Oct. 27. 1855.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



329 



that he had found the like triangle on coins of Sweden, 

 France, Denmark, and Portugal ; but, upon examination 

 of the coins mentioned, though some have triangular 

 figures, I do not find any have the like triangle as the 

 coins of King John. Nevertheless, he supposes that as 

 the heads of the kings were enclosed in a circle on their 

 English money, so, for distinction sake, he ordered his 

 head to be inserted in a triangle on his Irish coins, from 

 which triangle, says he, perhaps proceeded the arms of 

 Ireland, the harp, which we do not find represented on any 

 of the ancient Irish coins extant ; except it be what has 

 been taken for a hand, which I must owu I think is more 

 like a harp. 



" Now, admitting King John invented the triangle 

 to distinguish his Irish coins from the English, there 

 •was no figure so improper. It is certain the triangle 

 distinguished the Irish coins from the English, and there- 

 fore we may readily admit that King John intended it for 

 that purpose ; and it is obvious, by the representation of 

 the king's head within the triangle, that no figure was so 

 improper for the purpose, whence we may conclude there 

 was some latent meaning in it which bore some relation 

 to the kingdom of Ireland ; or of a religious or civil na- 

 ture, either relating to the kingdoms in general, or Ire- 

 land in particular. From the beginning of Christianity, 

 the coins of Christian princes have borne the cross, and 

 various other marks of a religious turn, and this triangle 

 as crosses and churches of a triangular form, as on a 

 Saxon coin of Anlaf (Camden's Tables, III., No. 34.), and 

 other triangular figures alluding to the Trinitj', as per- 

 haps this triangle upon the coins of King John may do, 

 the exterior point of each angle on some, terminating in 

 a crosspaiej but I should rather think it allusive to the 

 three sovereignties of England, France, and Ireland ; and 

 I am the more inclined to be of this opinion, because, 

 when this triangle was laid aside upon the Irish money, 

 the distinction upon the Irish money instead thereof was 

 three crowns. Nevertheless, I would not wholly reject 

 the ancient tradition, that this triangle might bear some 

 relation to the Irish harp, an instrument of music which 

 that nation was very fond of, and for another reason 

 which will be mentioned hereafter ; and perhaps all the 

 reasons might coincide for taking the triangle. 



" As to the harp, we are told {Jeu ef Armories) that 

 one of the first lords of this island, named David, took for 

 arms the harp of that king-prophet whose name he bore, 

 or, as Menestrier has it ( Veritable Art du Blazon, p. 221.), 

 it was a David, King of Ireland, who gave a harp for the 

 arms of that kingdom ; but I have not been able to dis- 

 cover such a King David. Was this true, then the harp 

 is the harp of King David. Sicily Herald, one of the 

 oldest and best writers of blazon, who lived in the begin- 

 ning of the fourteenth century, in his book entitled Le 

 Blazon des Couleurs, published between the years 1483 

 and 1498, amongst the arms attributed to the kings, has 

 ' Le Roy de Hyrlande ; ' being the figure of a king crowned, 

 sitting, and holding with both his hands ajleur de lis. 



" According to the vulgar tradition of the Irish, St. 

 Patrick, who converted them to Christianity in order to 

 explain to them the possibility of the Trinity, carried in 

 his hand a sprig of trefoil. And upon the money coined 

 by the Irish rebels in the reign of KingCharies the First, 

 he is so represented on one side, and upon the other is the 

 figure of King David playing upon his harp. -Taking in 

 both these traditions, and with verv little variation, the 

 arms ascribed to the King of Ireland by Sicily Herald 

 may be reconciled with, as it seems to be compounded of, 

 both ; for here is a king, who, instead of the harp, has 

 the emblem of the Trinity in his hands. The only dif- 

 ference is, St. Patrick had a trefoil ; but a fleur de lis is as 

 proper an emblem of the Trinity, and upon the monev 



No. 313.] - ^ 



before mentioned, some, instead of the trefoil, have a 

 cross in St. Patrick's hand, which being held by the foot, 

 as the other by the stalk, has the same effect ; and I make 

 no doubt that the bearing of trefoils, fleur de lis, crosses 

 fitched, and afterwards of three things in arms triangular, 

 was allusive of the same, and particularly the three fleurs 

 de lis of France, which, at the first bearing, was only one 

 fleur de lis, as in the above-mentioned Hibernian arms. 



