couché meaning: definition, etymology and quotations

couché

adj

Etymology Borrowed from French couché, past participle of coucher (“to lay, to lay down”). Doublet of couchant and collocate.

Government, Heraldry, Hobbies, Lifestyle, Monarchy, Nobility, Politics Inclined at an angle.

Azure, semé of tratti or billets couché or, two lions passant in pale of the same.1866, The Herald and Genealogist, page 77:
3rd, to sinister—on a shield couché a lion rampant within a bordure charged with eight roses, behind the shield a pastoral staff in pale, for Bishop Columba de Dunbar, being his arms and "baculum pastorale." […] Sir David Dunbar of Cockburn, said to be a son or grandson of George, tenth Earl. Seal, 12th December 1452,—on a shield couché, a lion rampant within a bordure charged with eight roses or stars; […]1881, Robert Riddle Stodart, Scottish Arms: Being a Collection of Armorial Bearings, A.D. 1370-1678, Reproduced in Fascimile from Contemporary Manuscripts, page 11:

3 more examples

Argent, semé of billets couches azure, a lion rampant gules, crowned or, Lordship of GEROLDSECK.1896, John Woodward, A Treatise on Heraldry, British and Foreign: With English and French Glossaries, page 114:
Andrew, Lord Avandale, bore on his seal a shield couché quartered : 1st , a lion rampant within a royal tressure […]1909, James Balfour Paul, The Scots Peerage: Founded on Wood's Edition of Sir Robert Douglas's Peerage of Scotland; Containing an Historical and Genealogical Account of the Nobility of that Kingdom, page 519:
A heater - shield of Savoy (Gules, a cross argent) couché, with helm, mantling, and crest of a lion's head between two wings;1916, Francis Pierrepont Barnard, The Casting-counter and the Counting-board: A Chapter in the History of Numismatics and Early Arithmetic, page 123:

Government, Heraldry, Hobbies, Lifestyle, Monarchy, Nobility, Politics Of a chevron Couched: issuing from the side of the shield rather than the bottom or top.

A chevron couché is one which emerges from one side of the escutcheon and has its apex on the opposite side, or at the fess point.
Gules, a chevron couché (or issuant from the dexter flank) argent, is the coat of MARSCHALCK. (Plate VII., fig. 5.) Gules , a chevron reversed argent, is the coat of the Bavarian Barons RUMLINGEN DE BERG; and of[…]1896, John Woodward, A Treatise on Heraldry, British and Foreign: With English and French Glossaries, page 148: