Crosses

Crosses are rare in early Cape Dutch heraldry, and it appears to have been the British who brought most of the well-known varieties to South Africa during the nineteenth century. A few more were introduced in the twentieth century, most of them by the Bureau of Heraldry in its quest to create a unique South African heraldic idiom:

Bow and arrow cross: introduced in 1978. Until it was given a name, it was blazoned as "a barbed fillet cross each limb surmounted crosswise by an unstrung bow". Example: the arms of Johannes van der Merwe (BoH 2001).

Fir-twigged cross: based on the Finnish fir-twig line, and introduced in 1989. It consists of four stylised fir-twigs, but in its Latin form only the three upper limbs are fir-twigged and the lower is plain, as in the arms of George Murfin (BoH 1989).

Gable cross: introduced in 1979 and consisting of four stylised Cape Dutch farmhouse gables. The only arms in which it has appeared to date have been those of Gideon van den Berg (BoH 1979). The cross was also used for the badge of the Order for Meritorious Service (1986-2002).

Huguenot cross: a 17th-century French protestant symbol, comprising a Maltese cross (or sometimes a cross moline) with fleurs de lis in the angles, and a descending dove below. It's sometimes used to indicate French Huguenot ancestry, or connections with the Huguenot settlers who arrived in 1688, e.g. in the arms of Stanley le Roux (BoH 1994). The earliest example that I've found is in the arms of the former Wellington municipality (1948).

Protea cross: four highly stylised protea flowers slipped and leaved and conjoined in cross. Although it was devised in the 1970s, I've not found any example of its use in a registered coat of arms.

References/Sources/Links

South African Heraldry Website © Arthur Radburn