Kitley Heritage - Bastard impaling Damarell

31/ Or a chevron azure Impaling Azure on a chief gules three crescents argent – Bastard impaling Damarell

This is the last of the very early Bastard marriages displayed in the hallway which have not been successfully identified (q.v. shields 26, 28 & 30). The family name depicted in the sinister coat suggests an association with the area around Efford and Eggbuckland &c, principal seat of the Bastards immediately after the Conquest, which hints at the antiquity of this unknown marriage. Indeed, given the positioning of these four shields in the overall scheme of things in the display, it is likely that they all signify events which pre-date the early fourteenth century Gilbert/Compton marriage depicted in shield 32.

The answers to all these early marriages must presumably lie somewhere, for the impalements would not have been shown in the heraldic display unless the person commissioned to undertake the research had discovered the details respecting them. At least, this is what must be supposed, although it may well be that valuable lands &c were inherited by the Bastards through each of these unions – as has been suggested was the case with the Bessilles marriage (q.v. shield 30) – in which case remembrance of the marriages might have been passed down through the generations as a Bastard family “tradition”. Whatever the case may be, they have so far eluded discovery by the present writer.