Pride's Revenge The pride of both characters leads to some sort of destructive action throughout the story. Pride can be the reason someone is too confident or, if a person's pride is insulted or questioned, it can lead to retaliation or revenge against that person. Throughout Edgar Allen Poe's story "The Cask of Amontillado" there is an underlying point of pride in which the coats of arms of the Montressor family are used to foreshadow the vengeance that will be meted out to Fortunato later in Poe's story and the Fortunato's pride leads him straight into Montressor's trap. Each family has a unique coat of arms. The coat of arms consists of the family coat of arms and the motto. Fortunato asks Montressor what his family's weapons are. It says: “A huge foot of human gold, in a field of blue; the foot crushes a rampant serpent whose fangs are embedded in the heel” (Poe 110). After explaining the family coat of arms to him, Fortunato asks him what his family motto is. He responds with: “Nemo me impune lacessit” (Poe 110). “[This] motto is also the motto of Scotland and the Order of the Thistle” (Deer 155). At the beginning of the story Montressor says: “The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as best I could, but when he ventured to insult I swore revenge” (Poe 108). This means that Fortunato said something that offended him and Montressor's pride is driving him to feel the need not to react immediately but to plan revenge that will ultimately lead to him killing Fortunato. The story does not tell what Fortunato said to insult Montressor to justify his revenge against Fortunato. Instead of simply forgiving Fortunato for what he said, Montressor decided to take the easy route and sought his revenge. As author Ellis Cose said, “[Revenge] is so… middle of the paper… Ford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2011. Print.Booth, Alison, and Kelly J. Mays. Norton's introduction to literature. New York: WW Norton, 2010. Print.Cervo, Nathan. "Poe's The Cask of Amontillado." Explicator 51.3 (1993): 155. Literary Reference Center. Network. 8 April 2014.Cose, Ellis. Bones to choose: forgiveness, reconciliation, reparation and revenge. New York: Atria, 2004. Print.Hoffman, Daniel. Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1972. Print.Stepp, Walter. "The Ironic Double in Poe's 'The Cask of Amontillado.'" Studies In Short Fiction 13.4 (1976): 447. Academic research completed. Network. April 9, 2014Weidman, Aaron C. and Jessica L. Tracy. "Saleem, Shiva and Status: Authentic and Arrogant Pride Personified in Midnight's Children." Interdisciplinary Humanities 30.1 (2013): 5-29. Academic research completed. Network. April 16. 2014.