This item was on the 03-2014 LoAR

40: Sajah bint Habushun ibn Ishandiyar al-Hajjaji - New Device

OSCAR finds the name registered exactly as it appears in November of 1999, via Atlantia

Vert, on a fess gules fimbriated between a penbox and a lozenge, a chalice Or.

Her previous submission, "Vert, on a fess gules fimbriated between a lozenge ployé and a penbox, a chalice Or" was withdrawn by the submitter in October, 2013 during the in-kingdom commentary period and redesigned (slightly) in this newer version. Golden Dolphin did not ask her to re-write her documentation for style as the charges remain the same. Her full documentation package is attached below and in comments. Not being conversant with Islamic heraldic styles, Golden DOlphin is going to attempt to pick out the highlights of her submission documentation.

"The use of arms, according to Da'ub ibn Auda in his article "Muslim Heraldry: An Introduction" 'were not so much to identify in battle and the tournament (as we have been told of European heraldry), but to "assert the personal vanity, pride, and power of the Mamluk warrior".(59) Da'ud ibn Auda espouses that the arms represent the rank and position of the person, and could be displayed not only on a shield but 'decorating buildings, doorways, banners, cloaks, blankets...aand many other "everyday" items. (59)

According to Auda, the symbols I have chosen represent specific jobs: The lozenge is a napkin or jamdar and represents the Master of the Robes, the chalice is a saqi and stands for the Cup-Bearer, and the penbox, the dawader, is the symbol of a Secretary. [note: the use of this style of penbox is a SFFP. - GDH]

Auda also discusses the tinctures found in extant examples of Islamic heraldry: Or, argent, gules, vert, azure, sable, brown, and what is called 'fieldless' in European heraldry - charges placed on the natural 'color of the material on which the emblazon was placed.' (60)

The client has provided examples of extant items of Islmic heraldry: a carven image from the National Museum of Aleppo (Syria)shows (in order from the top) a lozenge, a fess fibriated, a chalice charged with a penbox, and another chalice. https://www.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;ISL;sy;Mus01_A;48;en A Mamluk textile fragment in the Metropolitan Museum of art shows a lozenge, fess fimbriated, and two chalices. http:www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/1972.120.3 another example of the same style of display (but with differing colors in the upper third) can be found on an undredited photograph used in an article by the West Kingdom Needleworkers' Guild http://wkneedle.bayrose.org/Articles/applique.html . Also demonstrating the use of fimbriation between the areas of the field is a coin from the period, blazoned with script from the David Collection (Copenhagen). https://oscar.sca.org/s.php?u=10959 [ www.davidmus.dk ] . She includes as her final example another piece from the Met, with the field divided into two sections by fibriation and a chalice https://oscar.sca.org/s.php?u=10960 [ www.metmuseum.org ] .

In "Middle Eastern Heraldry", Lothar van Katzenellenbogen, it states, "FIELD TREATMENTS: Only barry, bendy, checky and teirced per fess were used (or per fess... a fess, if you prefer). Tierced per fess was common, the others were very rare. ORDINARIES AND SUBORDINARIES:The fess was used if the shield was divided at all, and was invariably charged with one or more charges. Occasionally, a charge equivalent to sextefoils, roundels, escutcheons, crescents or fleur-de- lys were used. A charge very much like a lozenge was almost invariably used in some way or another. . .All inanimate charges are more or less stylized. Some are immediately obvious as what they are, others are highly stylized. Some charges have no resemblance to the things that they were supposed to represent. . .CONVERSION TO SCA PRACTICE UNDER LIBERAL "REGIONAL STYLE" RULES: Islamic heraldry would be allowed to break the rules of tincture by using brown and "self-colored", and by not requiring good contrast between a fess and a field. Good contrast between the field and the charges would be required though.
Islamic heraldry would be allowed to break the layering rule by allowing the "primary charge" on a fess to be charged with another charge, as long as the primary charge was not obscured. (These quartenary charges were usually very small).
Islamic heraldry would be allowed to break the rule of "slot machine heraldry" to allow three different charges to be placed in pale." http://www.s-gabriel.org/docs/saracen-heraldry.html

The documentation continues, "Much of the above is further reinforced and supported by the conclusions of Paul Balog, an expert in Mamluk coinage and, by default, the heraldry used in the coinage. His extensive discussion, including hand-drawn images of extant Mamluk items can be found at http://numis01.zwq.net/Numis10/PDF/Balog-17.pdf . His article includes discussions of the fess present in my proposed device (187) as well as the napkin (190), the cup (195) and the penbox (204). If further documentation is required please let me know. I have a copy of "Heraldic Symbols: Islamic Insignia and Western Heraldry", William Leaf, 1986, and can offer further support in both text and images."

The above submission has images. To view them, see the URLs below:
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