[Illustration: Manners. Wake. Melsanby. Grey.]
Fitzalan of Bedale bore "Barry of eight pieces gold and gules."
Stutevile bore "Burely of silver and gules."
The Bend is a band traversing the shield aslant, arms with one, two or three bends being common during the middle ages in England. Bendy shields follow the rule of shields paly and barry, but as many as ten pieces have been counted in them. The bend is often accompanied by a narrow bend on either side, these companions being called Cotices. A single narrow bend, struck over all other charges, is the Baston, which during the 13th and 14th centuries was a common difference for the shields of the younger branches of a family, coming in later times to suggest itself as a difference for bastards.
[Illustration: Fitzalan of Bedale. Mauley. Harley. Wallop.]
The Bend Sinister, the bend drawn from right to left beginning at the "sinister" corner of the shield, is reckoned in the heraldry books as a separate Ordinary, and has a peculiar significance accorded to it by novelists. Medieval English seals afford a group of examples of Bends Sinister and Bastons Sinister, but there seems no reason for taking them as anything more than cases in which the artist has neglected the common rule.
Harley bore "Gold a bend with two cotices sable."
Ralegh bore "Gules a bend indented, or engrailed, silver."
[Illustration: Ralegh. Tracy. Bodrugan. St Philibert.]
Tracy bore "Gold two bends gules with a scallop sable in the chief between the bends."
St Philibert bore "Bendy of six pieces, silver and azure."
Bishopsdon bore "Bendy of six pieces, gold and azure, with a quarter ermine."
Montfort of Whitchurch bore "Bendy of ten pieces gold and azure."
[Illustration: Bishopsdon. Montfort. Lancaster. Fraunceys.]
Henry of Lancaster, second son of Edmund Crouchback, bore the arms of his cousin, the king of England, with the difference of "a baston azure."
Adam Fraunceys (14th century) bore "Party gold and sable bendwise with a lion countercoloured." The parting line is here commonly shown as "sinister."
The Cheveron, a word found In medieval building accounts for the barge-boards of a gable, is an Ordinary whose form is explained by its name. Perhaps the very earliest of English armorial charges, and familiarized by the shield of the great house of Clare, it became exceedingly popular in England. Like the bend and the chief, its width varies in different examples. Likewise its angle varies, being sometimes so acute as to touch the top of the shield, while in post-medieval armory the point is often blunted beyond the right angle. One, two or three cheverons occur in numberless shields, and five cheverons have been found. Also there are some examples of the bearing of cheveronny.