Talk:Karl I of Tejas

Proposed Arms

A proposed design for the arms of Karl I. Essentially, this is the regular arms of his family (germanic heraldry allows more than one person to use the same arms) but with the "boxes" of the regular arms replaced by fleur-de-lis as a tribute/homage/reminder of his Queen's royal connections. Zahir 17:59, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Wait, so you're replacing it with Fleur-de-Lys, or you have replaced it? BoArthur 18:42, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I have replaced it. And I'm totally open to suggestions. Zahir 19:41, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

It would seem fitting to add something to represent Tejas, once he became king. Based on what I think I know of German heraldry, I'd suggest keeping the blue lion and fleurs-de-lis in the center on an inescucheon; then group some of the other panels into smaller bits; then add a large section in the first quarter for Tejas. I understand that Germans acquiring new and exciting realms generally add them to the outer edges of the shield. Benkarnell 20:26, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed arms

Like this, you mean? When you described it, I instantly saw what you meant, and of course it would be a bit of sore spot to Tejanos if Tejas was such a small part of their monarch's arms. Zahir 22:28, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Looks good. So the early Tejan arms were just the flag sideways? Benkarnell 02:35, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I simply went with an early Texan Flag from *our* history that seemed the original inspiration for the flag of Tejas. Zahir 04:47, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm sure you could come up with something more distinctive then just the flag as COA. --Marc Pasquin 16:03, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Potential arms of Tejas

Fair 'nuff. Here are a variety, based on historical flags and emblems. A is of course based on the Tejano flag, which was in turn based on an early flag during the revolution *here* and is to some extent QSS as regards the current flag. B is based upon the Germanic society emblem founded by Prince Carl *here*, which would match up with what we know of this person's tastes. C is a fusion of the first two, assuming that an pre-existing Tejano flag was more-or-less adopted and modified by Karl's military. D is from the short-lived 1820 "Republic of the Rio Grande" and had this slightly startling but rather nice design for its flag. E adapts it somewhat by including the blue star in place of three white, and upon a different canton according the rules of tincture. F is a riff on the same, eliminating the red canton but adding the arrows of the Germanic Society, argent on sable. My own preference would be for "C" because I think it the most easily justified in terms of history. Feedback is eagerly awaited... Zahir 19:50, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Personally I don't like arms that are just flags on shields. That's just me, though, and it makes some sense in this case.

It is significant that these aren't supposed to really be the arms of the country, but were created to represent the country on Karl's royal arms. Kind of like Gules, a stockfish argent crowned Or, which represented Iceland on the Danish kings' arms (see here and here), but was not used much in Iceland as far as I know. (See this discussion.) Karl would want to show that Tejas was now a realm that he ruled, so he would not have been concerned with representing concepts like liberty and justice and the people of Tejas. A local animal or plant to symbolize the territory could work, but then, so could the star and arrows, or even the flag. I vote for A or B. Benkarnell 22:19, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not really that fond of arms that are just a flag on a shield, either, and I'm not all that fond of the (IME) heraldically unusual tierced (tricolour) COAs, to be honest. My personal favourites are B and F, but I can see what you mean about C being the easiest to justify historically. But when has that stopped us before? D is certainly striking, but still looks like a flag conformed to the area of a shield, as does E, IMO. Geoff 22:51, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

FWIW, the tricolor thing on a shield isn't my favorite either, nor are flags placed on shields. But finding an historical basis for Tejano's arms was no easy task. Zahir 23:23, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Understood.

Off topic slightly, the Tejano flag always reminded me of the flag of the unnamed state Springfield is in from The Simpsons. ([1]) Benkarnell

According to a website on Texas symbols *here*, the official state flower is the bluebonnet so maybe that could be part of their COA. --Marc Pasquin 14:35, 4 March 2009 (UTC)