County Crests

wicklowgael

Does anyone know who owns the right to county crests. I know the GAA starting designing their own crests a few years back so they could copyright them but is it ok to use the county council crest on merchandise

nuac

the Mayo Crest was designed by the late Michael Egan Solicitor who had studied heraldry,

It is registered with the appropriate office in Dublin who afaik was called the Chief Herald.

I believe copyright vests in Mayo County Council

Victor

There may be problems of passing off, with the council and the GAA objecting.

Which raise the matter of the tricolour - can one make money off selling tricolours?

Peregrinus

Strictly speaking, the coats of arms are those of the county council, not of the county. (Individuals and corporations can bear arms; land cannot.) The county council is the only body with a legal right to display and use its arms; it can intervene to prevent others from doing so.

It might choose not to, though. In general county councils like to see the image and reputation of the county being promoted, and if people are, e.g., badging souvenirs with the arms of the county council, the council is probably not going to object. There'll only be an issue if someone is using the arms to create the impression that they are the county council, or have some authority from the county council.

dublin daz

National Library catalogue holds the grant of arms - you can search for the relevant crest / arms.

Don't know if this helps.

http://catalogue.nli.ie/Search/Results?lookfor=%22+Heraldry+Ireland%22&type=Subject&filter[]=format%3A%22Manuscript%22&filter[]=digitised%3A%22Digitised%22&sort=year+asc

icdg

There is sometimes a bit of confusion between the GAA county logo and the county council's coat of arms.

Most GAA counties (with the exception, I think, of Donegal) have changed their crests recently and now use stylized logos which are quite obviously copyright of the GAA. Many are shaped like the shield of a coat of arms but they are not arms, they are logos. Others like Kildare are modern logos.

Prior to this GAA counties tended to use crests which sometimes were identical to the shield of the coats of arms of the county council, sometimes were very similar to the county shield, and some which were completely different. For example Dublin's old crest was similar to the shield of the Corporation of Dublin's coat of arms, but with three burning castles of slightly different design to that on the arms. Kilkenny's I think was identical to the shield of the county council coat of arms. Kildare's was completely different, though.