Presentation Abstracts

This paper will explore how heraldry from its beginnings in the 1130–40s undertook several remarkable journeys in its development and expansion. When, how, and why did this essentially martial phenomenon spread to such a wide variety of groups and communities? Initially armorial bearings had been adopted by an aristocratic warrior elite, but within a decade they were used by women, and within a century by men of lesser status—a journey that took them across society and down the social ladder. By the early 14th century esquires had adopted arms and they were followed by the lowest rank of the gentry, gentlemen. By 1300 churchmen were using arms followed quickly by abbeys and civic corporations, colleges, and town guilds. In the late Middle Ages arms were used by merchants, lawyers, and doctors. During the 16th century a new ‘rising gentry’ had become almost obsessed with genealogy and these tokens of lineage and status. What had prompted this extraordinary expansion from a simple marker of identity and recognition on the battlefield to a universal symbol of family or corporate pride, and how did each new armorial diaspora benefit from its display of arms, such as using specific charges that reflected a key relationship within a family or society. And how did the ancient nobility and heraldic purists react to this democratization? It is a remarkable journey and one of the great success stories of the Middle Ages and beyond.

Evidence will be taken from heraldic manuscripts, seals, effigies and brasses, and literary sources. The paper will add to our understanding of how women and newly emerging communities and professions used heraldry to help create a new personal or group identity, whilst reflecting significant broader relationships and connections, both real and imaginary. 

Over the centuries, travels in Africa have shaped the genealogy and heraldry of families and peoples. These adventures led to encounters, mergers, and cultural exchanges which modified identities and heritages. In this paper, we explore how travel in Africa influenced genealogy and heraldry, and how they contributed to ancient identities and current heritages. 

Travel to Africa played a crucial role in genealogy by enabling unions between individuals and ethnic groups. ese unions led to the birth of new groups and the spread of cultural and genetic traits. For example, Portuguese explorers, such as Vasco da Gama, established relationships with African royalty, which led to marriages between members of the two groups and the birth of new clans. They also influenced heraldry, particularly coats of arms and mottos. Explorers and colonizers brought back artistic and heraldic elements from Africa, which were later incorporated into European coats of arms and devices. For example, the armory of the de Gama family, one of the oldest and most prestigious families in Lisbon, is based on an African coat of arms. Additionally, travel to Africa inspired artists and architects, who created artwork and buildings inspired by African culture.

Thus, this study highlights the interactions between individuals and their descendants, highlighting migrations and changes in the family. This perspective allows us to study the impact of travel to Africa on genealogy and heraldry, analyzing how individuals shaped and transformed these elements over time.

The political adventurer, grand conspirator, and fantasist Magnus Beringskjold was born in Denmark in 1721. His career was diverse and rich in scandals, conspiracies, and megalomaniacal projects. His life's journey began in Randers, continued through Copenhagen and then the northern German territories, where he was given the title of court counsellor in Holstein-Gottorp. An ennoblement by Emperor Francis I also made him armigerous. Beringskjold then travelled to Russia before returning to Denmark, where he became embroiled in several conspiracies and was eventually reported for high treason against the Danish king by his own son. Beringskjold's two sons found it so difficult to be associated with their father that they were ennobled with a new name and a new coat of arms to completely erase the memory of their father's shameful behavior. Beringskjold ended up as a prisoner of state in Norway, where he died in 1804. This paper follows Beringskiold's heraldic journey as ennobled by the Emperor, naturalized nobleman in Denmark and finally the way in which he was struck by heraldic damnatio memoriae.

The Marmions were a rising Norman family that came to prominence in the England of Henry I. Beginning with William Dugdale, this lecture will survey nine treatments of this family's pedigree, from the sixteenth to the twenty-first century, examining developments in the sources used and the style of presentation, with excursions along the false trails left behind by some of the authors and commentary on the importance of the growth of the administrative machinery of twelfth-century England to the making of the pedigree.

During the Ottoman rule, two groups of compact Bulgarian colonies were formed outside the Bulgarian lands. The first group, or so called Banat Bulgarians, was formed in the possessions of the Habsburgs in the period from 1688 to 1731. The second, or Bessarabian Bulgarians—in the lands newly annexed to the Russian Empire between 1774 and 1830. Today, the two communities are located in four countries: Romania and Serbia, and Ukraine and Republic of Moldova. The changes of jurisdictions and the political dynamics from the end of the 17th to the beginning of the 21st century also brought forth different traditions in local self-government and their heraldic sanctioning.

The aim of the lecture is to present civic arms in the context of heraldic practices and jurisdictions and to highlight to what extent they reflect the collective Bulgarian identity. The research combines heraldic, historical, and anthropological approaches. Due to differences in legal basis, evolution of local self-government in the host countries and different forms of cooperation between local actors and heraldic authorities, several cases are observed. They have been compared according to John Mill’s methods. The main method of analysis used is content analysis of the field of the arms.

The research indicates that the arms of the municipalities of the Banat Bulgarians fit into the Habsburg Hungarian tradition and make use of local concepts. Among the Bessarabian Bulgarians, two approaches are observed. The “Bulgarian” arms in Moldova mostly highlight the origin and the migration, i.e. the connection with Bulgaria is explicitly emphasized. In Ukraine the focus is mostly on livelihood, which is an implicit expression of the local identity. 

Since George Neilson’s opening salvo in 1902, scholars have been engaged in a hundred years’ war over how to interpret the Middle English Alliterative Morte Arthure (MA). Two areas of contention are the poem’s genre and meaning as expressed through the poet’s treatment of the protagonist King Arthur and this character’s journey. I contend that the unique presentation of King Arthur’s arms in the MA offers a vital clue to the poem’s genre and meaning.

In the lead up to a sea battle with the forces of his treacherous nephew Mordred off the coast of Southampton, Arthur hoists up his war banner. The poet describes the banner as comprised of shining gold crowns elegantly arrayed on a field of gules with a white Virgin and Child in the chief (lines 3644–51).

Like the upper half of Arthur’s arms, the first eleven lines of the poem describe the celestial “Kingdom of Heaven” (6) and the thirteen lines that follow, like the lower half of Arthur’s arms, portray the terrestrial Kingdom of Man, including the “royal ranks of the Round Table” (17) that assist Arthur in winning the “castles and kingdoms and many countries” (26) that constitute it. The MA-poet is, I contend, cunningly and punningly pointing toward his version of the heraldic arms of King Arthur through his use of diction in the opening invocation of the poem.

The presentation of the arms of Arthur in the MA affirms that the MA is a Christian epic poem in which the classical epic form is tempered to advance Christian and Augustinian teachings about the primacy of the pursuit of the City of God, the futility of the pursuit of the City of Man, the spiritual benefits of humility, and the peril of pridefulness. The object of the MA’s critique is imperialistic kingship and the crusader ideology that underpins it. King Arthur as epic hero is the personification of this paradigm. 

From humble origins as the son of a parish clerk in Halland, one of the Scanian lands which was fought over by the Danes and the Swedes, Birger Gunnersen went on to become the most powerful cleric in mediaeval Scandinavia. Although the other Scandinavian countries Norway and Sweden were given their own ecclesiastical provinces in 1152 (Nidaros/Trondheim) and 1164 (Uppsala), the archbishop in Lund remained primate of Sweden. Archbishop Gunnersen was the last consecrated and confirmed Archbishop of Lund. Heraldically he is perhaps best remembered for the conflict between the Archbishop and Henry (Henrik) Krummedige regarding the alleged usurpation of the Krummedige arms by the archbishop when he assumed arms as a cleric. The conflict was ultimately resolved in the archbishop’s favor by the King’s Council. Or at least so the story goes, but what are the sources for this story, which has been known for hundreds of years?

This paper will examine the coats of arms of both Birger Gunnersen and Henry Krummedige, and the sources of their conflict. What is known about the origins of their coats of arms? Here the archbishop’s origins come into play, as his coat of arms is supposedly inspired by the coat of arms of the hundred he came from. The study is multifaceted, and will compare the readily available sources, as well as try to uncover older material, if possible. 

As a research fellow at the Massachusetts Historical Society, I photographed and catalogued over a thousand personal wax seals made by English colonists in America. Used to validate legal documents and signify the senders of letters, these seals were symbolically potent material identification marks of their owners, comprehensible by both literate and non-literate viewers of a manuscript.

Almost all the seals I discovered at the MHS were the emblems of “ordinary” men and women who lived quiet lives as farmers, blacksmiths, cordwainers, sailors, and a wide variety of other middling and low status occupations. For many, perhaps most, of these people, the impression of their seal in wax is the only remaining archival insight into their personalities and personal attributes. In this presentation, I will discuss the social and historical insights I have gained from my study of these seals. I will elucidate the symbolic significance of the color, size, and placement of seals, while also considering the diverse symbolic meanings of seal imagery, including a special focus on heraldic designs. Furthermore, I will discuss questions of change over time: are there significant differences between seventeenth and eighteenth-century seals, and can a period of transition be identified?

I will particularly focus on the varied journeys colonial American personal seals have undergone.  These journeys include the archival paths by which the seals have been preserved, the movement of sealing culture across the Atlantic and its transformations in early modern North America, and the transmission of seal imagery and individual seal matrices through family lines.

Medieval merchants’ business was primarily based on exchanges and earnings, which was the core of their activity. However, there was another façade of the matter—personal travels and marks used for managing the companies and their merchandise. As a general characteristic, the larger travels were not undertaken by the head of the company but by subordinate personnel (hired workers, family members, partners, etc.) who settled in the cities of origin or destination of the goods.

These displacements could be temporary because they wanted to return to their place of origin, or permanent when they married into families of their destination to improve trade prospects and/or for personal network expansion. ere could also be of a third type: continuous itineraries, following the exchange routes and business centers.

Regarding merchants’ marks, they were essential as an identity and/or prestige indicator of the company (the most successful ones used them personally on a variety of objects), as an organization for financial management (accounting books, correspondence, etc.), and as a means of managing and controlling merchandise during travel, handled by individuals who were not part of the company (ship captains, dockworkers, etc.).

