The heraldry of the Keperic people is based on the staff that was commonly carried in ancient times. Many of these staffs reflect hundreds of years of family history.
Each staff is composed of a series of rings which are about the width of a man’s thumb. The rings are occasionally made of metal, but the traditional method was to carve the design of the ring into the wood of the staff. Narrow bands of gold or silver separate each ring from the next.
Each narrow gold band separates the symbol of a father from that of his son. Silver bands indicate a female descendant or a wife. So a daughter might carry a staff like her father’s with a silver ring and her own personal symbol following that. A wife would carry a staff identical to her husband’s with a silver ring just below his personal ring.
A silver ring is also used when a man marries into a family of some prominence or if his wife is one of very few descendants of a family. In these cases the husband would include one or more rings from his father-in-law’s staff enclosed, top and bottom, with a silver ring carved into the shape of a braid. If the method is used for multiple generations, each inclusion uses a different braid pattern.
The rings themselves are made of a colored band that, for sons is red, orange, green, blue, purple, brown, or black. Daughters use rings of pink, light green, sky blue, or lilac. The ring is then stripped horizontally with silver or gold bands less than one fourth the width of the bands dividing generations to avoid confusion with generational bands. The following patterns indicate birth order:
- 1st son and daughter: A single narrow band.
- 2nd: Two bands close together at center of ring but with enough room for a 3rd band between them.
- 3rd: Three bands, with no extra space between.
- 4th: Two bands with room for three in between.
- 5th: Three bands with room for another in-between each.
- 6th: Four bands with a gap between the second and third.
- 7th: Five bands
- 8th: Two bands at top and bottom of ring.
- 9th and following: use pattern for 1-7 in between the outer bands of the eighth.
Note that sons and daughters are counted separately such that the first daughter will have a single band even if she has four older brothers. The band(s) used for this pattern can be gold or silver and will generally match the circles described next.
At three equi-distant points around the ring are circles that bear a personal symbol representing an individual. Each circle is gold or silver, or if it is one of the seven basic colors, then it has a border of gold or silver. In this context, there is no known significance to the choice of color or metal.
These rings, when combined, uniquely identify an individual. There is a bit more to the design of a staff, but I will have to cover that in a later post.
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