Heraldic Science Héraldique
  • ARTICLES
    • Bannière de France et pavillon blanc en Nouvelle-France
    • De précieux bijoux de famille : une légende au sujet du castor
    • Des emblèmes canadiens sur soie
    • L’Amérindien stéréotypé en héraldique canadienne : son évolution en regard de l’image imprimée
    • La médaille Kebeca Liberata a-t-elle inspiré le premier sceau de la ville de Québec?
    • La société de la Nouvelle-France était-elle féodale ?
    • Le Québec sur le Red Ensign : une fantaisie commerciale
    • Le tourisme héraldique : France
    • Le visage sur les cartes de Champlain : portrait ou symbole? (English summary) >
      • Annexe I Cartes ornées de portraits d’explorateurs, navigateurs ou cartographes
      • Annexe II Dessins de Louis Nicolas illustrés de soleils et lunes à visage
    • L’imagerie et le symbolisme de saint Nicolas et du père Noël
    • L’origine symbolique et chevaleresque du nom Dracula
    • Les anciennes armoiries de Montréal
    • Les armes sur les cartes géographiques du Canada >
      • Les armes de souveraineté sur les cartes de la Nouvelle-France et du Canada
      • Cartes canadiennes aux armes de sociétés commerciales
      • Les armes personnelles sur des cartes du Canada
    • Les armoiries de Claude de Ramezay
    • Les armoiries de François-Joseph d’Estienne de Chaussegros de Léry, baron de l’Empire
    • Les armoiries personnelles en Nouvelle-France >
      • Annexe I - La noblesse contestée de Denis-Joseph Ruette d’Auteuil
    • Les armoiries personnelles au Québec
    • Les origines du castor et de la feuille d’érable comme emblèmes canadiens
    • Les pavillons de la marine marchande en Nouvelle-France
    • Les symboles d’une congrégation de sœurs en guerre
    • Les symboles monarchiques dans les emblèmes du Québec
    • Où est passée la bibliothèque de l'Institut Drouin?
    • Un puissant symbole de vengeance qui brave le temps
    • Une accusation de plagiat héraldique au XVIIe siècle
    • A Mystery Emblem for Manitoba
    • A Precursor to the Flag of Nova Scotia
    • Adding and Subtracting Lions
    • Augmentations of Patriotism to Canadian Emblems
    • Canadian Badges on Liberation Plates of the Netherlands
    • Canadian Civic Arms on Ceramics
    • Canadian Postcards with Emblems and Rhymes
    • Did Alexander Scott Carter Give Canada Its National Colours?
    • Entalenté à parler d’armes
    • Globe Crests of Early Navigators
    • Heraldic Anachronisms in Movies and Television Series
    • Heraldic Postcard Colouring Books
    • Heraldic Whimsies
    • Land of the Maple
    • Mystery flags on a Rennaisance map
    • Nineteenth Century Postcards with Canadian Symbols
    • Royalty Mingling with Beavers and Maple Leaves
    • Royal Warrants of Appointment
    • The Achievement of Arms of Bordeaux: an Emblem Born in Strife
    • “The Maple Leaf Forever”: a Song and a Slogan / The Maple Leaf Forever : une chanson et un slogan
    • The Mermaid in Canadian Heraldry and Lore
    • The Much Maligned Arms of the Canada Company >
      • Appendix I The “Au Camélia” Trade Card
      • Appendix II Stylisation Versus Distortion
    • The Rise of the Single Maple Leaf as the Emblem of Canada
    • The Unicorn in Canada
    • Why Was the Beaver Left Out of Canada’s Coat of Arms >
      • Appendix I The Beaver Cutting Down a Maple
      • Appendix II The Flag of the Beaver Line
    • Why Three National Symbols of Sovereignty for Canada?
  • OUVRAGES / WORKS
    • ​La recherche de symboles identitaires canadiens >
      • Avant-propos
      • I Le tricolore de la France >
        • Appendice - Illustrations du tricolore dans des journaux canadiens
      • II L’Union Jack et le Red Ensign >
        • Appendice - Génèse de l'Union Jack
      • III Le choix d’un drapeau national >
        • Appendice 1 - Lettre de Stanley à Matheson
        • Appendice II Symboles métropolitains dans emblèmes provinciaux
      • IV Un ajout aux armoiries du Canada
    • Mythes et légendes au sujet d’emblèmes canadiens >
      • Introduction
      • Les symboles titillent l’imagination
      • La feuille d’érable en Nouvelle-France
      • Le castor
      • Comment la feuille d’érable devient emblème
      • La Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste et la feuille d'érable
