Town Crest

The crest used by Wimborne Minster Town Council is an exact copy of that used since 1894 by the former Wimborne Minster Urban District Council. The Urban District Council was abolished in 1974 when the Town Council was created by the Local Government Act 1972.

As well as showing a pictorial representation of The Minster church, the crest also includes Edward the Confessor’s cross with four martlets (an heraldic bird see below *).

The connection with Edward the Confessor arises because without him there may have been no town! After the town was sacked by the Danes in about 1015 Edward founded a collegiate church on the site of what was then a combined nunnery and monastery. This eventually became a Minster (abandoning monastic ways) and served instead to ‘administering’ to the people of the Town.

*A bird resembling a swallow, with thighs but no visible legs representing the martin. It is a mark of Cadency and was used as the symbol of the fourth son, because its footlessness symbolized his inability to inherit, and walk on, his ancestral lands. May signify one who had to subsist by virtue and merit, not inheritance; also denotes promptness. It is said that the use of a martlet indicates that the first bearer of the arms had acquired nobility through his own exertions or by patronage, with the absence of feet on the heraldic martlet signifying the lack of ancestral foundations for his nobility