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The family of Douglas, say the French writers,
were on account of their high feats of arms, honoured, ennobled, and
raised to the dignity of Dukes of Touraine, and marshals of France, a
post which no coward can fill, and few amongst the valiant obtain.
However no report of this encomium may appear, it is far inferior to
what the services of the house of Douglas to the French nation deserved,
as will appear in the sequel.”
Motto: Tendre et Fidèle
This article forms part of the Douglas family in France section of the
Douglas Archives.
Heraldry
Some of the Douglas families matriculated arms in France.
Some, such as the 4th earl of Douglas, incorporated their French
arms into their Scottish arms.
The 4th earl of Douglas used two
arms on his seals: one was Quarterly Douglas and Galloway, en
surtout Murray of Rothwell (Stevenson and Wood), another was
Quarterly Douglas, Galloway, Murray and Annandale (Catalogue of
Seals, 16054). One seal, attributed to him, shows a modified
version: Quarterly France, Douglas, Annandale, Galloway with the
title of duke of Touraine, earl of Douglas and of Longueville in
the legend. However, both Laing (suppl. 282) and the catalogue
of the British Museum (16055) date it to 1421, which is
impossible; moreover, the title of count of Longueville was
given to the 4th earl's son. I suspect that the latter seal
belonged to Archibald, 5th earl. In any event, the 4th earl did
use those arms with a French quarter, since a seal of his widow
Margret, daughter of Robert III king of Scots, shows Quarterly
France, Douglas, Annandale, Galloway impaling Scotland, and the
title of duchess of Touraine (on a document dated 1425; Laing).
Both the 5th and 6th earls used the same shield with a
quarter of France and the title of duke of Touraine (Stevenson
and Wood). No other earl of Douglas did so.
It is not
clear where the escutcheon comes from. This was the first time
that a French king conferred a peerage on someone who was not of
royal blood. Hitherto, the differenced arms of France became
associated with the peerage, so that the arms of Touraine,
Burgundy modern, Anjou, Berry, Alençon, as provinces, are all
differenced versions of the arms of France. In other words,
there were no arms of Touraine proper to be borne by a
non-royal.
Although there is no evidence to that effect,
I suspect that the reason for the escutcheon is the same as that
for the escutcheon of the Stuarts of Darnley, which is well
documented, and for the quarter of the Kennedy of Bargany. Thus,
the escutcheon of France is not a mark of peerage, and does not
represent the duchy of Touraine (or the seigneurie of Aubigny in
the case of the Darnley), but a special augmentation conferred
by the king independently of any fief.
Contrast and compare the dark armorial, above,
and the similar, but not identical' one on the white background
above. The dark one was located in the south of France, but this
may not necessarily identify the location of its owner.
Research by John Tepper Marlin has revealed three interesting
groupings of Douglas-related arms by canton (county):
• Ardennes (on
the border with Belgium, east of Pas de Calais) – Amblimont, Doux and
Lametz.
• Corrèze (interior southwest France, the Dordogne) –
Beaumont (gold stars), Margerides (1986), St Remy and St Fereole.
•
Pas de Calais (northwest France near Belgium; Flanders territory) –
Leulinghem (red stars and stripes) and Sibiville (post-Sir James Douglas
heart included in the arms, so clearly the link is from Douglas to
Sibiville). The Comtes de Douglas apparently had lived for generations
as seigneurs of Sibiville in 1747 (when their arms were
recorded).
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Bookplate for 'Louis Archambault Earl DOUGLAS, Knight of the Legion of Honour and the
Order of St Maurice and St Lazarus of Piedmont'.
It is assumed that his home,
Montreal Castle,
contained a library.
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