The forms of merchants’ marks contrasted widely. It was common for their mark to be a heraldic symbol, a simplified design of a family coat of arms. Its simplicity sometimes makes it difficult to identify. They are identified by the profile of the shield, the lines representing partitions, and some charges or figures.

The purpose is to relate, based on the mark, the coat of arms with the commercial company and with the fact that merchants were living in a city that was not their place of origin. Pisa is the nucleus of all the documentation used in this study, but the references come from throughout the Western Mediterranean region during the first half of the 15th century: Palermo, Rome, Florence, Barcelona, Valencia, Avignon.

As mass migration increasingly shapes the world in new ways, the concept of identity has evolved dramatically and became far more fluid than in previous generations. Today, Canadian society is remarkably multicultural. In this context, heraldry provides a unique way of choosing which elements of people’s background constitute the identity that they wish to construct for themselves.

This presentation will examine how Canadian heraldry is adapting to the ways in which identity is being redefined by mass immigration and is now making room for new ways of conveying belonging to multiple groups. In the past few centuries, identity often tended to be defined along national or religious lines; now, it has become something far more tailored to each individual irrespective of their place of birth. Through the use of traditional European symbols and the introduction of new symbols from across the world, Canadian heraldry showcases how religion, culture and ancestral origins allow people to create new forms of identity defying easy categorization. It will also highlight the ways in which traditional forms of heraldry can and are being adapted in Canada to reflect the changing realities of the population, as well as the challenges that arise through the inclusion of new symbols.

As a relative newcomer to heraldry who originally studied the concept of identity through a historical lens, I will focus on my own experience in working with petitioners of various backgrounds to reflect on how the Canadian Heraldic Authority is adapting heraldry to respond to worldwide cultures, particularly through the innovative use of charges and colors, as well as the reasons why this a fruitful and rewarding direction for modern heraldry to take. 

Many genealogical stories in the United States often start with the phrase “there were three brothers.” Typically, they are simply three men with similar names who genealogists have thrown together through research in the past. Occasionally, however, a thread of truth shines through. This case study will highlight ongoing research into the Brassfield family. This family was once discussed on a popular American television show and left me fascinated by connections to an American celebrity. Unfortunately, I quickly found that there were a few leaps made in the program that left me wondering if the research was correct. This presentation will trace the presumed family lines from Macclesfield, England, to the American Colonies of Virginia and North Carolina. While doing so, I will present research performed in the primary records that are still extant, theories of the family lines showing possible relationships, and DNA results from descendants to prove or disprove those relationships. As genealogy is a continual work in progress and never truly finished, I am excited to share the current state of the research and discuss where I want to go in the future. 

Thomas “Boston” Corbett is the Civil War soldier who shot John Wilkes Booth in a burning barn during the manhunt that ensued following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Corbett’s story is well-known through the hundreds of books and journal articles concerning the assassination. Corbett’s life was an interesting combination of religious zealotry, bravery, self-sacrifice, survival of imprisonment at Andersonville, and eventually, commitment to an insane asylum from paranoia resulting from years of inhaling mercury vapors as a hatter.

Boston Corbett, however, escaped from the Kansas State Insane Asylum in Topeka in 1888, by jumping on a pony le unattended. Corbett rode 120 miles south to the farm of a dear friend and fellow survivor from the infamous Andersonville prison, Richard Thatcher. After several days, Corbett was taken to a train station and Thatcher claimed Corbett was headed for Mexico. The goodbyes at the train station are the last time anyone is known to have seen Boston Corbett. 

For about ninety years following June 1888, the notion that Boston Corbett was never seen again, held as truth. Yet today, hundreds of Google search results and more recent books suggest that Boston Corbett died in the Great Hinckley Fire of 1894, including Bill O’Reilly’s book, Killing Lincoln.

How did the linkage of Boston Corbett and the Hinckley fire happen, and did Boston Corbett actually die in the Hinckley Fire? This presentation will demonstrate combining historical and genealogical research techniques of individuals on the move, including interviews, pension applications, newspapers, historical records and family relationships, and even Excel v-lookup, to uncover the truth: it was not Boston Corbett who died in the fire, but rather another Civil War soldier, with a similar name, who deserves credit for his valiant effort to save lives during the fire.

Heraldry originated in medieval Europe. Its basics are rooted in the worldview and the aesthetics of that time and place. From the sixteenth century onward, however, overseas exploration and conquest leads to the expansion of heraldry overseas as well as to the introduction of new charges, reflections of the Columbian exchange that are incorporated in the heraldic idiom. e scientific revolution redefines notions of species of plants and animals. Some traditional charges, such as the fire-breathing panther, survive to serve as charges alongside their biological counterparts. Closer to our time, the emergence of new independent states leads to the establishment of heraldic authorities tasked with expressing the state’s (re)conquered sovereignty and the values it upholds. Heraldic communities thrive on the Internet, for better or for worse. Looking back over six centuries, are there patterns in the way heraldry dealt with these novel influences? Can the diverse heraldic traditions that developed with early modern state formation maintain themselves in a globalizing world? Are we heading for convergence or ever greater diversity?

