You have probably seen Spain’s national coat of arms many times. It is displayed on the flag, used by the Spanish National Assembly, the Cortes Generales, the country’s government, the Supreme Court and other state institutions. If you look closely, you will find a number of elements from far back in Spanish history, but the Escudo de Armas is not at all as old as it may seem – it was approved in 1981. Spain’s coat of arms is reminiscent of past kingdoms, pillars that once marked the end of the world as most Europeans knew it, and Spanish empire building on the other side of the ocean.
On the coat of arms you will notice that we marked what is apparently the left side with the Latin word for right, “dexter”, while what we usually perceive as the right side is marked with “sinister”, i.e. left. This is because Coats of Arms shall traditionally be viewed from the bearer’s side. Let’s get to it.
At the top reigns the monarchy
At the top of Spain’s coat of arms, often called a helmet sign, we see a beautiful royal crown. It is not surprisingly the Spanish royal crown, in gold, studded with pearls and jewels and topped with a Christian cross. If you have seen Spain’s crown jewels, you will notice that the national coat of arms’ crown is not a copy of the physical crown – experts like to talk about a heraldic crown.
But the top crown is joined by two more royal crowns, you will find them on top of each of the two pillars that carry the coat of arms itself. If you look closely, you will find that they are not identical. On the left (sinister) side is the heraldic crown of the Spanish monarchy, on the right side you will find the crown of the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. The explanation for the latter is that Emperor Charles V (1500-1558) was also king of Spain. He is also known as Charles I or in Spanish: Carlos I.
And Carlos was none other than the grandson of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella who united Spain, and the son of Philip nicknamed the beautiful and his wife Joanna the Mad. Through family ties, he was heir to three of the leading European dynasties of the time. By the way, he himself was not lazy either when it came to subjugating territories in Europe, America and Asia. In short, he was a regent who long before any British monarch could rightly claim something similar, ruled an empire so large that the sun never set on it (el imperio donde nunca se pone el sol).
Past the pillars!
Spain’s time as a great power was relatively short, but is remembered in the national coat of arms from 1981 also through the phrase you see on the red ribbon: “Plus ultra”. It is no coincidence that the ribbon binds two pillars together, they symbolize the so-called Pillars of Hercules.
The Pillars of Hercules is the ancient name for the hills that surround the Strait of Gibraltar. It was here the very symbol of manhood for the ancient Greeks, Heracles, traveled to perform one of his 12 labors. The Greeks called the hero Heracles, but the Romans referred to the same figure as Hercules. Here in what is today southern Spain, he is said to have taken a herd of cattle, after first killing their owner, a scary giant named Geryon.
To the people of antiquity, the Pillars of Hercules represented the outer edge of the known world. The chosen phrase “Plus ultra” means something like “further beyond”, implicitly – further out in the world than what was previously known to Europeans. In the Renaissance, it was said that the pillars marking the entrance to the Mediterranean from the Atlantic bore the inscription “Non plus ultra”, which was a warning to sailors that the outside world was unsafe at best.
Kingdoms that once were
The two Pillars of Hercules serve as support for the shield of the Spanish coat of arms. This shield consists of six main elements.
At the top right (seen from the shield bearer’s point of view) you will find a castle with three stately towers on a field of red. This is the coat of arms of the kingdom of Castile. In 1479, this independent kingdom with Burgos as its capital, was merged (although through a personal/family union) with Aragón into the Kingdom of Spain. Castile was at war for a long time with the Moors on the Iberian Peninsula. The Spanish name Castile is said to come from the many fortifications that were built along the borders to the lands of the Muslim rulers.
Immediately below Castile’s castle, you will find a familiar pattern with four red stripes on a field of yellow. Here the stripes are vertical, but these same patterns exist in several regions both within and outside Spain’s borders and with both horizontal and vertical orientation.
In the Spanish coat of arms the motif of these red stripes on a field of yellow represents Aragón’s coat of arms. Aragón and Castile are often regarded as the very “founders” of Spain according to the official history book version of the story: That modern Spain came into being when Christian leaders defeated Muslim rulers after hundreds of years of armed conflict, a process often referred to as the Reconquista or Reconquest.
At the top left of Spain’s coat of arms we find a lion with outstretched claws and tongue. Lions are not an unknown figure in national coats of arms, even as far north as the country of Norway – they do not have to belong to the region’s natural wildlife at all. Lions are often perceived as symbols of courage, royalty, strength and so on. The pink-red lion on a field of silver is the coat of arms of the once independent kingdom of León in northwestern Spain. León was also part of various constellations: with Asturias from 925, and with Castile between 1037 and 1157, interrupted by a period as an independent kingdom before it was merged with Castile in 1230. In this way, León also becomes one of the founders of the modern state.
Just below León’s coat of arms, you will find a field of red decorated with gold chains and a green emerald as the centerpiece. This is the coat of arms of the kingdom of Navarre. In Spanish history, Navarre has often been given greater weight than its size would suggest, not least because the kingdom controlled one of the most important passes in the Pyrenean mountain range. Navarre was already a separate state in the ninth century, but alternated for long periods between independence and joining a union. From 1076 to 1134, for example, the kingdom entered into a union with Aragón, before it became independent again. Navarre’s location also means that the area at times has been closely linked to its neighbor in the north. In the 16th century, Navarre was divided, the southern parts came under Spanish rule, while the northern part was ruled by France. The court in the kingdom was a flourishing cultural center during this period.
And, speaking about France: in the middle of the four coats of arms you will find a motif with three lilies on a field of blue. That shield belongs to the House of Bourbon, a European royal house originating in France. Kings from the House of Bourbon came to power in both France and Navarre from the 16th century, and from the 18th century Spanish members of the Bourbon dynasty sat on the thrones of Spain, Naples, Sicily and Parma. And if you were wondering if the House of Bourbon (Borbón in Spanish) has disappeared from history in the Spanish context, note that the current Spanish royal family belongs to the Bourbons. In other words, the last Bourbon on the Spanish throne so far is Felipe the 6th, who ascended to the throne in 2014.
At the very bottom and relatively modestly located, you will find a pomegranate, the coat of arms of the Kingdom of Granada or the Reino de Granada as it is called in Spanish. Granada was the very last area on the Iberian Peninsula to be conquered from Muslim rulers. In 1492 the Emirate of Granada was added to the Castilian throne under the name of the Kingdom of Granada and remained so until 1833 when Spain was divided into provinces. In other words, it is the symbol of the Catholic kingdom that has found a place in Spain’s coat of arms as it appears today.
So you might ask, if this national coat of arms was adopted as late as 1981 – what kind of symbols did it replace? The answer is, of course, the Spanish national coat of arms of the Franco era, but the symbolism in that coat of arms is a story for another time.
Find Your Spain!
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