Blasons du Monde
Heraldry of the World is a private website which is devoted only to civic heraldry, i.e. coats of arms of cities, states, municipalities, countries etc. It also includes an attempt to make a complete catalogue of heraldic (paper based) collector's items, again with the main focus on civic heraldry.
The wiki-part of the site contains at present 177,143 pages and 295,341 images, the total site has over 50.000 pages. There have been 740,901,424 pageviews since June 2010.
The site was created in 1996 as Nederlandse Gemeentewapens (Dutch civic arms, hence the domain name www.ngw.nl) and went global in 1999 as International Civic Arms, since 2010 it is known as Heraldry of the World. It is by far the largest collection of civic coats of arms ever published and still growing.
Although as much information on the arms as possible will be included, like pictures, meaning and history, often there is just a picture, not a description of the arms, nor a history. Any additional information thus is welcome ! All information is taken from public sources (books, internet) and the sources are always mentioned and credited. Most pictures are scans from books, with the exception of the Dutch civic arms, where all the pictures are made by myself.
Countries
Arms of countries, areas or provinces that do not exist anymore, are placed under the country in which the area is situated at this moment. For example, cities, which were granted arms during the Russian Empire, are now under the individual countries. Similarly, towns in the former German provinces of Prussia and Posen are placed under Poland, the South African Colonies and Homelands are under South Africa and Dutch East Indies are under Indonesia.
Present and former colonies and (semi-independent) overseas territories that do not form a single present country are listed under the parent country, except for the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which is listed separately.
Largest collections
| over 10.000 arms | Over 5000 | Over 3000 | Over 2000 |
All countries
For arms of non-existing or phantasy states see Micro-Nations
Collector's Items
The site also has a large section on heraldic collector's items
Heraldic stamps (normal postage)
Heraldic cinderellas (non official postage stamps)
Heraldic tobacco cards (cigarette cards)
More at the Heraldic collector's items catalogue.
I am always looking for new items for the collection, see the Wanted page !
Educational and religious heraldry
There are separate sections for both educational (schools, universities ect) and religious (or ecclesiastical) heraldry.
Religious or Ecclesiastical heraldry of any denomination. Arms of (arch)bishops are included, but not of individuals of lower rank
Category:Educational heraldry includes arms of schools, colleges and universities worldwide.
About the site
- Awards
 Cool Site (1998) |
 Lycos (1999) |
 Sitekeuring.NET Award (2013) |
- Donations
The site is a private site, which is maintained by one person only since 1996. It is my hobby, which takes much time and money (books, hosting etc etc), which is OK for me. My only income for the site is the advertisments on the bottom of this page as well a bit from sales on eBay.
If you want to donate items or images, click here, for financial donations please do so using PayPal to webmaster@ngw.nl or by normal mail to the contact address mentioned in the contact page. For security, I will not send any bank details by e-mail. People or companies that have donated money, will be mentioned with name of logo on this page if wanted. Please contact me if you would like to be mentioned.
Thank you !
Ralf Hartemink
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