Many descendants of Scots, Irish, and Welsh emigrants (and others) take DNA tests to help illuminate the geographical and ethnic origins of their pre-emigration ancestors. The study of Y-DNA in particular is highly significant in helping to distinguish (in Scotland) descent from Picts, Britons, Gaels, Angles, and Vikings (and later immigrants such as Italian, Polish, Jewish, and Huguenot).

It has become clear that the term "Celtic" as applied to Scots, Irish, Welsh, Manx, Cornish, and Bretons is a complete misnomer—the error of a well-meaning scholar ca. 1700, and polished to a high gleam during the "Celtic Revival" of the late 19th century. In fact, the indigenous peoples and cultures of Britain and Ireland pre-date the European Celts by 1500–2000 years.

The first step in understanding one's origins is to discard myths and accept the evidence of genetics, anthropology, archaeology, and documented history. 

For well over a thousand years the inhabitants of the British Isles have been recording pedigrees which take us back to the fifth century and the end of Roman Britain, when the so-called Dark Ages began. This paper will attempt to untangle truth from legend, to reassess the nature of the arrival of the ‘Anglo-Saxons’ or Adventus Saxonum, and its impact on the genetic composition of England and Wales. This will include an exploration of the historical records of the period, and of the limited chronology which can be deduced from them. It will consider the merits and the weaknesses of pedigrees which act as bridges to antiquity, in particular those which connect Britain with the Roman Empire and will attempt to draw some conclusions about the nature of the Anglo-Saxon invasion of Britain, and the effect that it had on the British gene pool, in comparison with the later incursions of the Vikings and the Norman Conquest. It will consider the nature of the pre-existing ‘Celtic’ populations, and will conclude with an exploration of the most recently published DNA research, highlighting some of the controversies that have been thrown up by this increasingly informative, but still inexact, science.

The coat of arms of Sweden contains a number of symbols accumulated throughout the country’s history. They come from Denmark (the three crowns, lions, and the color scheme) and ancient Egypt through France (the Napoleonic eagle), as well as Italy, England, and Estonia. The talk will follow the migration of the key individuals, the ideas, and influences necessary to form the modern Swedish coat of arms. It will cover English medieval coinage in Sweden, Ptolemy II use of the eagle as a stand-in for Zeus in Greek Egypt and how it became a royal Swedish symbol through the Roman Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, and the French Empire. 

The talk also covers how three crowns shifted from being a Christian symbol to being a Swedish symbol, and how Sweden and Denmark fought a war over them. These symbols, once associated with Sweden, have since migrated to the West Indies, the United States, and Ukraine.

The purpose of the talk is to show how national symbols can be the outcome of a long history of migration, conflict, and collaboration. It intends to show the multinational origins of Sweden’s national symbols. The methodology consists of a contextualized image and symbol analysis, combined with non-heraldic historiography, previously employed in my master’s thesis on the heraldry of the Vasa dynasty (Karlstad University, 2023). The source material consists of coins, royal correspondence, modern flags, and official heraldry.

St. George holds a special place in Georgia as the most revered Saint. Its influence in the region dates back to ancient times. The early fresco depictions of St. George indicate a possible Byzantine influence or vice versa. The regalia of Georgian kings include the first images of St. George. The first European sources to showcase Georgian coats of arms also featured depictions of St. George. The Russian Empire's sources include the first images of St. George on Georgian coats of arms. St. George's image is prominently featured on Georgian heraldic cups. Written materials in European sources testify to St. George's widespread popularity. Modern Georgian heraldry continues to incorporate the revered image of St. George. 

Sometime before the christening of daughter Eugenia Julia Josefa Plauchu, in the city of Puebla de Zaragosa, Puebla, Mexico, the day aer Christmas 1852, Pablo Plauchu or Paul Joseph Antoine Plauchu, made the long voyage to Mexico from the small village of Jaussiers, France, which is in the Alps near the border with Italy. This paper and presentation will discuss the methodology needed to pinpoint his origins in France.

Often to trace an immigrant back to their native land and hometown, a variety of sources are needed as well as critical, analytical problem solving. This was the case with the investigation into the origins of Pablo. Several sources were brought together in puzzle-like fashion to finally determine his hometown in Jaussiers, France.

The search began in typical, tried, and true fashion, with Catholic parish records in Mexico but other sources were needed to identify the hometown more fully. As the investigation unfolded other helpful sources included a published work, online gazetteers, and finally departmental archives online in France were used to determine the correct man was located.

As a result of the research, it was learned that Pablo was not alone in his journey to Mexico. As is often the case with immigrants, he came with a group of his fellow countrymen in search of a better life and greater opportunities. Many families in Mexico can trace their ancestry back to this group of French men and women from the area where Pablo lived who also banded together in their immigration experience.