" Mr. Simon says he does not find the harp represented 

 on any of the ancient coins of Ireland extant, except it 

 be what has been taken for a hand, which he thinks more 

 like a harp than the triangle. 



" The money coined by King John, in his father's life- 

 time, as Lord of Ireland, has the head, or rather face, on 

 one side, and the English cross and pellets on the reverse ; 

 but after he was king, though he styled himself ' Dominus 

 Hibernie' in his writings, he is upon his Irish money 

 styled ' Johannes Rex ; ' and the head or bust crowned in. 

 a triangle, the crown in the angle ; a like triangle on the 

 reverse, and the name of the place where coined in Ireland. 

 This form was continued by Henry III. ; but King Ed- 

 ward I. inverted the triangle, for the more convenient 

 placing of the head with the crown in the side of the 

 trian'gle. There are no coins extant of Richard II.* and 

 Henry IV. King Henrj' V. disused the triangle, probably 

 as a figure, within which the head could not be properly 

 represented ; so that his Irish money is distinguished from 

 his English only by the place of mintage, 'Civitas Dub- 

 linie.' And some of the same kind of Henry VI., some 

 few with a single crown, others the English cross and 

 pellets ; but most have the arms of France and England 

 on one side, and reverse the three crowns in pale pyra- 

 midically, the largest at bottom ; which three crowns 

 manifestly allude to the three kingdoms, and probably 

 were taken in lieu and for the same purpose as the tri- 

 angle, which had been discontinued from Edward III. 

 The Irish money of King Edward IV. was (except one 

 with his device of the radiated rose) either with the arms, 

 and reverse the three crowns, or like his English money. 

 Richard III. likewise had the arms on one side, and three 

 crowns on the reverse. Henry Vllth.'s was like his En- 

 glish money, and so was Henry Vlllth.'s, till, in his . . , 

 year, he added the harp crowned on the reverse for Ireland, 

 and some of these have the title of 'Dominus Hibernie;' 

 which shows that he assumed the harp for Ireland, before 

 he took upon himself the title of King of Ireland. Why 

 King Henry VIII. assumed the harp for the Irish device 

 or arms, and not the three crowns, as his predecessors used, 

 does not occur, unless from tradition, that the old triangle 

 was the Irish harp ; and, if so, why was that ancient de- 

 vice discontinued from the time of Edward HI.? In this 

 case I can only conclude, that the triangle was not con- 

 sidered by the kings after Edward III. to be the Irish 

 harp, or to have any immediate relation to Ireland, so as 

 to be necessarily continued as the badge or insignia of 

 that kingdom; but afterwards, in the time of King 

 Henry VIIL, taking into consideration what might be a 



* King Richard IL, in the ninth year of his reign, 

 created Robert de Vere (Earl of Oxford), Marquis of 

 Dublin, and granted " ut ipse quamdiu vixerit et terram 

 et dominiam Hiberniae habuerit, geret arma de azuro cum 

 tribus coronis aureis et una circumferentia vel bordura de 

 argento," which arms he quartered with his paternal coat 

 (Sandford). The same year he created him Duke of 

 Ireland ; and, with the assent of both Houses of Parlia- 

 ment, granted him the whole island for life with the 

 fullest prerogative and marks of sovereignty, to hold it 

 " per homagium ligeum ; " and the same King Richard II. 

 had a purpose to have given him the title of king. (See 

 Selden's Tit. Hon.) 



