Lessons and Observations

I suppose that most webmasters keep an eye on their web statistics. It is always cheering to receive information as to how many visitors ones labours produce and very informative to know where those visitors are coming from.

My web statistics also tell me which of my pages are the most visited and week after week, month after month, two of my pages always, without fail, beat the rest. In second place is "How to read a coat of arms" - a simple page I put together in the early days of the web site simply as an exercise for myself and without any real scholarly pretensions. It is nevertheless pleasing that it is so often visited and I hope that it serves its purpose; it has certainly been the catalyst for many a communication from a willing heraldic novice.

The page that persistently retains its crown for the most visited part of the web site has, I suspect, a large majority of disappointed viewers. My statistics not only tell me where each visitor comes from (country), but I am also informed of the referring page and, if the viewer is referred to me by a search engine, what words or phrase was typed into it (Big Brother or what?). I will spare the sensitivities of my reader and not set down in print the most used search terms for the page in question and simply record for posterity that first prize for the most visited page on the Cheshire Heraldry web site is that which features the curious case of the arms of Dodge.

The Visitations of Chester of 1613 record  the armorial bearings of  Dodge of Stockport:

ARMS (in trick).—Barry of six Or and Sable, on a pale Gules a woman’s  dugg or breast distilling drops of milk Argent.

CREST.—A demi sea-dog rampant guardant Sable, tufted and collared Or.

Perhaps I can console myself with the thought that I may have gained an odd convert or two!