tarcz

Tarcz is the genitive plural form of tarcza, a Polish noun meaning shield, disk, or heraldic shield. The base noun tarcza has several senses: a protective shield used in combat, a circular disk, or a shield in heraldry—the shield that bears a coat of arms. Tarcz itself is not used as a stand-alone lexical item in normal speech; it appears in phrases where a possessive or quantitative relationship is expressed, for example kolory tarcz (colors of shields). The nominative plural is tarcze, used when referring to shields as the subject of a sentence.

In heraldry, tarcza denotes the shield on which a coat of arms is depicted. Tarcze in heraldic descriptions can be divided or charged with symbols and tinctures according to heraldic rules.

The form tarcz is most common in written Polish and is encountered in legal, historical, or literary contexts when the noun appears in the genitive plural, such as in lists or phrases describing multiple shields. For everyday use, tarcze is used for the plural, and tarcza for the singular.

See also: tarcza (shield), heraldry, coat of arms.