Fess

In

• 
  Fess cottised
• 
  Two barrulets
• 
  Two bars gemelles
• 
  Fess indented
• 
  Party per fess
• 
  Barry

  of eight
• 
  Barry wavy
• 
  Barry

  nebuly

Diminutives

In English heraldry, two or more such charges appearing together on a shield are termed bars, though there are no definitive rules setting the width of the fess, the bar, nor their comparative width.^[3] A shield of (often six or eight) horizontal stripes of alternating colour is called barry. Narrower versions of the bar are called barrulets ("little bars"), and when a shield of horizontal stripes alternating colour is composed of ten or more stripes, it is called barruly or burely instead of barry.^[3] A cotise, defined as half the width of a barrulet, may be borne alongside a fess, and often two of these appear, one on either side of the fess.^[3] This is often termed "a fess cotised" (also cottised, coticed or cotticed).^[5] Another diminutive of the fess called a closet is said to be between a bar and barrulet, but this is seldom found.^[3]

Other uses

• 
  Tierced per fess
• 
  Three eagles in fess
• 
  A fleur-de-lys between two mullets in fess
• 
  A flaming arrow fesswise

A shield party per fess (or simply per fess) is divided in half horizontally (in the manner of a fess). A charge placed horizontally may be termed fesswise or fessways, and two or more charges arranged in a horizontal row are blazoned in fess or in bar.

Notable and unusual forms

A mural fess, that is a fess embattled and masoned of the field, can be seen in the arms of Suzanne Elizabeth Altvater.^[6]

The arms of

A flag which has a central horizontal stripe that is half the height of the flag is sometimes said to have a Spanish fess. The name is based on the most well-known example of this style of flag, the flag of Spain.

See also

• Bar (heraldry)

Notes

Further reading

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Fesses in heraldry.

• Boutell, Charles (1890). Heraldry, Ancient and Modern: Including Boutell's Heraldry. London: Frederick Warne.
  OCLC 6102523
• Fox-Davies, Arthur Charles (1909). A Complete Guide to Heraldry. New York: Dodge Pub. Co.
  LCCN 09-23803
• Neubecker, Ottfried (1976).
  ISBN 0-07-046312-3
  .
• Volborth, Carl-Alexander von (1981).
  LCCN 81-670212
• Woodcock, Thomas and John Martin Robinson (1988).
  LCCN 88-23554
• Woodward, John and George Burnett (1892). Woodward's a treatise on heraldry, British and foreign. Edinburgh: W. & A. K. Johnson.
  LCCN 02-20303