In the 18th and throughout the 19th century, the Holy Roman Empire and its successor states saw the introduction of heraldic offices, nobility registers, and coat of arms censors—especially after 1806. By means of such institutions, monarchs and sovereigns sought to exercise their power by regulating nobility and heraldry aiming to curb the misuse of titles and coat of arms. In the kingdom of Württemberg (18061918) similar institutions were founded during that period. In 1806 the first coat of arms censor was appointed. In 1818 King Wilhelm I introduced the Württembergische Adelsmatrikel. From then on, the state only accepted those families to the nobility that had been registered.

Provided they stood in the monarch’s favor, the recognition of a noble title or coat of arms was—in principle—open to natives and foreigners alike. The latter, however, were well-advised to have their foreign honors officially recognized at home. Nevertheless, it would be easily conceivable if the natives were given preferential treatment—but was that really the case? Was the process of having one’s title or coat of arms recognized different by comparison? Or did favoritism in terms of origin play no role at all? And if so, what other factors could have been at play?

As a contribution to the area of heraldry, the lecture will outline the proceedings that lead to the recognition of titles and coat of arms in the kingdom of Württemberg between 1806 and 1918. It will then conduct a comparative study on the basis of selected examples in order to unveil the fundamental underlying principles behind the process both for domestic and foreign honors.

Using an array of records, seen both online and in person, follow Samuel and Julia (Horton) Weston, their families, and their turbulent lives across several states (Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and maybe others).

The case study illustrates a married and divorced couple and their children, in a dysfunctional 19th century family—divorce, illegitimacy, migrations, even possible bigamy. Being mobile across several states makes tracking what records were generated by the family even more difficult than usual. Many of the most relevant records for Samuel and Julia are in small local repositories without online catalogs, making finding and seeing the records even less visible. However, these records can be found to fill out the details of the family's story.

This session discusses the new Medieval Area, which I oversee, at the FamilySearch Library in Salt Lake City, Utah; to make it known as a resource for researchers of genealogy and history. Over the past two years, we at the Library have made a concentrated effort to aggregate and expand our materials concerning the medieval and early modern eras (pre-1600). This is in addition to creating educational materials, such as online lessons and FamilySearch Research Wiki articles for those interested in expanding their family trees past the inception of parish registers. We are also invested in creating digital “discovery experiences” that would allow a Library guest, regardless of research experience, to delve into the world of heraldry, kings, and everyday life in the medieval period to educate and enable them to draw closer to their longago ancestors.

This presentation will discuss specific holdings in our expanding book collection that are rich in heraldic and genealogical information, highlight key online databases and collections, as well as demonstrate current and future discovery activities. In so doing, I also hope to share our vision for the collection and our anticipated projects and goals that will continue to be valuable for those with interests in medieval and early modern heraldry and genealogy.

The three cups of the Butler family are centuries old emblems of one of the most powerful families of Anglo-Norman Ireland. When the family of Theobald Walter were appointed the Chief Butlers of Ireland, they assumed, in addition to the azure a chief dancetty or of the Walters, three gold cups as a heraldic device. However, in the centuries since the initial introduction of Anglo-Cambrian soldiers on the island, the Butler family played a fine line between loyal Englishmen and acclimating to the “barbaric” native Irish culture.

The objective of this research is to determine whether the Butlers adopted the heraldic customs of Ireland or held more firmly to the English standards of marshalling. While the English College of Arms ensured that no two people held the same crest at the same time, the Irish tradition focused more on clan crests that could be carried by anyone of the same sept. I endeavor to examine the material culture of the Butlers through building remnants, personal seals, town emblems, etc. to conclude first, whether there is evidence of the Butler family ever utilizing a “clan” crest rather than a personal crest for each armigerous man. Second, as the Butlers eventually branched into multiple “septs” of their own—the Kilkenny Butlers, the Cloughgrenan Butlers, and the Cahir Butlers—to compare such material evidence to determine as far as possible whether certain septs, such as the Cloughgrenan branch, who are already known to have been more accepting of Irish culture, demonstrated that acceptance in heraldry as well.

Since the Butlers were the epitomic “more Irish than the Irish themselves” Anglo-Irish family, the results of such a study could be considered a micro history of the entire Anglo-Irish class, thus demonstrating an overall attitude toward Irish heraldic customs from a colonizing people.

How are arms of incomers received or naturalized in the destination country? The main method of research used in this paper was the examination of 13th century seals and narrative sources in Latin. Our paper has two aims. Firstly, by examining the 13th century source material we seek to show that there is  tendency which can be detected on early coats of arms of the early Hungarian genera (or clans) and according to which the descendants of noble clans of foreign origin (“newcomers” or advenae in Latin sources), whose ancestors came from foreign countries to Hungary prior to or in the 13th century, they used honorary pieces or plants as main elements of their coats of arms (while the genera Hungarian origin used animal figures). This is not a general law, however, but just a tendency with some notable exceptions. On the one hand, the use of both plant motifs and honorary pieces can be found on the insignia of genera of Hungarian origin. On the other hand, some of the newcomer clans also bore animals on their coat of arms. Special attention will be paid to the heraldic representation of the Nagymartoni family whose ancestors arrived in Hungary from Aragon. In the second part of our paper, we try to examine the popular thesis whether the first know examples of Hungarian noble families can be linked to totems of the pagan Hungarian clans which had flourished some three hundred years earlier, before the Christianization of the Hungarians. The language of the paper will be English, with the slides in French.

