340 Notes on the Arms of Cardinal Pole. 
It is, however, plain that the task of presenting the arms of 
England, to say nothing of the quartered coat of Le Dospencer, in 
their proper proportions within the very small space at his disposal 
proved too great for the engraver’s skill, and he accordingly com- 
promised by drawing the Cardinal’s eight quarters of the varying 
widths which give so puzzling an appearance to this shicld. 
Even more remarkable is the order in which the quarters are 
given. It is obvious that the order is not in accordance with the 
laws of marshalling as they obtain at present; but the drawing 
must have been made during Cardinal Pole’s lifetime, since the 
book was published in the year before his death, so that it is a fair 
presumption that the arms as given are those which he bore, even 
though the order of the quarterings be irregular. It will be shown 
presently that he had a precedent for the order. 
He naturally bore Clarence in his first quarter, since his mother 
was the unhappy Margaret, Countess of Salisbury, the last of the 
Plantagenets, and precedence is properly given to her armorials as 
those of a princess of the blood royal; and this coat is duly 
followed by his own paternal arms. It is in the remaining six 
quarters, which, as the accompanying genealogical table! shows, he 
inherited from his mother, that the apparent anomaly occurs. 
The order of the matches from which Margaret Plantagenet 
descended is :—Clarence— Neville —Montacute — Monthermer — 
Beauchamp—Newburgh,—Le Despencer—De Clare,” and that is 
the order in which Reginald Pole, her son, would be expected to 
have borne these armorials on his quartered shield. But from the 
drawing in the “ Epitome ” it is quite clear that he bore Beauchamp 
and Newburgh immediately after Neville and before Montacute 
and Monthermer. 
1 This, as a glance will show, is only an extract. It only contains names 
enough to make the descent clear. 
2 With regard to the last two it must be observed, however, that precedence 
is always, in accordance with ancient custom, given to De Clare; since the 
De Clare heiress, being of royal descent, was a more important personage 
than her husband, Hugh Le Despencer. A precisely parallel instance of De 
Clare precedence is given in the arms of Clare College, Cambridge. 
