Why does heraldry fail?

[R. Sale]

Davidsch,

The VMs location is primarily the first three pages of the Zodiac section on the tub patterns of Pisces outer ring and the two Aries pages. At the top, paired patterns of alternating vertical stripes are similar to the standard, heraldic pattern called a paly. The traditional patterns of ordinaries and subordinaries are  standard in most references. You will also find other easy comparisons with barry, bendy and bendy sinister, along with chevrony and even such as a semy of roundels.

The difficult with papelonny is that it is a fur and not in the group of patterns listed above. Metals, colors and furs make up the heraldic set of tinctures. The vast majority of references in my investigations limited the topic of heraldic furs to the various examples of ermine and vair, and omitted the traditional (Pre-VMs) patterns of papelonny and plumety.

Without a name or a pattern, how can we match an unspecified VMs example? Without name or definition, all patterns are generic. Heraldry is a pre-VMs system that names and describes some of the patterns of the VMs tubs. Heraldry is a system of designation and, if we use it, it either succeeds or it fails. And there have been those who simply dismiss the whole investigation out of hand. But heraldry, to the contrary, can name and describe example after example from the VMs tub patterns.
 
PS: There's no intent on my part to close off this conversation. I was simply attempting to answer all three of their postings in a single reply rather than three separately. And as it happened, your comments posted, *while* I was composing my response. I only saw your comments afterwards and I agree with what you said. I took a while to think about it and write a comment (above). I can be *really* slow. Forgive my tardiness.