Corporate heraldry in the United States experienced a significant revival during the early 20th Century, fueled in part by the missionary work of several Roman Catholic religious communities and their need to authentic diplomas for newly established educational institutions. These religious communities, founded in Europe, required a new American identity and placed their faith in the capable hands of Pierre de Chaignon la Rose (1872–1941) of Harvard.

As the nation’s leading expert in ecclesiastical heraldry, la Rose assiduously built his reputation within the Roman Catholic Church following his landmark commission for arms in 1910 for the Archdioceses of Baltimore and Boston.

Through a thematic analysis of 250 designs of corporate arms by la Rose, this paper will examine how the designer constructed a framework without any precedence in the US to illustrate the ancestral origins of several Roman Catholic religious communities while accomplishing unification and differencing in their arms at the same time. Void of any heraldic authority in the US, la Rose built his methods based on the ancient rules and customs of heraldry, while forging a new pathway for corporate arms in America. La Rose fashioned new identity for these communities by employing unique charges representing their European foundations for unification, while differencing their arms based on their destinations, such as new colleges or branches of the community. La Rose filled a critical need in the US and was the first to employ these methods to create and preserve group identity while setting a high standard for best practices in designing corporate arms.

Through the brilliance of la Rose’s designs for these communities, he would render clear and perspicuous heraldry and many are still used today for identification.

Throughout history people who have moved up socially have often adopted armorial bearings as they did so, often continuing the use of symbols already used. What is rarer is that families have completely changed their armorial beings several times, as they moved up socially and without looking back.

The paper is a case study examining three separate cases from Denmark in the 17th–18th centuries where peasant or burgher families first assumed house marks or simple arms, later changed these to more elaborate compositions, and finally when they were ennobled were granted entirely new arms, in each case abandoning the previous symbols.  As such the paper will illustrate "journeys" not in a geographical sense, but in a social and heraldic sense.

The 2021-2023 creation of the von Maur family tree with more than 272 individual names and spanning more than 700 years was an enormous undertaking taking up more than a year and a half of intense work.

Spanning approximately 5,1x6,3 feet the giant painting has a multitude of microscopic stories and depicts the family’s journey from a tiny village in Württemberg, Germany across continents and cities to currently residing in Davenport, Iowa. Branches – all stemming from the same origin - spread across the globe and show the ever moving nature of human existence.

While showcasing the physical journeys of the family, the heraldic details of the tree further gives a clear view of the passing time as duchies become kingdoms before becoming provinces again.

The focus of the paper is on the creation of the family tree from an artistic point of view. Which details should be included, and how should the balance between names, branches, and artistic details be struck? Further the paper will look into some of the challenges of materials, inks, paper, and the sheer scale of such an undertaking, where the margin for error is almost non-existant.

The paper will give an insight into the otherwise hidden process of creating a family tree of this scale. It will illuminate some of the many pitfalls and hidden opportunities for artistic interpretation that are present, and give a better understanding of the cramanship and meticulous care needed to create such an enormous work.

Sitting directly in the crossroads between heraldry and genealogy, this paper aims to show how the two fields are mutually beneficial, giving a solid and colorful way of displaying and investigating both.

This lecture will cover an overview of the history of gravestones in 17th through 19th century Massachusetts. The style, stones, and techniques of various stone carvers will be discussed.  Further examination will deal with those who were stone carvers specifically in Boston who carved Heraldic crests upon gravestones and tombs in the city from the Colonial period.

Internet-based genealogy and DNA sites are transforming our ability to follow the paths our ancestors took, and to collaborate on shared ancestry. In this case study, two researchers from the United States and the Netherlands traced their shared heritage from Rombout Cheris (abt. 1486–aft 1529), an Antwerp shipping merchant who traded in London. Cheris was the son of a father of the Cereso family of merchants from Burgos, Spain and a Flemish mother from Antwerp. Acculturated in the Lowlands, Cheris never used the surname spelling “Cereso”, and is not recorded to have used his paternal crest—a cherry tree quartered with fleurs-de-lis of the Beltrán family.

Using published and online genealogies and primary documents, the researchers outlined their likely shared family tree. The search was confounded at times by the divergent paths of the families. The elder Cheris son and descendants remained Roman Catholic and married into noble families in Antwerp, North Brabant, England, and Hainaut. The younger Cheris son became Protestant and permanently left Antwerp for London. His refugee descendants settled in Zeeland in the 17th century. Through the centuries, the families of both researchers lost their connections to heraldry and genealogy.

Societal upheaval, illegitimacy, missing records, and the loss of Middelburg, Zeeland archival collections during WWII left gaps that were difficult or occasionally impossible to fill. Hoping to close the gaps, the researchers each took 22 autosomal chromosome DNA tests. Their results found no direct shared segments. However, comparing their separate lists of thousands of autosomal matches, the researchers triangulated two individuals who shared one block on Chromosomes 3 with the American and one block on Chromosome 18 with the Dutch researcher. Additional matches with extensive online genealogies confirmed that both researchers likely are genetic and genealogical descendants of Rombout Cheris.

