Definition
An officer recognized in English and historical European law performing functions in two broad eras:
1. Ancient and medieval law: A diplomatic messenger charged with conveying formal communications between sovereigns or states — particularly proclamations of war, peace, or truce. Heralds in this capacity held a protected, quasi-inviolable status as bearers of sovereign messages, analogous to later concepts of diplomatic immunity.
2. English law (medieval through modern): A royal officer whose duties encompass the keeping of genealogical records, the adjudication and registration of armorial bearings (coats of arms), the regulation of the rights and privileges of noble families, and the superintendence of royal ceremonies including coronations, state funerals, and royal marriages. In England, heralds are officers of the College of Arms (Heralds' College), a royal corporation incorporated under royal charter.
The office is today largely ceremonial and heraldic in the technical sense, retaining formal legal authority over grants and registrations of arms in England and Wales.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Contemporary common usage has largely shed the legal and diplomatic senses. The word survives chiefly as a surname and in the names of newspapers and institutions. As a verb, "to herald" means simply to announce or signal the arrival of something.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): An officer who denounced or proclaimed war, challenged to battle, proclaimed peace, and bore messages from commanders of armies — invested with a sacred and inviolable character. In the Middle Ages, the same officer also superintended genealogies, noble privileges, and armorial bearings.
The modern common meaning (to announce or foreshadow) is purely metaphorical and loses almost all legal content. Researchers encountering "herald" in historical legal documents should resist the common English sense entirely: the term almost always refers to a specific office with defined legal duties, not merely a messenger or announcer in the general sense.
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
Within the English College of Arms, heralds are formally ranked:
- Kings of Arms: The senior heralds (Garter, Clarenceux, Norroy and Ulster), with authority over grants of arms within defined territorial jurisdictions.
- Heralds of Arms in Ordinary: The mid-rank officers (including Windsor, Chester, Richmond, Somerset, York, and Lancaster Heralds).
- Pursuivants: Junior officers of arms (including Portcullis, Rouge Croix, Bluemantle, and Rouge Dragon Pursuivants).
Heralds Extraordinary are appointed for specific occasions and hold no ordinary office.
Why It Matters in Research
The term presents a clear temporal trap. Sources before roughly the sixteenth century may use "herald" primarily in the diplomatic messenger sense; sources from the sixteenth century onward in English law almost exclusively mean an officer of the College of Arms performing heraldic and ceremonial functions. Conflating these two senses when reading historical legal texts will produce misreadings.
Researchers working in English property, peerage, or nobility law will encounter heralds primarily in the context of disputes over armorial bearings, grants of arms, and the jurisdiction of the Earl Marshal's court (the Court of Chivalry). The College of Arms retains unique jurisdiction over armorial matters in England and Wales — a jurisdiction that has no functional equivalent in American law.
The Rapalje & Lawrence entry in the source corpus does not address "herald" directly; the snippet appears to be a neighboring entry returned by proximity in the source scan. Do not rely on it as authority for this term.
For American legal researchers: the office of herald has no counterpart in U.S. law. References to heralds in American legal sources are either historical or refer to English practice, occasionally surfacing in cases touching on the validity of English titles or armorial claims in inheritance disputes.
Historical Dictionary Support
The historical dictionaries converge on the dual ancient/modern structure of the term. Burrill's Law Dictionary is the most precise of the shelf sources, correctly identifying that modern English heralds are principally occupied with public pageants, genealogies, and coat armour, and cross-referencing Heralds' College directly. Both editions of Black's Law Dictionary preserve the ancient diplomatic function alongside the modern English office, which is the appropriate treatment given the term's appearance in texts across several centuries.
None of the shelf sources adequately address the formal hierarchy within the College of Arms (Kings of Arms, Heralds, Pursuivants), which matters for researchers tracing specific grants or orders. The historical dictionaries also do not address the Scottish heraldic system, which operates separately through the Lord Lyon King of Arms — a distinction material to any research touching Scottish genealogy or armorial law.
Jurisdictional Note
England and Wales: The College of Arms holds continuing legal authority over grants of arms. Scotland: The Court of the Lord Lyon operates as a separate heraldic authority with its own statutory jurisdiction. No equivalent institution or legal office exists in the United States, Australia, Canada (federally), or most other common law jurisdictions, though Canada has its own heraldic authority established in 1988.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: College of Arms; Court of Chivalry; Armorial Bearings.