Great Seal of the United States

The Great Seal of the United States is used to authenticate certain documents issued by the United States government. The phrase is used both for the physical seal itself (which is in the keeping of the U.S. Secretary of State), and more generally for the design represented upon it. The Great Seal was first publicly used in 1782.

Though the United States has never adopted any "national coat of arms", the image from the obverse of the great seal is often used informally as national arms, and is used on state documents such as passports in this capacity. The description below refers to colored representations of the seal as often seen; the physical Great Seal itself, as affixed to paper, is of course monochrome.

Since 1935, both sides of the Great Seal appear on the reverse of the One-Dollar Bill of the United States.

Design

Obverse

The main figure on the obverse (front) of the seal is a Bald Eagle with its wings outstretched ("displayed", in heraldic terms). From the eagle's perspective, it holds a bundle of 13 (referring to the Thirteen Colonies) arrows in its left talon and an olive branch (with thirteen leaves and thirteen olives) in its right talon, symbolic respectively of war and peace (see Olive Branch Petition) and a preference for peace. The eagle also has its head turned towards the olive branch, symbolizing again a preference for peace. The eagle clutches the motto "E Pluribus Unum" (Out of many, one) in its beak; over its head there appears a "glory" with thirteen stars on a blue field.

The shield the eagle bears on its breast, though sometimes drawn incorrectly, has two main differences from the American flag; it has no stars on the blue chief (though other arms based on it do; the chief of the arms of the United States Senate shows thirteen, and that sometimes used by the September 11 Commission has fifty mullets on the chief), and unlike the flag the outermost stripes are white, not red, so as not to violate the heraldic rule of "color on color". It is usually blazoned Paly of thirteen argent and gules, a chief azure. This is a technically incorrect blazon under traditional Western heraldic rules, as a shield cannot be paly (vertically striped) of an uneven number; a more proper blazon would be argent, six pallets gules... (six red stripes on a white field). This fact was recognized at the time of its adoption,^* but the incorrect blazon was chosen and is used to preserve the reference to the thirteen original colonies.

Abstract of all elements counting thirteen:

13 stars
13 stripes
13 arrows in the eagle’s talon
13 letters in the motto
13 laurel leaves
13 berries on the branch
13 brick levels of the pyramid

Reverse

An unfinished pyramid with thirteen layers of bricks appears on the reverse of the seal, inscribed on its base with the date 1776 in Roman numerals. Where the top of the pyramid should be, the so-called Eye of Providence watches over it. The shadow cast by the pyramid from the rising sun represents the undiscovered lands to the west. The sun, which is rising, represents that a new nation has begun. Two mottos appear: Annuit Cœptis signifies that somebody (presumably Divine Providence) has "nodded at (our) beginnings". Novus Ordo Seclorum, a quotation from Virgil, means "a new order of the ages", (commonly, and imprecisely, rendered New World Order). The reverse has never been cut (as a seal), but appears, for example, on the back of the one-dollar bill.

Significance

The symbolism of the obverse is obvious—the shield is reminiscent of the national flag, and the Bald Eagle is a well-known national symbol.

That of the reverse is more murky. Many consider the eye atop the pyramid to have its origins in Masonic iconography^*. However, the icon is not a Masonic symbol, nor designed by a Mason. Among the Great Seal committee, only Benjamin Franklin was a Mason, but his ideas were not adopted by the committee.

The all-seeing eye was a well-known classical symbol of the Renaissance. The all-seeing eye of God is mentioned several times in the Christian Bible. The eye in a triangle design originally was suggested by Pierre Eugene du Simitiere, and later heraldist William Barton improved upon the design. In Du Simitière's original sketch, two figures stand next to a shield with the all-seeing pyramid above them. The August 20, 1776 report of the first Great Seal Committee describes the seal as "Crest The Eye of Providence in a radiant Triangle whose Glory extends over the Shield and beyond the Figures."

Another controversy centers on the pattern of the glory of stars on the obverse. Some historians believe that Haym Solomon, the financial genius and banker of the American Revolution, played a role in the seal's design. He was Jewish, and the stars appear to be arranged, roughly, in a Star of David pattern; so the suggestion has been made that they might be a mark of "recognition" for Haym Solomon's efforts. However, this theory ignores the difficulty in arranging 13 stars in a symmetrical and aesthetically pleasing design, and in the then much more common use of 6 pointed stars. It was only towards the end of the nineteenth century that the individual stars were drawn with only five points.

History

On July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress named a committee to design a great seal for the country. Almost six years and three committees later they still had not agreed on a design. Finally the problem was turned over to Charles Thomson, the secretary of the congress, who merged elements from all three previous attempts. Congress finally approved his integrated design on June 20, 1782, still in use today, and had it engraved into brass cylinders ("matrices") about 2.25 inches in diameter.

On September 16, 1782 Thomson used these matrices for the first time, to verify signatures on a document that authorized George Washington to negotiate an exchange of prisoners. Thomson took care of the seal until the Constitution installed a new American Government in 1789, when he passed it over to the Secretary of State, Thomas Jefferson. He and all following secretaries have been responsible for applying the seal to diplomatic documents.

The first matrices of the seal were replaced in 1841 when they became too worn to be effective.

There have been a total of seven reengravings of the seal since the original, which is now on display in the National Archives in Washington, D.C., USA.

Current Seal

The obverse side of the Great Seal is used to emboss the design on international treaties and other official US Government documents. It is stored in the Exhibit Hall of the US Department of State inside a locked glass enclosure. An officer from the State Department does the actual sealing of documents after the US Secretary of State has countersigned the President's signature. It is used 2,000 to 3,000 times a year.

External links

National coats of arms | National emblems of the United States | Seals

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