Request for Badge or Achievement for the Royal Zouavs

[Sir Txec dal Nordselvă, UrB]

Azul,

I'm not the Minister of Defense, but as the Captain of the Zouavs, I respectfully request that the Royal Talossan College of Arms create a badge or other achievement for the Royal Zouavs.

Respectfully submitted,
Txec dal Nordselva
Captain of the Zouavs

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Acting on behalf of the Dean, this petition is accepted by the Royal College of Arms.  I assign it to myself, and pray that you will assist in its development.

-NRH

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

The Zuavs have a specific historical legacy they're referencing, plus some goofy stuff from their past history in our country, plus the current incarnation's dramatic shift in orientation.  It seems to me like it would be ideal to pay tribute to all three things.  Do you concur, and/or did you have anything you think might be well-suited?

-NRH

[Sir Txec dal Nordselvă, UrB]

Acting on behalf of the Dean, this petition is accepted by the Royal College of Arms.  I assign it to myself, and pray that you will assist in its development.

-NRH

I'd love to see something with a bedpost on it, as that is our official weapon.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

The historical reference for the Zuavs are the French unit which was once drawn from the ranks of the Berbers in Africa, since that people was known for being impressively fierce in battle and their imperialist French rulers wanted to borrow some of that fierceness for their own ends.  The French Zouaves were soon intermixed with European recruits, and the end result was one of the most effective French units.  They got a big reputation, and so several other countries founded imitation zouave units (including the Papal State, Poland, and both sides of the American Civil War).  The "traditional" outfit of these units was usually loosely based on Berber clothing, with red fez, blue coat, and big red pants.  Eventually, almost all of these units were discontinued (with some scattered exceptions), and the most prominent zouaves out there were some recreational marchers, like these from Jackson, MI who appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcZeGu1ynbc

Bedposts are obviously the main goofiness of most of Zuav traditional jokery, so your idea about including them makes a lot of sense.  So that's one element sorted.  Hm...

-NRH

[Carlüs Éovart Vilaçafat]

My two bents:
It sounds like gules and azure should be the main tinctures, and you could include a fez and bedpost couped, or couped-fitchy if you want it to look more broken off...

Again, just some ideas from a non-fellow.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

I fooled around with a fez and a bedpost, but couldn't make them look decent.  It ended up looking like a badly-emblazoned baseball team.  So I went a different direction.  I put a Gules in chief, but humetty to make it invoke the idea of a fez (without being pictorial) and putting the bedpost on there.  And I put an Azure semy of doves everywhere else, to complete the color reference to the historical zouaves while also invoking the peaceful cultural army of the modern Zuavs.  It respects the rule of tincture, and it's visually striking and unique.

Argent, semy of dove Azure beaked or and legged or, a chief humetty Gules, a bedpost Or.



I did a (in my opinion) more boring one without the semy.  But hey, who doesn't love a good semy?

Argent, a chief humetty Gules, a bedpost Or, a dove Azure.



-NRH

[Mic’haglh Autófil, SMC EiP]

Many military units utilize something with crossed cannons, sometimes as a charge, sometimes as supporters (as below). What if we were to do something along those lines, but with bedposts?



- TLF

[Sir Txec dal Nordselvă, UrB]

Something like this would be awesome.

-REH

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

We have never granted supporters to an organization before, but crossed bedposts can certainly be a charge.  I'll work up some new designs tonight.

-NRH

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Haven't forgotten about this -- will do this tonight (for real though this time).

-NRH

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Okay, so here's Argent, a chief humetty Gules, two bedposts in saltire Azure.

-NRH

[Mic’haglh Autófil, SMC EiP]

Okay, so here's Argent, a chief humetty Gules, two bedposts in saltire Azure.

-NRH

I feel like we might be able to make it a little more obvious that it's a bedpost as opposed to a baseball bat :P

Overall though, I quite like it. Simple, but in a good way.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Yes, I'll work up a better SVG of a bedpost in Inkscape if the applicant likes this approach, don't worry.  This is a baseball bat, but it's just a placeholder.

-NRH

[Carlüs Éovart Vilaçafat]

I've been thinking about this request, and I don't want it to get buried. I've mocked up a couple of designs, hopefully they give you some ideas.

I made the "bedposts" myself. They are simple but I think get the idea across until they are small and then they kind of look like drumsticks  ;D