Staffordshire's Respited Arms - Amphlet

 Richard Amphlet

There are several surviving historic records concerning the coat of arms of Richard Amphlett of Clent, whose arms were famously respited during Sir William Dugdale's Visitation of Staffordshire on April 10, 1663.

Because he failed to provide sufficient legal proof to the visiting heralds at the time, his arms were never officially tricked (drawn) in the 1663 Visitation register, leaving behind a paper trail of disputes, unapproved engravings, and an eventual formal grant.

In the Collections for a History of Staffordshire (compiled by the William Salt Archaeological Society), the editors note that Richard Amphlett was treated somewhat strictly. The official record contains no drawing ("trick") of his traditional coat, noting only that a "respite was given for shewing as well as proving the arms" because he did not comply with Norroy King of Arms' order to bring the arms and crest he used. A subsequent note adds that "nothing was performed therein".

Historical commentary on the visitation explicitly mentions surviving correspondence preserved in the College of Arms between Richard Amphlett and one of the heralds regarding this exact dispute and his failure to produce proof.

The following is noted in the preface to the (later) Visitations of Staffordshire 1614 and 16663 and 1664:

"On the other hand, Richard Amphlett of Clent seems to have been treated somewhat harshly, though it would appear, from the absence of any trick of his traditional coat, and the note that respite was given for shewing as well as proving the arms, that he did not comply with Norroy's order to ‘bring with him such arms and crest as he then used and bore.’ Nothing, it is added, was performed therein. But it appears, from a correspondence preserved in the College of Arms between Mr. Amphlett and one of the officials, that the coat he exhibited was Argent, a fesse between three lozenges azure, and that it was objected to as being the arms of a family named Hastings.* Mr. Amphlett's reply was that he would furnish the necessary proof at Easter then next, when he contemplated visiting London. But no evidence exists that this was ever done, and consequently the Amphletts, in common with several other families of equal antiquity and importance, are still regarded by the Heralds as “ignobiles:” for the “Law of arms,” like that of the Medes and Persians, “altereth not.”

* William de Hastinge bears the coat in a Roll of Arms compiled between 1278 and 1285, printed in the ‘Genealogist,’ pp. 216, 261, from a copy in Harl. MS. 6137."

Despite being respited and unproved at the 1663 visitation, the traditional Amphlett arms were publicly engraved just over twenty years later when, in the decorative border of the county map published in Dr. Robert Plot’s The Natural History of Staffordshire (1686), the Amphlett coat of arms appears among a group of gentry shields. Heraldic historians specifically note that Plot included several unproved and disclaimed coats, including Amphlett's, alongside legitimate ones.

Because Richard Amphlett's arms were respited in 1663, his descendants had to formally petition the College of Arms centuries later to legitimise the traditional design:

According to The Heraldry of Worcestershire (Clent was a detached part of Staffordshire surrounded by Worcestershire), the traditional arms used by the Amphletts of Clent were blazoned as: Argent, a fess between three lozenges (or mascles) Azure, in chief a cinquefoil Sable (or on the fess a cinquefoil Or), with a crest of a dromedary Proper.

Because no official entry of those arms had been registered to Richard Amphlett of Clent when William Dugdale, Norroy King of Arms, respited them at the Visitation of Staffordshire on 10 April 1663, in 1903 Edward Greenhill Amphlett petitioned the Earl Marshal for a formal grant with necessary distinctions.

The exact blazon recorded in the formal 1903 Grant of Arms to Edward Greenhill Amphlett (published in Visitation of England and Wales: Notes, Vol. 5 [Vol. 26 of the overall series], edited by Frederick Arthur Crisp, pages 43–44) is as follows: Arms: Argent on a fesse nebuly Azure, gutté d'eau, between three lozenges of the second, a cinquefoil Or. Crest: On a Wreath of the Colours a dromedary statant Proper with halter and line reflexed over the back Or, charged on the body with two lozenges Argent. Motto: "Chi legge regge" (Italian for "He who reads, rules").

The 1903 grant introduced specific heraldic differences to distinguish the design from the historical Amphlett family coat of arms: The traditional blue fess was changed to a nebuly (wavy) fess sprinkled with silver water drops (gutté d'eau), while retaining the three blue lozenges and adding a gold cinquefoil. The traditional dromedary crest was updated with a gold halter and line reflexed over its back, plus two silver lozenges on its body.

Prior to this formal grant, a monument in Clent Church to Edward Greenhill Amphlett's ancestor, John Amphlett (d. 1705), displayed the undifferenced coat: "Argent on a fesse between three lozenges Azure, a cinquefoil Or".

The transcribed pedigree, the respite notes, and the historical preface detailing the College of Arms correspondence is in the William Salt Archaeological Society's Collections for a History of Staffordshire, Vol. 5, Part 2 (1884).

The original visitation entry and the 17th-century letters from Richard Amphlett are held in the archives of the College of Arms in London (specifically MS. C. 36 for the Staffordshire Visitation).

A 1903 bookplate (ex libris) displaying the granted coat of arms and motto is in the Collection of Auckland Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hira, Percy Neville Barnett bookplate collection, Donated by Auckland Ex-Libris Society, 1956.

On this bookplate, the arms of Amphlett are impaled with those of the Charlton family of Chilwell Hall, Nottinghamshire.

In British heraldry, impaling two coats of arms side by side on a single shield represents a marriage. This 1903 bookplate (ex libris) belonged to Edward Greenhill Amphlett (1853–1930) of Worthing, Sussex, who married Amye Charlton (1860–1938), daughter of Thomas Broughton Charlton of Chilwell Hall, on 7 February 1882. 

Dexter (left side as viewed): Amphlett: Argent on a fesse nebuly Azure, gutté d'eau, between three lozenges of the second, a cinquefoil Or.

Sinister (right side as viewed): Charlton of Chilwell: Azure, on a chevron Or between three swans Argent, as many cinquefoils Gules.

Crest: A dromedary statant Proper with halter and line reflexed over the back Or, charged on the body with two lozenges Argent. Motto: "Chi legge regge" (Italian for "He who reads, rules"). A fitting motto to be placed upon a bookplate.