Royal motto of the United Kingdom
Dieu et mon droit
(
French pronunciation:
[djø
e
m??
d?wa]
,
Old French
:
Deu et mon droit
), which means
'
God and my right
'
,
[1]
[2]
is the motto of the
monarch of the United Kingdom
.
[2]
It appears on a scroll beneath the shield of the version of the
coat of arms of the United Kingdom
.
[1]
The motto is said to have first been used by
Richard I
(1157–1199) as a battle cry and presumed to be a reference to his
French
ancestry (indeed he spoke French and
Occitan
but knew only basic English) and the concept of the
divine right of the monarch to govern
.
[3]
It was adopted as the royal motto of
England
by
King Henry V
(1386–1422)
[2]
[3]
[4]
with the phrase "and my right" referring to his
claim by descent to the French crown
.
[4]
Language
[
edit
]
The motto is French for "God and my right",
[2]
meaning that the king is "
Rex Angliae Dei gratia
"
[5]
[6]
[7]
[8]
("
King of England
by the grace of God
").
[2]
It is used to imply that the monarch of a nation has a God-given (divine) right to rule.
[2]
It was not unusual for the royal coat of arms of the
Kingdom of England
to have a French rather than English motto, given that
Norman French
was the primary language of the English
Royal Court
and ruling class following the rule of
William the Conqueror
of Normandy and later the
Plantagenets
. Another
Old French
phrase also appears in the full achievement of the Royal Arms: the motto of the
Order of the Garter
,
Honi soit qui mal y pense
("Shamed be the one who thinks ill of it"), appears on a representation of a
garter
behind the shield. Modern French spelling has changed
honi
to
honni
, but the motto has not been updated.
Other translations
[
edit
]
Dieu et mon droit
has been translated in several ways, including "God and my right", "God and my right hand",
[9]
[10]
"God and my lawful right",
[11]
and "God and my right shall me defend".
[12]
The literal
translation
of
Dieu et mon droit
is "God and my right".
[2]
However,
Kearsley's Complete Peerage
, published in 1799, translates it to mean "God and my right hand" (in standard French that would be
Dieu et ma main droite
, not
mon droit
). The Kearsley volume appeared during publication of the 1st edition (1796?1808) of the German
Brockhaus Enzyklopadie
, which emphasised the raising of the "right hand" during installations and coronations of
German Kings
.
Diderot's
Encyclopedie
lists the motto as
Dieu est mon droit
, which Susan Emanuel translated as "God is my right".
[13]
Use as royal motto
[
edit
]
Dieu et mon droit
has generally been used as the motto of English monarchs, and later by British monarchs, since being adopted by
Henry V
.
[2]
[4]
[14]
It was first used as a
battle cry
by
King Richard I
in 1198 at the
Battle of Gisors
, when he defeated the forces of
Philip II of France
and after he made it his motto.
[14]
[15]
Medieval Europeans did not believe that victory necessarily went to the side with the better army, but (as they also viewed personal
trial by combat
) to the side that God viewed with favour.
[16]
Hence Richard wrote after his victory "It is not us who have done it but God and our right through us".
[14]
So after his victories on the crusades "Richard was speaking what he believed to be the truth when he told the Holy Roman Emperor: '
I am born of a rank which recognises no superior but God
'
".
[17]
Alternatively, the Royal Arms may depict a monarch's personal motto. For example,
Elizabeth I
and
Queen Anne
's often displayed
Semper Eadem
;
Latin
for "Always the same",
[18]
and
James I
's depicted
Beati Pacifici
, Latin for "Blessed are the peacemakers".
[19]
Current usages
[
edit
]
Dieu et mon droit
has been adopted along with the rest of the Royal Coat of Arms by
The Times
as part of its
masthead
. When it incorporated the Coat of Arms in 1875, half the newspapers in London were also doing so. Since 1982 the paper abandoned the use of the current Royal Coat of Arms and returned to using the Hanoverian coat of arms of 1785.
[20]
Versions of the Coat of Arms, with the motto, is used by various newspapers, including Melbourne's
The Age
in Australia,
Christchurch
's
The Press
in New Zealand, the UK's
Daily Mail
, and Canada's Victoria
Times Colonist
. It is also used in Hardwick Hall in England on the fireplace of The High Great Chamber, also known as the Presence Chamber, though there it reads
Dieu est mon droit
, God is my right. instead creating an additional 'ES' monogram. The extra E and S are a superimposition on the original E. This was added at a later date after the original writing was put up; to deface the Royal Arms would have been very dangerous, hence it was added later.
It is also found on the official belt buckle of the
Jamaica Constabulary Force
;
[
citation needed
]
the front page of a
British passport
; the rank slide of a warrant officer in the British and other Commonwealth armed forces; the arms of the
Supreme Court of Victoria
and
Supreme Court of New South Wales
; and the crests of Hawthorn Rowing Club in Melbourne, Australia,
Nottingham Law School
, and
Sherborne School
.
[21]
The coined phrase was also used by Michael Jackson at his Neverland Ranch's front gates. The crest on the main gates carried the Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom, along with the phrase at the bottom.
[22]
The motto was formerly included in a scroll on the Western Australia Police Force coat of arms, before being replaced with "Protect and Serve" when the organisation changed its name from Western Australia Police Force to Western Australia Police Service.
[
citation needed
]
It is the motto of
Queen Elizabeth's School, Barnet
.
[
citation needed
]
It is the motto of the Royal Grammar School, Guildford, England.
