Abbey of Our Lady in the Dunes

ABBEY OF OUR LADY IN THE DUNES (Onze-Lieve-Vrouw Ten Duinen / Duinenabdij)

Town/city : Koksijde and Brugge (from 1645-1796), Belgium
Denomination : Roman Catholic
Order : Cistercian

Established : 1138
Abolished : 1796

Arms (crest) of Abbey of Our Lady in the Dunes

Official blazon

Origin/meaning

The arms gradually developed as can be seen on the few seals of the abbey and the abbots that showed coats of arms. Generally the seals showed only the image of St. Mary on a throne with Jesus on her lap.

Seal of the abbey as defined in 1335 and confirmed 1666

On the contra-seals from around 1290 an arm holding a crosier was seen above a fish. The meaning of these is not clear, it could be tha the arms and crosier refer to the abbey and the fish to either Jesus or the location near the sea. One of the few abbots that used a personal seal was abbot Pieter de Foere, who, on his seal from 1423, shows two small shields next to himself. One shield shows the family arms, the other two crossed crosiers and in base a fish. The seal of abbot Andriaan Cancellier from 1618 also shows two shields, again one with his family arms and the other two crossed crosiers, a fish in base and a bar in front of the crosiers.

The claw in the upper half does not appear on the seals, but appears on a manuscript from 1488 (where there is no fish and the bar is behind the crosiers) and on a map from Pourbus from 1580. On his image the bar is again in front of the crosiers.

The Abbey arms in a manuscript from 1488
The Abbey arms on a painting by Pieter Pourbus (1580, Groeningemuseum, Brugge)
The arms on a garmentfro Lucas de Vriese

On later images there is no agreement on the bar, sometimes shown before, sometimes behind the bar. The claw differs from an eagle to a bear's claw and the fish is sometimes more a normal fish, sometimes more an heraldic dolphin.

The colours, on the other hand, have remained the same. The motto Fac Necessitate Virtutem is also first seen on the image by Pourbus.

The image above dates from an early 19th century document published in Brugge.

The arms in the Armorial Cistercien (1979)

Arms of Abbots

From all abbotts arms are known from armorials in the abbey library. However, for most of these until the abbots of the 16th/17th century, the origin of the arms is doubtful and may have been 17th century (?) attributions. From Abbot Jan Crabbe on the other hand his arms are confirmed from a manuscript, so some may have been true arms.