A Coat of Arms We Have (Partly) Seen Before

In today's post, we come to the arms of one of the Deans of York Minster, whose pronomial arms we have seen before on our way to visit the Cathedral. I am speaking, of course, of the arms of Arthur Perceval Purey-Cust.

You can refer back to my post of December 21, 2023 (http://blog.appletonstudios.com/2023/12/we-e-e-e-ere-off-to-see-minster.html) for the rendition of his pronomial arms impaled by those of the See of York (modern). (I didn't remark on it in that post, but that is a huge martlet "for difference" on those carved and painted arms!)

Anyway, here in the interior of the Minster is a large, carved, and brightly painted memorial to Dean Purey-Cust, set in the midst of a memorial to the "boys" of the Minster Choir who lost their lives in World War I and World War II.

Arthur Perceval Purey-Cust (born Cust) (1828-1916), was Dean of the Cathedral 1880-1916. He has his own entry on Wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Purey-Cust where you can learn more about the man and his life.

This close-up of his memorial shows his quartered arms impaling those of his wife, Lady Emma Bliss Bligh.

The entire achievement would be blazoned: Quarterly: 1 and 4, Ermine on a chevron sable three fountains proper (Cust); 2, Or an escutcheon between eight martlets sable (Brownlow); and 3, Argent on a fess between three martlets sable three mullets argent (Pury/Purey), overall in chief a martlet sable for difference; impaling Azure a griffin segreant or armed and langued gules between three crescents argent (Bligh). Crest: A lion's head erased sable langued gules collared compony argent and sable (should be "compony argent and azure). The motto is: Esse quam videri (To be, rather than to seem).

The addition of the "martlet for difference" is, of course, the cadency difference for a fourth son.

Anyway, I found myself more than a bit overwhelmed by this memorial; the photographs here do not really do it justice. It really needs to be seen in person to get the full effect there in the cathedral.

But I hope that you can get a least a feel for how truly gorgeous this memorial is.