There are literally tens of thousands of different coats of arms. Amazingly, there are Colleges of Heraldry established to keep track of all these Coats of Arms. Anyone who is serious about knowing exactly how the items on their coat of arms should contact one of these colleges. For a substantial fee, the heralds at the college will detail who received what charge and under what circumstances. It is exacting work done with a high degree of professionalism…thus the high fee.
Of course, if your desire is not that great, you can find out basic information by looking up the coat of arms associated with your surname. Most such programs will show you the coat of arms and give you a family history. It won’t tell you much about the coat of arms. The material we have covered here will help a bit in understanding the meanings associated with your coat of arms. By conducting a Gooogle search for various items on the shield, you will be able to find out more (say a Boar’s Head appears on your coat of arms… run a search for Bear on a Coat of Arms and you will find out that it is generally associated with bravery, recognize Google is a mass retrieval system, it will bring up everything it can find that is remotely related to your search so you might have to do some sifting).
Given the vast number of coats of arms, charges, and the meanings associated with them we will content ourselves with illustrating one coat of arms and how the armorial achievement of that coat of arms is presented. The coat of arms below is George Washington’s.
Arms: Argent two bars and in chief three mullets Gules.
Crest: From a crest coronet a raven rising wings elevated and addorsed proper.
Motto: Exitus acta probat (The outcome is the test of the act).
The above image and description were found on the American Heraldry Society’s website (https://www.americanheraldry.org/heraldry-in-the-usa/arms-of-famous-americans/presidents-of-the-united-states/george-washington-1st-president-of-the-united-states).
In common terms, the Raven represents “Devine Providence”… seems very fitting on George Washington’s Coat of Arms. Red (Gules in blazon parlance) is used to designate a warrior or martyr. It also represents military strength and magnanimity. The mullet (spur rowel) is the mark of the third son. We could go on but I am sure you get the idea how precise terms describing a coat of arms translate into specific colors, bars, etc. on a given coat of arms.
