"Mr. Punch's" Book of Arms

Chapter 4: Joseph, first Earl of Birmingham.

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About This Book

A sequence of humorous mock coats of arms presents parody blazons, crests, supporters, and mottos that lampoon prominent public figures, institutions, and current events of the author's day. Each entry mimics heraldic language while twisting symbols into absurd, ironic descriptions that expose political foibles, journalistic excesses, and imperial pretensions. The work alternates detailed visual description with sharp, often bawdy wordplay, arranging entries like an illustrated armorial interspersed with brief epigrams. Through exaggerated symbolism and mock-formality, it satirizes power, public personalities, and civic ceremonial, inviting readers to view familiar characters and controversies through a comic, barbed heraldic lens.

Joseph, first Earl of Birmingham.

Arms / quarterly / i an antique Boer in his glory regarding a lion spotted over a bordure 'chartered' componee, partly white-washed / ij an heraldic bartlet cuffed and erased under a chapeau doubled up carmine / iij an Irish shamrock, barred in perpetuity on a ground orange of prejudice / iiij a mysterious libel voluntarily erased sable, rendered more or less illegible after the manner of the new journalism / over all, on an escutcheon of pretence, several ministerial billets of the best, clawed and collared in advance. Crest / a lion of debate langued mordant, bearing in dexter paw the union flag flowing to the sinister, dropping in his progress a Phrygian or republican cap of liberty 'turned up' and refaced ermine. Supporters / two highly crusted pillars of the constitution +sang-+azure in a demi-furious state of suppression.