Quote Originally Posted by Lemur
I haven't had to lift a finger. Turns out our family's last name is pretty rare, and some absolute maniac has built up a web-based family tree that goes back to the 1400s. Turns out we even have a coat of arms, and it's incredibly ugly. Why couldn't my ancestors petition for something cooler?
Tsk. It's very cool. For a grant made in 1547, the arms are quite simple - by this time, most armorial creations were quite complex - the rule tends to be that simpler achievements are more ancient.

I couldn't see clearly from the photograph, but looking up the Somerset Visitation of 1623 (go to Pedigree, and then page 5) shows them to be:

Argent, on a fess gules three eagles' heads, erased, of the field.

Translated, this means: The shield background is silver, and has a red stripe horizontally across the middle. This stripe is decorated with three torn off (erased) eagles' heads, which are in the same colour (silver) as the background.

The old tomb decoration doesn't do it justice.

It would be interesting to discover why the eagles were chosen, but this is a noble coat of arms for a mere knight (mere as in his standing at the time of grant, as one might suppose a less prestigious achievement).

You share the argent field with me.