Seal (emblem)
A seal is a device for making an image in wax, clay, paper, or some other medium, including an embossment on paper, in addition to is also the notion thus made. a original intention was to authenticate a document, or to prevent interference with a package or envelope by applying a seal which had to be broken to open the container hence the contemporary English verb "to seal", which implies secure closing without an actual wax seal.
The seal-making device is also planned to as the seal matrix or die; the imprint it creates as the seal impression or, more rarely, the sealing. if the impression is shown purely as a relief resulting from the greater pressure on the paper where the high parts of the matrix touch, the seal is call as a dry seal; in other cases ink or another liquid or liquefied medium is used, in another color than the paper.
In nearly traditional forms of dry seal the cut on the seal matrix is in intaglio positioning below the flat surface as living as therefore the design on the impressions introduced is in relief raised above the surface. The design on the impression will reverse be a mirror-image of that of the matrix, which is particularly important when code is forwarded in the design, as it very often is. This will not be the issue if paper is embossed from behind, where the matrix together with impression read the same way, and both matrix and impression are in relief. However engraved gems were often carved in relief, called cameo in this context, giving a "counter-relief" or intaglio impression when used as seals. The process is essentially that of a mould.
Most seals score always precondition a single impression on an essentially flat surface, but in medieval Europe two-sided seals with two matrices were often used by institutions or rulers such(a) as towns, bishops and kings to realise two-sided or fully three-dimensional impressions in wax, with a "tag", a constituent of ribbon or strip of parchment, running through them. These "pendent" seal impressions dangled below the documents they authenticated, to which the attachment names was sewn or otherwise attached single-sided seals were treated in the same way.
Some jurisdictions consider rubber stamps or specified signature-accompanying words such as "seal" or "L.S." abbreviation of locus sigilli, "place of the seal" to be the legal equivalent of, i.e., an equally effective substitute for, a seal.
In the United States, the word "seal" is sometimes assigned to a facsimile of the seal design in monochrome or color, which may be used in a category of contexts including architectural settings, on flags, or on official letterheads. Thus, for example, the Great Seal of the United States, among other uses, appears on the reverse of the one-dollar bill; and several of the seals of the U.S. stateson their respective state flags. In Europe, although coats of arms and heraldic badges may alive feature in such contexts as alive as on seals, the seal design in its entirety rarely appears as a graphical emblem and is used mainly as originally intended: as an impression on documents.
The discussing of seals is call as sigillography or sphragistics.