University Shield

The University Shield, or coat of arms, is a symbol associated with Columbia. Some schools and divisions of the University use their own variation on the shield. However, most use the crown, and usage of the shield is becoming rarer. It has disappeared from the Law School's website, the podium used at University public events, the Soccer team uniforms, etc. Its use is technically regulated by the Secretary of the University.

The shield as originally adopted by the trustees consists of a blue shield, a white chevron, and three gold crowns. Heraldically its described as "Azure (blue), Chevron Argent (silver), Three Crowns or (gold)." The blue and white colors were drawn from the traditional school colors (which in turn were drawn respectively from the Philolexian Society and the Peithologian Society.) The shield-with-chevron design was a nod to the coat of arms of Samuel Johnson, and the crowns an allusion to the original Crown of King's College.

The similarity to the Oxford shield is possibly intentional, as King's College was once envisioned to be the first university in North America, in the mold of Oxford and Cambridge, and the second President of King's College, Myles Cooper, was an Oxford-educated priest.

One of the shield's purposes was to serve as a loosely regulated but official ornamental symbol of the school, since the University Seal, Columbia's oldest symbol, was and still is reserved for purposes of symbolic legal authentication. An informative leaflet states that "The design of the shield is the copyrighted property of the University, and while general permission to reproduce it is freely given, any debasement or undignified use of it may result in such permission being rescinded. It may be used as a decoration without special permission by graduates and members of the University, and may be reproduced in proper form on stationary, and on jewelry and pottery."^[1]

Today the shield is paringly used even in its officially sanctioned purpose as the official unofficial symbol of the school, having been superseded by the King's Crown.