      • La licorne et sa chaîne
    • CANADA’S COAT OF ARMS Defining a country within an empire >
      • Preface
      • Chapter 1 European Heritage
      • Chapter 2 The Beaver and Maple Leaf
      • Chapter 3 The Dominion Shield
      • Chapter 4 One Resolute Man
      • Chapter 5 King Rules or Heralds Rule
      • Chapter 6 Bureaucrats and Artists
      • Conclusion
    • A GUIDE TO HERALDRY From a Canadian Perspective >
      • ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
      • PREFACE
      • Chapter I BIRTH AND SURVIVAL OF HERALDRY
      • Chapter II TAKING A CLOSER LOOK
      • Chapter III ARMS VERSUS LOGO
      • Chapter IV THE QUEST FOR ARMS
      • Chapter V DESIGNING ARMS >
        • ANNEX I
      • Chapter VI AN AUXILIARY SCIENCE >
        • ANNEX II
      • CHAPTER VII HERALDRY WITHIN THE SYMBOLS’ FAMILY
      • CONCLUSION
      • APPENDIX I LEARNING TO BLAZON
      • APPENDIX II TRACING PERSONAL ARMS IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES
      • APPENDIX III IDENTIFYING ARMS FROM VARIOUS COUNTRIES
      • BIBLIOGRAPHY
      • GLOSSARY
    • VARIATIONS IN THE ARMS OF SOVEREIGNTY CONNECTED WITH CANADA (a Pictorial Overview) >
      • The “Who was Who?” of Canadian Heraldry / Le « Qui était qui ? » de l’héraldique canadienne >
        • A
        • B
        • C
        • D
        • E
        • F
        • G
        • H
        • I
        • J
        • K
        • L
        • M
        • N
        • O
        • P
        • Q
        • R
        • S
        • T
        • U
        • V
        • W
        • X
        • Y
        • Z
        • APPENDIX/APPENDICE I
        • APPENDIX/APPENDICE II
      • Foreword
      • Royal Arms of Colonial Powers
      • Dominion Shields
      • Arms of Canada
      • Arms and Devices of Provinces and Territories
      • Afterword
    • Glanures héraldiques * Heraldic gleanings >
      • Projet d’un juge d’armes de France pour la Nouvelle-France / Project of a Judge of Arms of France for New France
      • The Arms of a Little-known Navigator / Les armes d’un navigateur peu connu
      • Une bouillabaisse sur écu / A Bouillabaisse on a Shield
      • Managing a Heraldic Conflict / Gestion d’un conflit héraldique
      • Une opinion sur les armes du Québec / An Opinion on the Arms of the Province of Quebec
      • La fleur de lis seule : marque d’autorité et de possession royales en Nouvelle-France / The Single Fleur-de-lis: a Royal Mark of Authority and Possession in New France
      • Un écu fictif pour Samuel de Champlain / A Fictitious Shield for Samuel de Champlain
      • Coïncidences héraldiques / Heraldic Coincidences
      • Vision d’une mort tragique ? / A Tragic Death Foretold?
      • The Mystery “Arms” of the North West Company / Les mystérieuses « armes » de la Compagnie du Nord-Ouest
      • Were the Arms of Newfoundland Granted to the Province Originally? / Les armoiries de Terre-Neuve étaient-elles originellement assignées à la province ?
      • A Tragedy Illustrated on a Coat of Arms / Une tragédie illustrée sur des armoiries
      • Une fleur de lis ardente / A Glowing Fleur-de-lis
      • Chadwick’s Écu Complet for the Dominion of Canada / Chadwick conçoit un « écu complet » pour le Dominion du Canada
      • A “The More the Merrier” Expression of Canadian Patriotism / Le patriotisme canadien selon la formule « plus il y en a, mieux c’est »
      • Gare aux blasphémateurs ! / Blasphemers Beware!
      • An Armorial Bookplate with International Scope / Un ex-libris d’intérêt international
      • La couleur sable est-elle issue d’une fourrure? / Was the Colour Sable Derived from a Fur?
      • Le gouffre, un symbole pré-héraldique universel / The Gurges, a Pre-heraldic Universal Symbol
      • The Customs Value of Heraldic Art / La valeur douanière de l’art héraldique
      • Don’t Tamper With Symbols! / Ne faussez pas les symboles!
      • Pulling Coats of Arms out of a Hat / Des armoiries tirées d’un chapeau
      • La feuille d'érable en chanson / The Maple leaf in song
      • La compagnie maritime Allan Line a-t-elle plagié le tricolore français? / Did the Shipping Company Allan Line Plagiarize the Tricolour of France?
      • Un emblème patriotique inclusif / An Inclusive Patriotic Emblem ​New Page

