Small shield

[steve_rowlands]

Found this today, not sure what to make of it. Maybe some sort of mount? Any guesses or info welcome.
Found in Hertfordshire England.

Steve

 

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[Red-Coat]

You stated that the Lions are 'Passant', maybe by mistake as the Lions on the Cambridge Uni are ''passant guardant''.
As the casting is so poor it's hard to tell which it is, but they do look Passant to me & that would indicate a French Royal connection, not English.

Sorry, my bad. We would indeed call the Cambridge lions “passant guardant” (ie ‘striding’ with the right forepaw raised and the head turned towards the spectator) and that’s the traditional representation for royal patronage. I couldn’t see for sure whether that’s the case for the badge here, but agree they just appear to be ‘passant’, although that in itself doesn’t make them French.

The nomenclature has become a mess over the years, not helped by the fact that we continue to express the terms using French language cues in a way that the French themselves do not use.

Our early heraldry distinction up until the time of Henry III was that any ‘lion’ in a striding position was termed a ‘leopard’ whereas the French made the distinction largely based on the direction the head was facing (and still do). For the French, a true heraldic lion is always depicted “showing but one eye and one ear” and in ‘rampant’ attitude (standing upright on hind paws). They call this ‘lion ‘léopardé’ and when the ‘lion’ is passant they call it ‘‘léopard lionné’. That distinction holds irrespective of whether or not the beast has a mane, spots, or any other identifying characteristics that determine which of the two animals it is.

Our modern English heraldic terms: ‘lion passant’, ‘lion passant guardant’, and ‘lion rampant guardant’ correlate to the old French terms: ‘lion léopardé’, ‘léopard’, and ‘léopard lionné’, respectively.

 

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[Relicific]

Very cool find