heraldryofyorkmi01custuoft

ROYAL HERALDRY. 387
His three brothers, Louis X., Philip V., and Charles IV., reigned in
succession. On the death of the youngest without male issue, Joanne,
daughter of Louis X., and wife of Philip Count of Evreux, was crowned
Queen of Navarre at Pamplona, in 1329. Her great granddaughter
Blanche, was married, first to Martin of Sicily, and afterwards to John,
son of Ferdinand of Aragon. The latter, after her death, made himself
King of Navarre, with the title of John II. He was followed, 1479,
by his daughter Eleanor, the wife of Gaston de Foix. After her death,
Francis Ph rebus, her grandson, was crowned, 1482. His sister Catherine,
wife of Jean D'Albret, succeeded, 1483. The latter having fallen under
the papal ban, Ferdinand the Catholic, 1512, seized the whole of what
is now Spanish Navarre. The small portion on the French side of the
Pyrenees being retained by Henry II., son of D'Albret, 1516. His grandson,
Henry III. of Navarre, became Henry IV. King of France, 1589, and
united non-Spanish Navarre to the French crown, 1607.
As regards this shield,
BLANCHE OF
CASTILE.
it has been not a little difficult to arrive
at any satisfactory explanation of the dolphins being quartered
with the
castles, and I know of no similar shield. I venture to identify it as
belonging to Margaret, the second wife of Edward I., and to offer the
following as a solution. The territory known as Dauphine, formed,
originally, part of the Regnum Provinciae of the Roman Emperor, which,
in the ninth century, was separated into two distinct kingdoms, that of
Provence to the south, with Aries as its capital and that of Vienne to
;
the north, with Vienne as its capital. In the ninth and two succeeding
centuries, the latter became broken up into principalities, the most
important of which were the Lords of Albon, a little to the south of
Vienne. First, they assumed the title of Counts of Vienne ; afterwards,
Dauphins, and their possessions were called Dauphine. Why they chose
this sobriquet I cannot discover, and can only conjecture. Heraldry had
not then been established. I can only, therefore, assume that it had a
Roman origin, for Tacitus speaks of " Vienna " as " Ornatissima ecce
" " Colonia valentissimaque Viennensium ; and Martial says of it :
" Fertur habere meos, si vera est fama, libellos
Inter delicias Pulchra Vienna suas."
It was, therefore, a city of culture, poetry, and song, the known
characteristics of that region ; and perhaps, therefore, associated with the
fabled Arion : a
famous lyric poet of Lesbos, and musician, who is said
to have gone into Italy and made immense riches by his profession;