A Precursor to the Flag of Nova Scotia
​

Auguste Vachon, Outaouais Herald Emeritus
​

A flag design featured on an envelope or cover advertising the Nova Scotia Provincial Exhibition at the very end of the nineteenth century is based on the old arms of the province granted in the seventeenth century (fig. 10). The interest of this older design is that it almost replicates the province’s present flag some 30 years before it was adopted. To trace the genesis of the two flags, it is necessary to outline the history of the two versions of the armorial bearings (arms or coat of arms) of Nova Scotia. The use of a large number of illustrations has greatly helped in achieving this goal. 

N.B. Figures 1-2, 4 are from the Auguste and Paula Vachon Collection of Heraldic Ceramics now in Canadian Museum of History. Figures 6, 10 are from their heraldic postcard collection. Figures 8, 9, 11 were produced by the author.

The original armorial bearings of Nova Scotia were granted by Charles I in 1625 or shortly before. These arms appeared on maps of the territory in the early1750’s and continued being displayed in various places for many years (fig. 1). [1] In 1868 just after Confederation, Nova Scotia received a new grant of arms by royal warrant of Queen Victoria. These new arms were quite different from the previous ones (fig. 2), but the new arrival did not completely replace the older emblem which continued to be reproduced on various objects (figs. 3-4). [2]
​

Picture
Fig. 1. Advertisement plate by Wedgwood & Co., England, c. 1850-1865 featuring the 1625 arms of Nova Scotia. This Wedgwood company is not the same as the one mentioned with figures 2 and 4.
​

Picture
Fig. 2. Decorative 1908 Wedgwood plate with the arms assigned to the province of Nova Scotia by Queen Victoria in 1868. The granted arms are exclusively what appears on the central shield. The additions around the shield do not belong to the arms, namely: (1) the royal crown which was often placed above provincial arms without royal authorization; (2) the baroque framing around the central shield; (3) sprays of mayflower, the provincial floral emblem, on both sides of the shield; (4) the motto inscribed on a scroll underneath, Terrae Marisque Opes (Resources from land and sea), is taken from the 1730-1767 Great Seal that George II assigned the province. 
​

Picture
Fig. 3. Bank of Nova Scotia, ten-dollar bill, July 2, 1877, Bank of Canada Currency Museum Collection.
​

Picture
Fig. 4. Decorative 1907 Wedgwood plate showing the 1625 arms of Nova Scotia with the crest on top, but without the supporters as in figure 1. The added elements are described with figure 2.
​

On 19 January 1929, a warrant of King George V restored the seventeenth century arms of Nova Scotia with the same components as the old ones, but with a helmet added between the shield and crest, which is a normal practice (compare figures 1 and 5). The royal warrant stated that the arms could be borne “upon Seals, Shields, Banners or otherwise according to the Law of Arms.” These words authorized the content of the shield (fig. 6) to be displayed on the whole surface of a squarish or rectangular banner, and the province adopted its provincial flag accordingly (fig. 7).

Picture
Fig. 5. Armorial bearings of Nova Scotia originally assigned by Charles I in 1625 or shortly before, restored by royal warrant in 1929. From The Arms, Flags and Floral Emblems of Canada (Secretary of State of Canada, 1967).
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Picture
Fig. 6. From a postcard booklet reproducing the arms of Canada, its provinces and territories. It can be dated close to 1965 because it states on one of the cards that the population of British Columbia is 1.8 million at the time. In heraldry gold, as on the central escutcheon in this illustration, can be represented as yellow or given a more metallic appearance. “A Traveltime product, made in Vancouver, Canada, by Grant-Mann lithographers Ltd.”
​

Picture
Fig. 7. Flag of Nova Scotia assigned by royal warrant in 1929 and replicating, on a rectangular surface, the elements on the shield as seen in figure 6. Same source as figure 5.
​

Picture
​Fig. 8. Royal arms of Scotland placed in the centre of both the Nova Scotia arms and flag. They are blazoned: Or a Lion rampant within a double tressure flory-counter-flory Gules. The double tressure consists of the two parallel red stripes shaped as the shield; flory-counter-flory describes the fleurs-de-lis on the stripes pointing alternately in one direction, then in the other.

