Queen Mother's funerary hatchment, showing the canting bows and lions of Bowes-Lyon
Canting arms is a technique used in European heraldry whereby the name of the individual or community represented in a coat of arms is "translated" into a visual pun. The term probably originally came from the same root as the term 'cant' meaning slang or argot. Scottish Shield only on funerary hatchment. ... Scottish Shield only on funerary hatchment. ... Heraldry is the science and art of describing coats-of-arms, also referred to as achievements or armorial bearings. ...
An example of canting arms are those of the late Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, who was born Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon. Her arms, shown to the right contain in sinister (i.e., on the wearer's left/viewer's right) the bows and blue lions which make up the family arms of the Bowes-Lyon family. HM Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother (née Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon) Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth (Elizabeth Angela Marguerite) (4 August 1900 - 30 March 2002) was the Queen consort of George VI of the United Kingdom from 1936 to 1952. ...
Those are coats of arms whose blazon, or verbal description in the language of heraldry, recalls the name (or, less often, some attribute or function) of the holder of the arms.
Cantingarms (armes parlantes in French) are extremely common.
The medieval mind was quite fond of puns, but at a more basic level, arms were a form of visual identification in a world of limited literacy, and it was perfectly natural for someone to use as his emblem a device which recalled his name.
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