Royal Coat of Arms

The coat of arms that Questors encounter and must identify in the sign of the King's Arms Tavern is the official ceremonial symbol of the British Hanoverian kings (George I, II, and III) from 1714 until the Union between Great Britain and Ireland in 1801. Many of the symbols incorporated within it, however, are much older.

In the coat of arms, the central shield displays the various emblems of the different kingdoms and principalities over which the Hanoverians ostensibly ruled: the upper left hand corner (or quarter) is split between the three royal lions of England and the rampant (standing on one leg) royal lion of Scotland; the upper right hand quarter displays the royal arms of France (three fleurs de lis), over which British monarchs maintained at least a nominal claim; the lower left hand quarter displays the royal arms of Ireland; the lower right hand quarter displays the arms of Hanover, which includes those of Brunswick, Lüneburg, and Westphalia, along with a crown that represents the Holy Roman Empire (in which the Hanoverian kings were Electors).

The shield is flanked by a lion that represents England and a unicorn that represents Scotland, surrounded by the symbol of the Order of the Garter (a garter bearing the chivalric motto "Honi soit qui mal y pense" — "Evil to him who evil thinks"), and supported by a banner that contains the motto of the monarch ("Dieu et mon droit" — "God and my right," a medieval English battle cry to celebrate victory over the French).