Goutte


A goutte is a droplet-shaped charge used in heraldry. Its name derives from the Old French for "droplet".
A goutte may be blazoned by its tincture, as in a goutte argent. Alternatively, there are special names given to gouttes of various tinctures, as in a goutte d'eau.
In medieval and Renaissance depictions of coats of arms, the goutte was drawn with wavy sides. More modern depictions have smoothed the sides to make the droplets fatter and more symmetrical.
In their earliest uses, gouttes were semé: strewn upon the field of a coat of arms. Rather than semé de gouttes, this is termed goutty, gutté, or gutty. It was only much later that the goutte came to be used individually in heraldry as a charge in its own right.