The classic view of immigrants coming to a place with the intention of setting down roots forever has been shown to be wildly incomplete. Modern migration scholarship acknowledges and explores those who never intended, for a variety of reasons, on settling permanently. Exact numbers of those returning to Europe from the United States and other areas of the world cannot be known but it is estimated that between 13–50% did so.

The use of genealogical research methods can provide information on individuals and families, allowing migrations to be traced. Ties to those who moved earlier or who returned may be identified thus enriching the data and possibly showing reasons for the various migrations.

Three case studies illustrating different migration types will be presented: those who kept moving, those who returned ‘home’ and those who went back and forth. Strategies and resources for tracing these types of migrants will be shared and consideration will be given as to why the migration took place and how their identities may have changed during their experiences. Migration paths to and from the United States and Europe will be focused on.

Many Americans and others who might desire to bear arms are either not eligible for or choose not to petition for a foreign (e.g. English, Scottish, or Irish) grant of arms. While they are generally free in America to design and assume unique new arms, many hope to somehow appropriately reflect their family roots. One option, for those with Scottish or Irish roots, is to follow the common Scottish and Irish heraldic custom of reflecting, in new grants, the key design theme(s) of the historic arms of their clan or sept chiefs or other prominent historical families of the same name, sufficiently differenced to avoid appearing to be merely “determinate” (documented) cadency within the historic chiefly lineage—the Scots call this “indeterminate cadency”.

My approach will compare various examples of “indeterminate cadency” with the historic Scottish or Irish arms, noting the specific “indeterminant” elements, with my conclusions as to what differences are sufficient and appropriate to express “clan”/“sept” heritage without infringing on the historical “old world” arms.

This lecture will cover an overview of heraldic traditions used by Jewish families throughout Europe. While a heraldic authority did not recognize Jewish coats of arms during the Middle Ages, there is evidence of heraldic seals and other instruments bearing the images of the lions and other iconography. Further examination will deal with gravestone images used in the United States from the 17th century to present.

There is an ever-increasing interest in acquiring an official and legal Coat of Arms, particularly from American citizens of Scottish ancestry, however, this interest from overseas is not merely augmenting the scope and participation in Scots Heraldry and Clan culture. Over the last 100 years it has evolved into an influencing and meaningful presence.

While the noun “diaspora” refers to a dispersion or spread of a people from their original homeland, the term used by the present Lord Lyon King of Arms, the ancient office of the Scottish Chief Herald, of the “living Scotland”, to refer to the increasingly vibrant and committed communities around the world who share Scottish heritage, perhaps does more justice to describe the phenomenon to be witnessed overseas of f lourishing communities who engage with Scottish culture, heritage, history, and heraldry.

This paper will analyze how, while the legal and enforceable jurisdiction of Scots Heraldic Law extends only to Scotland itself, there has undoubtedly been a seismic shift and surge in the interest, participation, and meaningful contribution to Scots Heraldry and Clan culture from the “Living Scotland” in many places around the world, notably North America.

Scots Heraldry and Clan culture is increasingly serving as a powerful tool to preserve, reinforce, and create growing group identities in communities which have been separated from their place of origin over time. This mass overseas participation is undoubtedly leaving a permanent mark on the health and visibility of Scots Heraldry and augmenting its appeal as a means of a legal and artistic form of not only individual identification, but community cohesion and sense of belonging.

The methodology of this study will cite primary sources such as the Public Register of all Arms and Bearings in Scotland, and associated Court Books, as well as written sources and correspondence with notable figures within the Heraldic and Clan spaces both in the UK and abroad.

The Church of England's presence in Belgium dates back to the sixteenth century and was officially recognized as a national church in 1870 by the Belgian Government. However, it is often said that communities of British origin immigrating to European countries barely try to integrate with the local population, preferring a social life made up of people from the same culture.

Today, things are changing and a number of clergymen are tending to choose Belgian nationality as well as learning the national languages. These choices have one main incentive: the work of the Central Committee of Anglican Churches in Belgium, based in Brussels, which is the official Anglican authority, in dialogue with the Belgian federal government.

Today, things are changing and a number of clergymen are tending to choose Belgian nationality as well as learning the national languages. These choices have one main incentive: the work of the Central Committee of Anglican Churches in Belgium, based in Brussels, which is the official Anglican authority, in dialogue with the Belgian federal government.

We propose here to give a description and an analysis of these coats of arms, showing how the Central Committee imagines what is a good process of immigration and complete integration for a foreign Church in a traditionally Catholic country.

This talk will use the records of the Chancery court to tell the stories of the numerous contacts there were between families in America and England in the 17th and 18th centuries.

There will be examples of people in America chasing inheritance in England, of trade deals between across the Atlantic that have gone awry, details of ships travelling back and forth, but the most interesting will be the cases that link families in America with families in a particular place and time in England.  Correspondence that formed evidence concerning the representative of a Glasgow firm selling goods in New York and Virginia in the late 18th century will add another dimension to the type of information that survives to connect families across the Atlantic.