[
citation needed
]
It is the motto of several, but not all, schools within the
King Edward VI School Foundation
, Birmingham, England including:
It is also found on the
Old Customs House in Sydney
, Australia. The Royal Coat of Arms is intricately carved in sandstone, located above the main entry pediment.
Variants
[
edit
]
The
Hearts of Oak
, a revolutionary New York militia commanded by
Alexander Hamilton
, wore badges of red tin hearts on their jackets with the words "God and Our Right".
[23]
The phrase was the inspiration for a joke motto by
The Beatles
,
Duit on Mon Dei
("Do it on Monday")
[
citation needed
]
and
Harry Nilsson
's 1975 album
Duit on Mon Dei
.
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh
, as consort of the British monarch, used a similar motto: "God Is My Help".
Dieu est mon droit
[
edit
]
Henry Hudson
in 1612 used the wording
Dieu est mon droit
(God is my right).
[24]
Other people considered the phrase
Dieu est mon droit
(God is my right) means he was direct sovereign and not vassal of any other king.
[25]
Another example of
Dieu est mon droit
is inscribed under the royal coat of arms on the over mantle of the High Great Chamber in Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire.
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
"Coats of arms"
. The Official Website of the British Monarchy
. Retrieved
25 April
2009
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
Morana, Martin (September 2011).
Bejn kliem u storja: glossarju en?iklopediku dwar tradizzjonijiet ? toponimi ? termini stori?i Maltin
(in Maltese).
Malta
: Best Print. p. 59.
ISBN
978-99957-0-137-6
.
OCLC
908059040
. Archived from
the original
on 5 October 2016.
- ^
a
b
Dieu Et Mon Droit on British Coins
Accessed 23 December 2008
- ^
a
b
c
Juliet Barker (2 September 2010).
Agincourt: The King, the Campaign, the Battle
. Little, Brown Book Group. p. 24.
ISBN
978-0-7481-2219-6
.
- ^
Ted Ellsworth,
Yank: Memoir of a World War II Soldier (1941?1945)
, Da Capo Press, 2009, p. 29.
- ^
The Journal of the British Archaeological Association
, vol. 17, British Archaeological Association, 1861 p. 33.
- ^
Henry Shaw,
Dress and decoration of the Middle Ages
, First Glance Books, 1998, p. 92.
- ^
Dresses and Decorations of the Middle Ages
, vol. 1, William Pickering, 1843, section 2.
- ^
Kearsley, George (1799).
Kearsley's Complete Peerage, of England, Scotland, and Ireland
. p. xxiii
. Retrieved
25 April
2009
.
- ^
Mary Ellen Snodgrass (2003).
Coins and Currency: An Historical Encyclopedia
. p. 227.
- ^
Foreign Service Journal (Pg 24) by American Foreign Service Association (1974)
- ^
Edward Coke (1671).
The Fourth part of the Institutes of Laws of England: Concerning the Jurisdiction of Courts
. Retrieved
25 April
2009
.
The ancient Motto of the King of England is, God and my right (
intelligitur
) shall me defend
- ^
"God is my right"
.
Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert - Collaborative Translation Project
. 20 August 2013
. Retrieved
1 April
2015
.
- ^
a
b
c
Pine, Leslie Gilbert (1983).
A Dictionary of mottoes
. Routledge. p.
53
.
ISBN
978-0-7100-9339-4
.
- ^
Norris, Herbert (1999).
Medieval Costume and Fashion
(illustrated, reprint ed.). Courier Dover Publications. p.
312
.
ISBN
0-486-40486-2
.
- ^
"If a battle was followed by victory, it was understood that the army was to be seen as in God's favour and the victory viewed as a gesture of blessing." (
Lehtonen, Tuomas M. S.; Jensen, Kurt Villads (2005).
Medieval history writing and crusading ideology
. Studia Fennica: Historica. Vol. 9 (illustrated ed.). Finnish Literature Society.
ISBN
951-746-662-5
.
)
- ^
Hallam, Elizabeth (1996).
Medieval Monarchs
. Crescent Books. p. 44.
ISBN
0-517-14082-9
.
- ^
Watkins, John (2002).
Representing Elizabeth in Stuart England: literature, history, sovereignty
(illustrated ed.). Cambridge University Press. p.
206
.
ISBN
0-521-81573-8
.
- ^
Biden, William Downing (1852).
The history and antiquities of the ancient and royal town of Kingston upon Thames
. William Lindsey. p.
6
.
- ^
Staff (25 January 2007).
"FAQ: infrequently asked questions: The Times and Sunday Times are newspapers with long and interesting histories"
.
The Times
.
- ^
Max Davidson (30 June 2009).
"State vs independent schools: Sherborne, Dorset"
.
The Telegraph
.
- ^
Brian Mills (4 May 2012).
"A Night Inside Michael Jackson's Abandoned Neverland Ranch"
.
Fierth Magazine
. Archived from
the original
on 21 December 2019
. Retrieved
28 May
2014
.
- ^
Chernow, Ron.
Alexander Hamilton
. Penguin Press, (2004) (
ISBN
1-59420-009-2
).
- ^
"[Illustrations de Descriptio ac delineatio geographica detectionis freti supra terras Americanas in China atque, Japonem ducturi] / [Non identifie] ; Henry Hudson, aut. du texte"
. 26 December 2017 – via gallica.bnf.fr.
- ^
La Porte, Joseph de (1714?1779) Auteur du texte.
L'esprit de l'Encyclopedie, ou Choix des articles les plus curieux, les plus agreables, les plus piquants, les plus philosophiques de ce grand dictionnaire...
Le Breton – via gallica.bnf.fr.
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