Lozenge (heraldry)


The lozenge in heraldry is a diamond-shaped charge, usually somewhat narrower than it is tall. It is to be distinguished in modern heraldry from the fusil, which is like the lozenge but narrower, though the distinction has not always been as fine and is not always observed even today. A mascle is a voided lozenge—that is, a lozenge with a lozenge-shaped hole in the middle—and the rarer rustre is a lozenge containing a circular hole in the centre. A field covered in a pattern of lozenges is described as lozengy; similar fields of mascles are masculy, and fusils, fusily. In civic heraldry, a lozenge sable is often used in coal-mining communities to represent a lump of coal.
A lozenge shaped escutcheon is used to depict heraldry for a female, but is also sometimes used as a shape for mural monuments in churches which commemorate females. Funerary hatchments are generally shown within lozenge shaped frames, for both male and female deceased.

Lozengy

The blason Lozengy is a form of variation of the field or of another charge which consists of lozenges semée, or sown like seeds, or strewn across the field, but in an organised contiguous pattern. The arms granted to the Canadian John Francis Cappucci bring an example of lozengy voided, the same as "lozengy" but with a smaller lozenge-shaped hole cut out of each segment.

Examples