Until recently, I did not know that there had been at least one attempt to create a provincial banner based on the seventeenth century shield. I discovered this while consulting Joachim R. Frank, The Postal History of the Canadian Participation in the South African War, 1899-1902 (BNAPS, 2013), p. 43. The envelope illustrated in his work is postdated 27 March 1900 and was sent by a soldier from Sea Point C.G.H. (Canadian General Hospital) in Cape Town to someone in Toronto, during the South African War. The author further informs us that such envelopes or covers were donated to be used as stationery, which might explain their availability to Canadian troops in South Africa. The cover in this article (fig. 10) was sent from Halifax to Charlottetown in 1899. Like the others, it is illustrated with a flag in colour and inscribed: “Nova Scotia Provincial Exhibition, Halifax. Sept. 23 to 30 1899. M.S. Lith. Co. St. John & Halifax. $17,000 IN PREMIUMS.” The premiums no doubt represents amounts paid by exhibitors.

By comparing figures 6, 7 and 8 to figures 9, 10 and 11, the difference between today’s flag and the one on the exhibition envelope becomes apparent. Figure 7 is a banner of the arms which duplicates faithfully the entire content of the shield (fig. 6) on a rectangular surface. Figure 10 introduces a minor change where the smaller shield in centre, called an escutcheon or inescutcheon, becomes a rectangular banner with the same content as the shield. More precisely, the former displays the royal arms of Scotland (figs. 7-8) over the blue saltire while the latter displays the royal banner of Scotland (figs. 9-10) over the same cross. Figure 11 was created because the details of the royal banner of Scotland in centre of the flag are not very clear in figure 10. 


Picture
Fig. 9. Royal banner of Scotland often referred to as a standard.
​

Picture
Fig. 10. This flag differs from the actual provincial flag in that it reproduces the royal banner of Scotland in the centre rather than the royal arms of Scotland as in figure 7. Printed by Maritime Steam Litho. Co., St. John, N.B. and Halifax, N.S. 
​

Picture
Fig. 11. Flag combining a blue saltire on a white field with the royal banner of Scotland. This illustration shows clearly the components of the flag in figure 10.
​

The same banner as figure 10 appeared on the cover of the Nova Scotia Provincial Exhibition (Halifax) in both 1900 and 1908. The 1901 envelope features the 1625 arms as a full achievement, which arms are repeated on the 1902 envelope along with those of the city of Halifax. In 1904 an allegorical figure holds the shield alone, which shield reappears also on the 1905 envelope. On the 1909 cover, the 1625 shield gives way to the 1868 one. These illustrated covers demonstrate that the older 1625 grant was often more popular than the 1868 one. The example of the banner on the envelopes (1899, 1900 and 1908) is of historical interest because it may constitute the only attempt before 1929 to design a flag representing Nova Scotia based almost entirely on its seventeenth century arms.

 There can be little doubt that the flag was meant to designate Nova Scotia given that it is based on the provincial arms assigned by King Charles I to the province. On the envelopes, it alternates with the two coats of arms of the province and fulfills the same function that the arms do. This flag is correct heraldically and could have been an interesting and appropriate alternative to today’s flag, though not necessarily more efficient or more pleasing aesthetically. In the case of armorial banners or banners of the arms, the most frequent practice is an unchanged transfer of the shield of arms, but variations do occur.  Three other Canadian provinces have armorial banners: British Columbia and New Brunswick replicate exactly what is on their shield, while Prince Edward Island adds a border alternating red and white to the composition.
​

Notes

[1] A plan of the harbour of Chebucto and town of Halifax. | Library of Congress (loc.gov) and
Plan des Havens von Chebucto und der Stadt Halifax | Library of Congress (loc.gov).
 
[2] For further information regarding the two versions of the Nova Scotia arms, see: http://ash.heraldry.ca/issues/2011_2012/ASH_4_10_Vachon_NS_Arms.pdf
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