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Heraldic concepts

Pietra Santa Method
Saltires and X crosses
Blazonry

See also:

Heraldic dictionary by James Dignan, part of FOTW temporarly on Z.Heimer's pages
a site explaining heraldry topics

Pietra Santa's method

It's a method created in 1638 to render colors in black and white images of coats of arms. Each color (called tincture) is represented by a different hatch. In heraldry tinctures have old french names; tinctures are divided into "colours" (or "smalts") and "metals"; it is better to avoid using metals on metals and smalts on enamels. The natural colors (e.g. the pink of skin) is left empty.

METALS
argent (silver or white)        empty (mnemonic: the empty paper) or (gold or yellow)       :::   points (mnemonic: bright surface)
COLOURS
gules (red)               |||   vertical lines (mnemonic: the leftmost line of R) azure (blue)              ===   horizontal lines (mnemonic: the horz line of A) sable (black)             ###   vert and horz lines (mnemonic: almost full) vert (green)              \\\\  backslashes (mnemonic: the leftmost line of V) purpure (purple)          ////  slashes (mnemonic: ?)

giuseppe bottasini

In the book by Milos Ciric: Heraldika 1, Belgrade 1988 I found the paterns for:

tenne (orange)	vertical line-dot-line	|.|
					.|.
					|.|
maroon (brown) 	crossing bendwise and palewise =\=\=\

In my notes I also found (I don't know the source) this combinations:

sanguine (blood red) 	bendwise sinister 	/// (like above for purpure) "iron" or "gray" 	crossing bend sinister and palewise =/=/=/

I don't know if that has been standardized somwhere else. These are, of course, newer colors, and maybe the patterns are not the same in all sources. I have no other reference for "gray", and I suspect it is, in fact, a metal, iron or steel.
zeljko heimer 18-OCT-1995

Saltires and X crosses

A "X" cross on a flag is, strictly speaking, a saltire and not a cross. Although I think it's referred to as a cross, especially in relation to St. Patrick, because he was purportedly cruicified on a cross this shape.
robert czernkowski

In effect "St.Andrew cross" is an X. St.Andrew was crucified on a X cross. He is represented with this kind of cross in a lot of shields and pictures (also in the church of my town, dedicated to him).
giuseppe bottasini

I believe the St Patrick thing was invented, and never actually used in Irish heraldry to mean Ireland. I've also heard the red saltire on white called the Geraldine cross, presumably after a group of people involved in Irish politics at the time. I guess it fitted in much better with the pre-Union flag of Great Britain (to make the United Kingdom) than the Irish harp would have.
Christopher Vance

St. Patrick was not crucified in any way, shape or form, he lived to a ripe old age. (When Giraldus Cambrensis sneered at the Irish for not having any martyrs, the Archbishop of Cashel retorted "Our people never raised their hands against God's saints... but now that men have come here who know how to make them, we shall have martyrs in plenty!")
The so-called "St Patrick's cross" is really taken from the arms of the FitzGerald Earls of Kildare, and plopped in the Union flag to represent Ireland for no good reason anyone can figure out.
Will Linden

Blazonry

Here's an example of "Blazonry":

Argent, on a Fess dancettee Vert, between in cief a Castle triple-towered Sable, upon a rock proper issuant from the fess, masoned Argent, windows, vanes and portcullis Gules, and in base a three-masted Lymphad of the third sails furled Azure, flagged of Scotland (viz. Azure a saltire Argent), a Ram's head affrontee proper, horned Or, between two Garbs of the last.

To describe flags I don't know of any formal language other than the "blazonry" above, with special terms not found in standard heraldic blazonry like fly, mast and canton (the last is occasionally seen in standard heraldry). There are several varieties of blazonry, although they are all fairly similar. The above is an example of English blazonry, which is accepted in pretty near all the English speaking world. There is also a Continental (European) standard blazonry, I believe.
Grammar is fairly strict, and can be unearthed in many books on heraldry. Basically, you go from the background colour of the flag (the "field"), to the major "divisions" (eg, the Italian flag is "tierced per pale", i.e., divided vertically in three), to the "added bits", which are called "ordinaries" if they are sections of a design (like, say, the cross on the Danish flag) or "charges" if they are emblems like a lion or fleur de lys placed on part of the flag. To go through the one above:

Argent[A white background] on a Fess[horizontal division in the middle of the flag] dancettee[zigzag] Vert[green], between in chief[above it] a Castle triple-towered Sable[black], upon a rock proper[rock-coloured] issuant from the fess[coming out of the horiz. div.], masoned Argent[white mortar on the castle], windows, vanes and portcullis Gules[red windows, doors and flagpoles], and in base[below the fess] a three-masted Lymphad[heraldic round bottomed ship] of the third[third colour mentioned - black] sails furled Azure[blue], flagged of Scotland (viz. Azure a saltire Argent[white X on blue]), a Ram's head affrontee [facing forward towards the viewer] proper[ram-coloured], horned Or[with gold horns], between two Garbs[sheafs of grain] of the last[colour, i.e., gold].

Note particularly that it starts with the field, goes to the ordinary (the fess), then describes the charges on the field, then finally describes the charges on the fess (even though the second word of the description, "on" indicates they will eventually be described).
Look for a simple text on heraldry by someone like A C Fox-Davies or J P Brooke-Little if you want to go into blazonry further.
james dignan