+ + BLENCOWE/BLINCOE COAT OF ARMS
by Bro. Thomas Spalding

The shield Is red except for square (quarter) at the top left. which Is silver. The dagger's handle Is gold, its blade and the heart is red. The wings are silver. The wreath is silver and red. If there is mantling (sae arms at the end), it Is also silver and red.

The motto is: QUORSUM VIVERE MORI, MORI VITAE.

The heraldic description is, Gu., a quarter arg. Crest-- A sword in pale, arg. hilt in chief or enfiladed with a human heart gu., all between two wings expanded arg.

The coat of arms, Fig. 1, is taken from one that appears in the Harleian Society Publications Visitatlon of Northampton-shire 1681 (p. 19). In that one, however, the Blencowe arms is quartered with that of the Walleston family. whose heiress a Blincoe married. I have eliminated the quartering. Compare Fig. I wIth the sketch, Fla. 2. of the arms and motto carved In stone above the main entrance of Blencowe Hall near Blencow Village in Cumbria (Cumberland).

The sketch is make from a photo taken by Bob and Helen SImpson. I have sketched the arms, motto, etc. as they appear in the photo. The Henry Blencowe (Henricus Blencow) whose name is carved with the arms was twice sheriff of the county of Cumberland and was in 1617 knighted by King James, according to Burke's Landed Gentry of 1858. He was a descendant of Adam de Blencowe (as are possibly all Blencowes, Blincoes, Blyncos, etc. ).

I have not yet discovered when these particular arms were granted. In the edition of Burke's Landed Gentry mentioned above It Is stated:

'Adam De Blencowe distinguished himself in the French Wars in the reign of Edward Ill.. under the banner of William, Baron Greystoke, who granted arms to him and his heirs by the following warrent: 'To all to whom these presents shall come to be seen or heard: William, Baron of Greystoke. Lord of Morpeth, wisheth health In the Lord: Know ye. that I have given and granted to Adam de Blencowe an escutcheon sable, with a bend closetted (or barred) argent and azure, with three chaplets pules; and with a crest closetted, argent and azure, of my arms; to have and to hold to the said Adam, and his heirs. the arms aforesaid: In witness whereof, I have to these letters patent set my seal. Written at the castle of Morpeth, the 26th day of February, In the 30th year of the reign of King Edward ill., after the Conquest [1357]'."

One has only to compare this description to the previous heraldic description to see that this was not the shield (escutcheon) and crest borne by the Blencowes at a later date.

A.G. Bradley, in The Highways and Byways of the Lake Dlstrlct, pp 70-71, says concerning Blencowe Hall; "The Blencowe of that period [unnamed but obviously Adam] so distinguished him self at Poitiers that he was allowed to bear the Greystoke arms, and Blencowes were here till the beginning of the century, when the Howards absorbed them.... They were connections of Lady Jane Grey, and over the door is carved the egnigmatic sentence, "vivere morl, vivere vitae," which some think was an allusion to that unhappy lady.'

This quote Is a good example of the unreliability of romaticized legend. There Is no mention of the fact that the arms above the door bear no resemblance to the Greystoke [or Greystock] arms. True, the Blencows were at Blencowe Hail till the beginning of the century but the nineteenth century. They sold Blencowe Hall In 1802. The author, moreover, Is apparently unaware that the sentence he misquotes was the motto of the Blencowes: 'Quorsum vivere mori, mori viae,' of which more below. And the connection with Lady Jane Grey was very remote and probably much after the motto was chosen. Sir Henry's grandfather married Winifred Dudley, who was a second cousin once removed of the Guilford Dudley who married the unfortunate Lady Jane. But I hope to go into some of this In another Instalment on the Blencowes.

The Latin scholars I have consulted are puzzled by the motto. Literally it means 'To what purpose to live to die, to die of life.' A freer translation might be; 'One must live to die, to die from living.' But this Is not my last word on the motto.

The 1858 edition of Burke's Landed Gentry gives this description for the arms of the Blencowes of Blencowe and Thoby Priory. "1st, Blencow, gu., a quarter erg. 2nd, Greystoke, augmentation with a difference. 3rd, Laton Dalemain. 4th, Prescott.' The third and fourth were quarterings from later marriages. The first two suggest that Adam de Blencowe had a coat of arms before being granted that of the Greystokes. The 1858 edition also says concerning the crest of the Blencowe arms; 'A legend In the family refers this curious crest to the circumstance that, In the Border wars [with Scotland], a Blencowe, whose crest was a sword, having slain a Douglas (no small honor In those days), was permitted to unite It In the present form, the the bleeding heart of the Douglas" (p.146). If so, this would have been before 1462, when the Earls of Douglas, rivals to the Scot- tish royal house of Stewart. were final ly reduced, but by the King of Scotland, who confiscated their lands, and not the English.

Besides the Blencowes of Thoby Priory of EssexI[13], there were also prominent Blencowe families In Marston St. Lawrence In Northamptonshire tons hire[ [12] and The Hooke In Sussex[14]. All of these claimed the original coat of arms of the Blencowes of Blencowe in Cumber- land but with the quarterings of other families with whom they Intermarried. Accounts of these several branches can be found In different editions of Burke's Landed Gentry. which make clear that they were all branches of the original Blencowes of Blencowe who came to prominence in the 14th century with Adam de Blencowe, of whom I hope to have something to say In another Instalment. Most of these families returned to the primitive or simple arms of the Blencowes (without quarterings) as the one In Fig. 3 taken from a later edition of Burke's Landed Gentry for the Blencowes of the Hooke Indicate.

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updated: 1 February 2003