roll... The main reason that Gules fretty Or, overall a lion argent conflicts with Gules fretty Or lies not in how we consider fretty, but in how we consider overall charges. So long as overall charges, by definition, can never be primary charges, such conflicts will continue to exist. Such considerations cannot change the evidence, however; the majority of the evidence shows fretty and a fret to be interchangeable charges, artistic variations of one another, and we shall henceforth so treat them. (10 November, 1992 Cover Letter (September, 1992 LoAR), pp. 3-4)


Registerability:

September 2002 - mailly not registerable:

"Mailly" is a field treatment which covers the treated area with a pattern of linked rings representing chain mail. It is a modern invention." "Because mailly cannot reasonably be viewed as anything other than a "field treatment", and because SCA-invented "field treatments" are too far from period practice to be acceptable, mailly will no longer be accepted after the LoAR of April 2003." September 2002 LoAR Cover Letter

September 2001 LoAR - honeycombed no longer registerable:

"Honeycombed was defined as a weirdness in the LoAR of June 1999. It is not a period field treatment, nor has it become entrenched in SCA usage." "Hence, after the LoAR of April 2002, honeycombed will no longer be registerable in the SCA." September 2001 LoAR


Conflict:

February 2012 - field treatment tincture:

Antonius Hasebroek. Device change. Gules scaly Or.

  • This device is not in conflict with the badge of Yrjö Kirjawiisas, Sable, scaly Or//, or the device of Deykin ap Gwion, //Vert scaly Or, by complete change of tincture of the field.
  • Section X.4.a.ii of the Rules for Submissions says:
    • (b) Complete Change of Tincture - If the fields of two pieces of field-primary armory have no tinctures in common, they are considered completely different and do not conflict, irrespective of any other similarities between them.
    • ...The addition of a field treatment is also a change of tincture, so Per fess argent and gules// is completely different from //Per fess argent masoned gules and sable.
  • In this case, scaly is a field treatment. The rules and precedents clearly state that a field X <treatment> Y is considered completely different from a plain field X. It seems perverse to rule "no tinctures in common" when considering a plain field versus that same field with a field treatment but to deny "no tinctures in common" when considering two fields with the same field treatment; this is a case where our use of the term tincture with regards to field treatments may be confusing.
  • It cannot be denied that two fields with the same treatment look similar, but X.4.a.ii.b also gives the example of the fur Ermine being completely different from the fur Argent ermined gules. Furs are not field treatments, yet visually the amount of tincture changed would be similar to that seen between a hypothetical Argent <treatment> sable and Argent <treatment> gules. However, field treatments typically leave more of the underlying tincture showing than they cover. Fortunately this case does not require Laurel to rule on whether or not two fields of identical underlying tinctures with the same type of field treatments in different tinctures are clear of conflict or not; this submission presents the simpler case of different underlying tinctures with identical treatments.
  • Therefore, we see no reason to not grant difference, and for field primary armory to grant complete difference, between two fields that share a field treatment, as long as the underlying tinctures are not identical.

His previous device, Per pale purpure and Or, a pair of trews potent, is retained as a badge. http://heraldry.sca.org/loar/2012/02/12-02lar.html


January 2002 LoAR - masoning:

"Architectural charges made of stonework such as towers, castles and walls may be drawn masoned as a matter of artist's license. Therefore, there is no additional tincture difference for adding or removing masoning for these types of charge." January 2002 LoAR===


Identifiability:

Collected Precedents:

Collected Precedents:

The Ordinary:

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