Mon

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Mon

(n.) The badge of a family, esp. of a family of the ancient feudal nobility. The most frequent form of the mon is circular, and it commonly consists of conventionalized forms from nature, flowers, birds, insects, the lightnings, the waves of the sea, or of geometrical symbolic figures; color is only a secondary character. It appears on lacquer and pottery, and embroidered on, or woven in, fabrics. The imperial chrysanthemum, the mon of the reigning family, is used as a national emblem. Formerly the mon of the shoguns of the Tokugawa family was so used.