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What was each Garter Knight's coat of arms?

An original rule of the order was that as each knight died, a casting of his arms should be placed in his stall in St George's Chapel, Windsor. Regrettably this did not happen reliably. And of the arms that were put up, quite a few were purloined over the centuries since then. Remarkably a large number have in fact survived.

Our garter ancestors all lived before 1539 and there were 66 of these. Of these 66, stall-plates survive for 27 and so 39 ancestral plates are missing.

Further there were little or no records of what the missing arms had been. Fortunately various scholars have been working on these matters for at least the last hundred years and in the last year we have been privileged to have credible lists published of the arms of all garter knights since the foundation of the order in c. 1348.

The publications I have used are:

  • Wm St John Hope's "Plantagenet Stall Plates" pub 1901.
  • "Dictionary of British Arms: Medieval ordinary" in 4 vols, pub by Soc of Antiquaries from 1992 to 2014.
  • "Illustrated Catalogue of Stall Plates of the Knights of the Garter in St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle", pub 2014.
  • "Garter Armorials" CDROM pub by Heraldry Society in 2015.
  • "Catalogue of Seals in the British Museum" in 6 vols pub 1887 to 1900.
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