# If Your Family had a Coat of Arms...



## Christopher Bunn (Oct 26, 2010)

If your family had a coat of arms, what would it be?

Mine would be a gravestone with a skull and a pillow, and the saying "Puteus quietatur sumus mortuos" (we'll rest when we're dead).


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

My family has one.

Okay, so my father ordered one on a lark from some company quite a few years ago who would design one for you for something like $50, I think. Since we knew that (a) you can't trace our family name beyond my father's paternal grandfather, and (b) we were pretty sure they wouldn't really do any research anyway at that price, we ended up with something quite generic that could apply to any family (sort of like horoscopes  ).

Anyway, if I were to design my own, I think it would have a lot of blue (favorite color) and consist of a trumpet rampant above a canine recumbent, separated by a bar sinister.


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## KBoards Admin (Nov 27, 2007)

We have one, too, that goes back to the 15th Century. Apparently our family motto is "Fortune de Guerre" - which in English translates to 'The Fortune of War'.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

I'm descended from O'Connors







and McCaffreys









My husband has no idea about the Von Hagel . . . . .


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## CoraBuhlert (Aug 7, 2011)

Ann, Von Hagel probably has a coat of arms, because the "von" often indicates aristocratic origins.

Anyway, my family has a coat of arms. It's a pegasus. I've always found that fitting, since the pegasus is the poet's horse.


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

Here's the coat of arms I mentioned above that my Dad purchased just for the fun of it. I get a chuckle out of the "old and distinguished Reace name", since it cannot be traced past the late 1800's. And the "less than 50 households" is an understatement: it was probably under 10.


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## Christopher Bunn (Oct 26, 2010)

Suddenly, I'm somewhat intimidated by our moderators (I figure if someone has a Coat of Arms, they probably have some medieval weaponry as well).   Those are awesome Coats of Arms. Nogdog, what is a bar sinister?


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

CoraBuhlert said:


> Ann, Von Hagel probably has a coat of arms, because the "von" often indicates aristocratic origins.
> 
> Anyway, my family has a coat of arms. It's a pegasus. I've always found that fitting, since the pegasus is the poet's horse.


When we've done searches, we find something for Hagel that looks pretty authentic so probably actually is for a family named "Hagel". . . . . A brother in law found something once that's rather like the one Nogdog posted above, except it's got a vertical bar in the lower right and a V in the upper left. Hmmmm.  My personal opinion is that the family name is from some byblow of the Hagel family who decided to use VON rather than whatever the German equivalent of "Fitz" is . . . . probably a con man of some sort.


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## SEAN H. ROBERTSON (Mar 14, 2011)

Impressive coats everyone and awesome topic idea!!!

My Robertson crest/COA dates back to 11th century Scotland when my bloodline ruled Scotland for two centuries. Our family motto is 'Virtutis Gloria Merces' = GLORY IS THE REWARD FOR VALOUR!


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

Christopher Bunn said:


> ...Nogdog, what is a bar sinister?


If memory serves (I'm too lazy to even Wiki it), it's a diagonal bar going from the upper right to lower left from the perspective of the viewer -- whereas from the perspective of the wearer, it would be the angle a left-handed swordsman's arm would describe when drawing his sword from his right hip, thus the "sinister" designation, the opposite being the "dexter" bar. (I wish I had anywhere near as many truly useful facts -- or factoids? -- cluttering up my brain.)


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## Scheherazade (Apr 11, 2009)

We also have one but I can't find a good enough picture of it.  I also have medieval weapons.  The motto is "Semper Paratus" - Always Ready.  I do not embrace that at all though.  It should be Semper Procrastus in my case I think.


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

I decided to see what the "official" (not!) Reace coat of arms would look like in color:


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## spotsmom (Jan 20, 2011)

My dad's family has a formal coat of arms and an interesting history.  A couple of them were knights and are buried in tombs in the Church of the Crooked Spire in England.  My dad gave me a ring with the coat of arms engraved so I can seal stuff in wax (something I do every day, right).

If my mother's side of the family had a coat of arms it would show me as the Munch "Scream" in the middle of it.


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

NogDog said:


> ...Anyway, if I were to design my own, I think it would have a lot of blue (favorite color) and consist of a trumpet rampant above a canine recumbent, separated by a bar sinister.


So I'm not an artist....


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## kindlequeen (Sep 3, 2010)

Is there a reliable website for finding your family's coat of arms and heritage?  My maiden name is Jones and I see a ton of different ones out there!  It probably would be super hard to find, I pretty sure my direct ancestors came over well before the Declaration of Independence was signed.  

Most notably I see a lion with red nails, that must be where I get my desire to keep mine painted bright colors.


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## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

My family coat of arms is a yellow pale on the back of the shield.

Mike


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## Carol (was Dara) (Feb 19, 2011)

No idea what my family's coat of arms (if we have one) looks like. Like Nogdog, I think some of my relatives hired someone to create one but I haven't seen it. If I were designing it I'd want a dragon. Or a griffin. And I'm partial to the color blue.


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## Susan in VA (Apr 3, 2009)

On my dad's side we do have one...  sort of.    It's a Borders family in Northumberland, and the Scottish side has a coat of arms dating back to 1300-something  --  but 20 miles away from them, the English branch (that's us) doesn't see itself as part of that anymore, for whatever reason.  
I have a description of the coat of arms but I don't know my way around the terminology used in heraldry.  All I can decipher is that there are spurs, crescents, and boars' heads, and that it's in blue and silver.


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## Susan in VA (Apr 3, 2009)

Ann in Arlington said:


> My personal opinion is that the family name is from some byblow of the Hagel family who decided to use VON rather than whatever the German equivalent of "Fitz" is . . . . probably a con man of some sort.


It could be the other way around too. At a certain point in history, a number of aristocratic families in Germany decided to stop using the "von", and sometimes only _some_ of the members of that family changed their name. So you might find family history under both versions.


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## Martel47 (Jun 14, 2010)

NogDog said:


> So I'm not an artist....


That's nice NogDog, but if my memory serves correctly (and it's cluttered like yours with much useless information), you cannot designate the trumpet as rampant since that only serves for animals...but I don't remember what the designation would be for an inanimate object. And I could be wrong.

My family stock is entirely peasant, and proud of it.


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## BTackitt (Dec 15, 2008)

I have 4 inherited ones, but if my family now had to design one... wow, I dunno, something with books and the Marine Corps emblem, as we all read and DS#2 is a 3rd generation Marine. Semper FI Bibliophile!


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

Martel47 said:


> That's nice NogDog, but if my memory serves correctly (and it's cluttered like yours with much useless information), you cannot designate the trumpet as rampant since that only serves for animals...but I don't remember what the designation would be for an inanimate object. And I could be wrong.
> 
> My family stock is entirely peasant, and proud of it.


Ahh...but to the trumpet player, it *is* a living thing. 

Sent from my BlackBerry 9330 using Tapatalk


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