Tis post was made possible by my Patreon #4 in the Heraldry / Bio series. This is the first in the series focusing on a halfblood, which might need a bit of explanation:

when people die in Elyden, one of two things happen:

1) either their soul remains attached to the decaying body, slowly (over many decades or centuries) growing into a glass-like sphere known as a soul-stone, ranging in colour from opalescent white to oily black. This phenomenon had stopped for millennia though is now starting to happen again, in increasing numbers, giving philosophers and mythographers a lot to think about.

or

2) much more commonly: the soul leaves the body and gestates in the otherworld with only vague recollections of its past life. After anything between weeks and millennia existing this way, the spirit is reborn on the material plane as an otherworlder, a strange alien being that's aloof and timeless. The mortal races have created a mythology around these strange beings, with many scholars claiming they are guides sent to the material realm to either guide or hinder mortals (a sort of psychopomp to the living), though this is unproven.

Otherworlders are known to form relations with mortals, with their offspring known as halfbloods. Halfbloods can show physical and mental traits of the otherworlder parent for as many as 10-generations, and form what are known as houses, with the most powerful halfblood houses rivalling the most established patrician families across Elyden.

As per ancient heraldic tradition, halfbloods are not allowed to possess heraldry. Instead they developed the use of the household sigil, which emerged from their use of signet rings to identify themselves in correspondence. While not technically heraldry, it has, over the centuries, developed its own tradition and symbolism almost as rich as that of heraldry itself.



Originating from the otherworldly alphabet, these sigils have since become corrupted into a half-forgotten symbolic representation of the house strength (and sometimes weaknesses), though such symbolism is often at odds with that of common heraldic languages.





A note regarding heraldry of the halfblood houses: