Adventure Forums - View Single Post

ATMachine · 08-06-2007, 01:55 PM

I was rewatching bits and pieces of Kingdom of Heaven today when I noticed something.

Spoiler:
The end features a cameo by Richard I "the Lionheart" of England. Richard's arms are very famous, mainly because they still make up part of the UK coat of arms today: three golden lions on all fours, their heads to the left, on a red field.

But in KoH Richard's arms are shown as two golden lions, standing on their hind legs, facing each other on a red field.

Then I was looking up English kings' coats-of-arms elsewhere and saw something interesting. It was many years after Richard returned from the Crusades, in fact very near his death, when he chose the three-lion coat of arms.

Before that, when he went on the Third Crusade, he had a different coat of arms. It's unknown for certain but generally assumed to have been the two-lion device, based on a description of his equipment in a contemporary chronicle.

Most movies with King Richard (eg The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, 1938) show him with the standard 3-lion crest (which also, as said before, represents England). But Ridley Scott was the only director who actually cared about accuracy enough to use Richard's actual coat of arms from the Crusade days in his movie.

08-06-2007, 01:55 PM	#2772
ATMachine Retired Buccaneer Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Florida Posts: 779	I was rewatching bits and pieces of Kingdom of Heaven today when I noticed something. Spoiler: The end features a cameo by Richard I "the Lionheart" of England. Richard's arms are very famous, mainly because they still make up part of the UK coat of arms today: three golden lions on all fours, their heads to the left, on a red field. But in KoH Richard's arms are shown as two golden lions, standing on their hind legs, facing each other on a red field. Then I was looking up English kings' coats-of-arms elsewhere and saw something interesting. It was many years after Richard returned from the Crusades, in fact very near his death, when he chose the three-lion coat of arms. Before that, when he went on the Third Crusade, he had a different coat of arms. It's unknown for certain but generally assumed to have been the two-lion device, based on a description of his equipment in a contemporary chronicle. Most movies with King Richard (eg The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, 1938) show him with the standard 3-lion crest (which also, as said before, represents England). But Ridley Scott was the only director who actually cared about accuracy enough to use Richard's actual coat of arms from the Crusade days in his movie.