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Falkirk Council Civic Crest
The origins of the crest's design
The following passage is taken from the Lyon Register lxxix, 42: 6 June 1996:
Quarterly, 1st Sable, a bend bretessed accompanied by six billets or three in chief and three in base (for Falkirk); 2nd, Gules, a stag’s head erased with a cross-crosslet fitchee between the attires or (for Grangemouth); 3rd per pale Gules and Sable, in a sea in base undy Argent and Azure, a three-masted ship of the 17th centurt or in full sail proper, flagged Gold (for Bo’ness); 4th, per fess engrailed Azure and Vert, in a chief a demi-angel, attired Argent, wings displaued or and celestially crowned of the Last, holding in either hand a palm branch of the Secind, and in base a bend wavy of the Third charged with a bendlet wavy of the First (for Denny)
Above the Shield is placed a Coronet appropriate to a statutory Area Council, videlicet: issuant from a ciclet eight paling piles (three and two halves visable) Or and eight garbs (four visable) of the Last, banded Sable, and in an Escrol below the same this Motto "Ane for A"
Falkirk Council administers the local government area that was formerly the responsibility of the Falkirk District Council (as a secondary authority within Central Region). The headquarters are in Falkirk.
The Council has been re-granted the arms approved in 1976 for Falkirk District Council. They show features from the arms of the four burghs in the area.
What do the crest's illustrations show?
In the first quarter - for Falkirk - appears the black field and gold billets of Callendar, the historic family associated with the town from early times; the bend has been made embattled to denote the Roman wall of Antonine, which passes close to the town.
The second quarter - for Grangemouth - shows a stag’s head with a cross-crosslet between its antlers, recalling the town’s connections with Abbots Kerse and with Holyrood Abbey, which once held the Lordship of Kerse.
The third quarter is for Bo’ness, properly Borrowstounness; the red half of the field recalls the long connection of the Dukes of Hamilton with the town and the black half the coal-mining industry; the ship, in full sail to denote prosperity, refers to the town’s former shipping interests, and recalls that, in the eighteenth century, Bo’ness was the third seaport in Scotland.
The fourth quarter - for Denny and Dunipace - shows the angel of peace placed above the bridge over the Carron river, which flows between Denny and Dunipace. The angel of peace is an appropriate symbol for a town whose neighbourhood is said to have been the setting for three important treaties in Scottish history and Dunipace takes its name from two ancient mounds nearby: the Hills of Dunipace, which George Buchanan calls "Duni Pacis" or "hills of peace".
The Scots motto recalls "Touch ane touch a", one of the mottoes of the former burgh of Falkirk.