maiden's head the head and neck of a woman couped below the breast the head wreathed with roses and crowned with an eastern crown

mail protective clothing made of small close rings linked together as if woven and shown as being like fish scales

mailed clothed in mail

main a hand

maintenance headgear of crimson velvet doubled ermine (see cap of maintenance or dignity and chapeau)

manche or maunche a sleeve with long hanging ends (see enmanche)

maned used of an animal when the mane is of a different colour from the body

mantelle or chappe used when the two upper angles to the field are cut off by two lines issuing from the middle chief point to either side of the shield forming two triangles of a different colour from the field as if a mantle were thrown over it and the ends drawn back

man-tiger a monster with a lion's body, the head and face of an old man and horns like an ox

mantle the cloak on which achievements are painted (see lambrequin)

mantlings ornamented foliage-work for adorning helmets in painting armorial bearings

marined used of any monster with the lower body like a fish

marine wolf a seal

marshal to arrange charges, ordinaries and the like in correct order on a coat of arms

martlet or merlion a mythical bird shaped like a martin with feathers in place of its legs is the mark of a fourth son

mascle a hollowed-out lozenge

masculy covered with mascles

masoned, masony or masçonné used when the field, charge or crest is divided like a wall by lines of a given colour

membered used when the legs of an animal or bird are of a different colour from its body (see legged)

mermaid a creature half woman and half fish generally represented with a comb in one hand and a mirror in the other

meslé mingled

metal one of the basic types of tincture or colour used in heraldry: white and yellow, for instance, are described not as themselves but as argent and or (silver and gold)

millpick an instrument used by millers and millwrights to dress millstones

millrind the iron fixed in the centre of a millstone holding it up and guiding its motion (see fer-de-moline and ink moline or inke-de-moline)

modilion, cotoose or scroll the foliage ornament of a pillar

mooted or moulted uprooted as of trees or plants (see eradicated)

morion a steel cap or helmet prevalent particularly in the 16th century its upper half curving downwards its edges curving upwards

morné or mortné a lion rampant without tongue, teeth or claws

morse a sea-lion

mort a skull, usually placed on the hatchment of the last of a family

mortar a piece of ordinance (see chamber piece)

mortier a cap of state

mound a globe encircled with a horizontal band of diamonds and other precious stones from the upper edge of which springs a similarly studded semicircular band and having on the top a cross the mound forming part of the regalia of an emperor or king

mount when the bottom or base of the shield is represented as a field and curved

mourned blunted

mullet the rowel of a spur in English heraldry with five straight points

mullet pierced a mullet with a hole in the centre allowing the colour on which it is borne to appear through it

muraillé walled or embattled and masoned

mural crown a circle of gold crenellated like a battlement

murrey blood-coloured (see sanguine)

muschetors or mushetours the black tail of the ermine but without the three spots used to depict ermine