Let me talk for a second about heraldic registries in the US.
I'm gonna come out and say it; they do not in any way make your heraldic assumption any more legitimate than if you were to not use them. In other words, all they do is announce and publicize your assumption of arms to only those adherents who bother to notice and/or subscribe to a given registry. They offer you no protection from your... fears of usurpation, theft of concept, lack of feeling accepted, lack of accomplishment, lack of recognition or any other imagined results. Registries can "assist to facilitate" the process of banishing such fears, but it in no way guarantee removal.
Heraldic identity and existence only really lives in the minds of its proponents and possessors.
That being said, some "keepers of interesting records" such as the New England Historical and Genealogical Society (...breathe)... aka. the NEHGS have existed for a respectable amount of time and records penned and kept have endured beyond a single person's normal lifespan. Such a repository would be well recommended to stash evidence of your existence, and more importantly the existence of your arms.
On the other end... a fly-by-night website (such as the type of project I might put together) is not something to put your enduring trust into. Using myself as an example still, I might offer to register arms (assumptive, foreign, granted, etc.) in some self-determined interpretive way (in the ardent support of later period heraldry, I might demand that only full achievements be registered to always include crests, or I might try to make unsubstantive classifications based on supporters or lack of them). If I do this, be assured that I am completely fabricating the rules because to be frank, they don't exist in any place a heraldic authority acts without the backing of law or several hundred years of established and well defined tradition (this removes from France as a qualifier in my opinion).
A coat of arms, regardless of what a registry might tell you, is literally the actual design on the shield. It need not be a complex "full achievement" bedecked with helm, mantle, crest, motto, compartment, supporters, chivalric belts, pendant medals or any other such accessories.
So what should an heraldic registry, especially one in a land lacking a LEGAL heraldic authority such as the USA, require at minimum for registration?
ANSWER: Nothing more than the blazon (and/or either colored or tricked emblazonment) for a shield required.
That's it. Any "general public" registry which requires more (not saying it can't offer more, but the key word here is "require") is as wrong as a three dollar bill.
If all you have is a blazon for a shield device to register... do not let that stop you. Get it recorded if you want... or don't. If you post an image on Facebook, and that's all you do, that carries as much authority (at least in the US) as paying for an honorary grant from the College of Arms.
For that matter, if you are English, and you assume a shield device, that also carries as much weight (on the internet and in the US), even if you are unable to obtain an actual grant.
I'm gonna come out and say it; they do not in any way make your heraldic assumption any more legitimate than if you were to not use them. In other words, all they do is announce and publicize your assumption of arms to only those adherents who bother to notice and/or subscribe to a given registry. They offer you no protection from your... fears of usurpation, theft of concept, lack of feeling accepted, lack of accomplishment, lack of recognition or any other imagined results. Registries can "assist to facilitate" the process of banishing such fears, but it in no way guarantee removal.
Heraldic identity and existence only really lives in the minds of its proponents and possessors.
That being said, some "keepers of interesting records" such as the New England Historical and Genealogical Society (...breathe)... aka. the NEHGS have existed for a respectable amount of time and records penned and kept have endured beyond a single person's normal lifespan. Such a repository would be well recommended to stash evidence of your existence, and more importantly the existence of your arms.
On the other end... a fly-by-night website (such as the type of project I might put together) is not something to put your enduring trust into. Using myself as an example still, I might offer to register arms (assumptive, foreign, granted, etc.) in some self-determined interpretive way (in the ardent support of later period heraldry, I might demand that only full achievements be registered to always include crests, or I might try to make unsubstantive classifications based on supporters or lack of them). If I do this, be assured that I am completely fabricating the rules because to be frank, they don't exist in any place a heraldic authority acts without the backing of law or several hundred years of established and well defined tradition (this removes from France as a qualifier in my opinion).
A coat of arms, regardless of what a registry might tell you, is literally the actual design on the shield. It need not be a complex "full achievement" bedecked with helm, mantle, crest, motto, compartment, supporters, chivalric belts, pendant medals or any other such accessories.
So what should an heraldic registry, especially one in a land lacking a LEGAL heraldic authority such as the USA, require at minimum for registration?
ANSWER: Nothing more than the blazon (and/or either colored or tricked emblazonment) for a shield required.
That's it. Any "general public" registry which requires more (not saying it can't offer more, but the key word here is "require") is as wrong as a three dollar bill.
If all you have is a blazon for a shield device to register... do not let that stop you. Get it recorded if you want... or don't. If you post an image on Facebook, and that's all you do, that carries as much authority (at least in the US) as paying for an honorary grant from the College of Arms.
For that matter, if you are English, and you assume a shield device, that also carries as much weight (on the internet and in the US), even if you are unable to obtain an actual grant.
