Fraternity and Sorority Arms, Seals, Flags and other Insignia

[MysticCat]

Originally Posted by SWTXBelle

Symbol: Crescent Moon
Founder Mary A. Bingham contributed the idea of a crescent as part of the badge design. The crescent stands for growth of the Sorority and its individual members.
"We . . . must show growth in knowledge, wisdom, power, womanliness year by year or we are not living up to our chosen symbol." Sara Preston Finley (University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, 1912)

. . .

Crest
Our crest, or shield, was envisioned by Gertrude Comfort Morrow (University of California-Berkeley), the winner of a Sorority-wide design contest in 1915. The meaning behind its individual components, including the lamp, book, crescent, Greek letters and carnations, is revealed to members during the initiation ceremony. At Convention 1927, delegates affirmed that the crest could only be worn by initiated members who were able to understand and appreciate the ideals within.


eta - and I love, love, love our badge - A monogram badge? A symbol badge? It's two, two, two types of badges in one! Our beautiful crescent in black enamel with the Hebrew word - revealed during initiation or if you are a Hebrew scholar - and a gorgeous monogram in the center.

And here's where posting badges in this thread can be helpful. We get to see how the crescent symbol is carried through on the coat of arms and badge.

Question: Has there ever been another rendering of the coat of arms, of have you always used this version? (I'm talking about the specific way it is presented, where it looks sort of painted, not the design itself.)

Originally Posted by Drolefille

Here's a monochrome version of our coat of arms, often also seen in lavender. I couldn't find a good, full color version so I'll go with this one.

I'm always fascinated that Sigma Kappa and Kappa Sigma both have 5 stars on a bend (diagonal bar), or bend sinister (from the left from the wearer's perspective) in the case of Kappa Sigma. Cool coincidence.

Keep 'em coming, and it would be great if along with pictures, we could get information on things like when they were adopted. That way, trends (if any) might be a little more evident.

[Drolefille]

This thread makes me wonder if GLO founders, or COA creators, deliberately broke the rules of heraldry since following them would make the meanings obvious to outsiders?

Like if a lion = royalty in heraldry then using a lion would make it obvious that you were kings or something. (Intentionally bad example.)

Obviously not something people could answer in detail as it would 'give away the game' so to speak. But then, I don't know the rules either.

[lovespink88]

Here's a small and bad quality version of our flag (it's all I could find!!) As you can see it's dark blue with Alpha Xi Delta written across the middle. Our coat of arms is in the top left corner and ten stars for our ten founders are in the bottom right corner.

We have one on the flag pole in front of our chapter house, as you can see in the top left corner of this grad picture :

[SWTXBelle]

Originally Posted by summer_gphib

Gamma Phi Beta Coat of Arms

I've seen the crest presented like THIS (see above), looking kinda "squished" and with the 1874. The version I put in my post is the current official rendering - I don't know if it was something which was formally changed or if it is just something which evolved. I prefer the non-squished version.

I wish we had a flag. I was always envious of Sigma Chi's flag.

[purcupile]

that I mentioned from the post the other day.

The first one is the engraving by R.B. Lockwood that was rejected by The Fraternity.




This next one is the engraving that was created by Louis Dreka after the Lockwood image was rejected. This image was the official coat-of-arms since 1903. In it's original use (college annuals) it was 2 3/4 inches tall.




Here is a hand-drawn image made in the 1920's using the rejected Lockwood engraving as it's example. This image has been the one copied by all of the vendors for t-shirts, decals, and most all other products.




This last image is one that I digitally created of the Dreka (official) image.
The original is a vector image and as a result can be enlarged to billboard size without distortion or pixealizing.




Purc

[Miriverite]

Alpha Chi Omega
We have a rather simplistic CoA =)


Alpha Kappa Psi


Beta Sigma Phi - note our motto is in Latin, not Greek.

In both AXO and AKPsi, our badges are not found anywhere on the CoA. There are some symbols, but I feel they are relatively straightforward. The sad thing is that our beloved lyre is not represented on the AXO CoA at all =(

[Drolefille]

Originally Posted by Miriverite

Alpha Chi Omega
We have a rather simplistic CoA =)



In both AXO and AKPsi, our badges are not found anywhere on the CoA. There are some symbols, but I feel they are relatively straightforward. The sad thing is that our beloved lyre is not represented on the AXO CoA at all =(

It looks like the crest (right word?) over the coat of arms itself is kind of a stylized lyre to me!

[IrishLake]

Originally Posted by Drolefille

It looks like the crest (right word?) over the coat of arms itself is kind of a stylized lyre to me!

I thought the same thing!

[Drolefille]

Originally Posted by IrishLake

I thought the same thing!

It also makes me go back and forth on the bird being an eagle or other raptor and being a peacock.

[SWTXBelle]

It's not a lyre bird?

[AZTheta]

This thread is fah-bu-lous.

[Drolefille]

I don't know SWTXBelle, but it would make sense both in looks and for the name

[jennyj87]

Originally Posted by MysticCat

I can't find the pearl. Where is it/are they?

Oops. meant to say two!

[MysticCat]

Originally Posted by Drolefille

Like if a lion = royalty in heraldry then using a lion would make it obvious that you were kings or something. (Intentionally bad example.)

Obviously not something people could answer in detail as it would 'give away the game' so to speak. But then, I don't know the rules either.

There is probably some truth to this. I suspect that the most important thing to many of the designers was the symbolism rather then "rules," though many arms encompass both. Like I've said before, too, in American symbolism in general, one often sees a certain "freedom" from the rules.

And for what it's worth, it's very rare that a particular symbol always stands for a particular meaning (like lion = royalty). While royal arms often use lions, so do many other arms.

Originally Posted by Miriverite

We have a rather simplistic CoA =)

From the standpoint of good heraldic design, simpler is almost always better because it's easier to "read" and identify.

The sad thing is that our beloved lyre is not represented on the AXO CoA at all =(

As others have said, the lyrebird is there.

[Drolefille]

Originally Posted by MysticCat

And for what it's worth, it's very rare that a particular symbol always stands for a particular meaning (like lion = royalty). While royal arms often use lions, so do many other arms.

True, as I said it was a bad example, but there are pretty strong traditional meanings to some symbols as well, even if there are alternative ones.

I was simply curious. I think CoAs are harder to discuss than badges because so much of them are ritual. We can't say "and the stars mean this and the lamp means that and the colors stand for something else entirely."