Quarterly. One and four Or, a bull's head erased Sables, langued Gules, horned Argent, crowned Or. Two Argent a griffin segreant left, armed Or. Three Argent an eagle Gules armed and beaked Or, langued Gules. The wings charged with a trefoil Or.
Use
Great arms for use by parliament and superior state authorities, lesser arms for lower state authorities.
The symbols used in the coat of arms go back to at least the Middle Ages, when they were used by the
Dukes of Mecklenburg,
Dukes of Pomerania and
Margraves of Brandenburg. However, the arms of the dukes were somewhat more complex as they also included many "
quarterings" representing subordinate titles, many of which are still used by their modern counterparts. This complexity was retained by the Mecklenburgian arms until the dissolution of the
Free States of Mecklenburg-Schwerin and
Mecklenburg-Strelitz under Nazi rule.
The complex Pomeranian arms lasted until the extinction of the ducal line in the 17th century. Both
Swedish Pomerania and the
Brandenburgian/Prussian province of Pomerania used only the griffin as their emblems, as did
the reconstituted post-1815 Prussian province, which existed (officially) until 1945. During the interwar period a crowned red sinister (i.e. looking towards the viewer's right) griffin was also used for the
Polish Pomeranian Voivodeship, which lay between the Prussian provinces of Pomerania and
East Prussia (i.e.
Pomeralia), forming the so-called
Polish corridor. After 1945 the portion of Prussian Pomerania east of the
Oder-Neisse line (
Farther Pomerania, Hinterpommern in German) was ceded to Poland. Today, in addition to the German Vorpommern, the red griffin is used as the coat of arms of the Polish
West Pomeranian Voivodeship, which corresponds roughly to western Farther Pomerania; the more eastern
Pomeranian Voivodeship, which corresponds roughly to the remainder of Farther Pomerania and Pomeralia uses a black griffin on gold.