The examples used for this paper will contribute to the understanding of the connection between families across the Atlantic and will illustrate the value of these records for anyone tracing the genealogy of an emigrant or a merchant.

There will be a certain amount of detail on the records themselves, how to find and interpret them, but the talk will mainly concentrate on telling the stories of families split by the Atlantic ocean.

Marriage dispensations provide valuable genealogical clues, but British genealogists largely ignore them. For England and Wales, they exist primarily during the period of papal supremacy and relate to families of wealth. The process of obtaining a marriage dispensation, and associated records, changed when King Henry VIII initiated the English Reformation in the 1530s.

Once in vogue in British genealogical circles, these records lost popularity during the democratization of genealogy. An 1828 genealogical guidebook, for example, devoted a chapter to the topic, whereas Herber’s Ancestral Trails (2nd ed., 2009), makes only a brief mention of them.

In contrast to nations such as Spain, pedigrees illustrating kindred relationships rarely appear in marriage dispensations for England and Wales. Sometimes pedigrees can be reconstructed using other sources, based on clues in the dispensations.

These records can be found today in the Archivio Segreto Vaticano, in British archives, and one important register held in France. The Calendar of Papal Registers, Britain and Ireland series, covering the Papal Regesta, is nearly complete through 1534. The Canterbury and York Society has published references from the Apostolic Penitentiary to England and Wales through 1503, as well as abstracts of many archbishops’ and bishops’ registers.

Following the break with Rome, the Archbishop of Canterbury granted upwards of 1,000 dispensations from 1534–1540. These records have been published. The practice of seeking papal dispensations was revived in Queen Mary’s reign. The Legatine Register of Cardinal Pole, the last Catholic Archbishop of Canterbury, is said to contain approximately 300 marriage dispensations from 1554–1557 (a portion simply dispense banns). The volume is held at the Bibliothèque Marceline Desbordes-Valmore in Douai, France, and awaits publication. As Protestantism solidified in Queen Elizabeth’s reign, the importance of marriage dispensations diminished. In the Church of England, the process was replaced by application for a marriage license.

By the end of the 13th century, pedigree rolls were regularly used for royal pedigrees, but in the second half of the sixteenth century the practice spread to individuals. One may order a private roll whether to demonstrate marital relationships with other noble families, or to show the branches of his family. But the principal motive was to demonstrate the antiquity of his nobility, and to establish his family's right to bear both its own arms and the quartered arms which includes the families that have joined his.

The roll I will talk about was made in 1637 for the Darell family of Kent, England, whose origins are from the twelfth century in Yorkshire. The family split into seven branches—all in southern England (West and East), and each had its own quartered coat of arms. The roll contains about 300 coats of arms, copies of documents as deeds, letters, seals etc.), painted monuments with its inscription. The evidentiary aspect goes throughout the vertical line of the lineage.

In my lecture I will briefly review the development of pedigree rolls, then I move on to tell the story of the Darrell family, mainly according to the roll, but I rely also on materials that have survived in churches, houses, and on research. I will focus on important and interesting passages of the roll that represent important family ties. Thus, the first "connection" to the royal house in the fieenth century is proudly presented (Richard Darrell married Margaret Beaufort Beaufort), as well as the fact that the origins of Jane Seymour was in Darrell family (Jane was the granddaughter of Elizabeth Darell who married Elizabeth Darell who married John Seymour). The roll also shows the family connection with Henry Chichele (Chichele), Archbishop of Canterbury and so on.

In a 1917 memorandum to the Prime Minister of Canada, Deputy Defense Minister Major-General Eugène Fiset complained about the prevalence of suspect heraldic devices on official stationery. The circulation of no fewer than eight “incorrect” emblems posing as the “Arms of Canada” supported Fiset’s advocacy of a new, distinctive Canadian coat of arms. A few years later, Frederick Cook, the assistant King’s Printer, noted that the proliferation of unapproved heraldic devices was a result of British heraldry’s journey to North America: the divided duty that some Canadian civil servants felt toward the British Empire and the new Canadian nation had led to heraldic chaos.

This presentation will explore how Canadian government departments used heraldry on their official stationery between the assignment of a quartered shield to the Dominion in 1868 and the adoption of a new, distinctive coat of arms in 1921. A sample of over 130 examples of official letterhead from the collections at Library and Archives Canada forms the basis of the study. It confirms Fiset and Cook’s observations about the variety of heraldic devices but challenges the insinuation that this diversity was necessarily chaotic. Rather, it suggests that there was some method behind federal departments’ heraldic practices.  Departments with external-facing functions typically used the Royal Arms of the United Kingdom throughout the period, while the departments most likely to adopt a version of the 1868 Arms of Canada were those that provided services directly to citizens or were concerned with internal administration.  The division is not perfect: different offices in the same department sometimes chose different heraldic devices, and usage varied across time owing to personnel and partisan political changes. However, the pattern does point to an emerging bureaucratic culture that associated the work of particular departments with ideas about imperial and national sovereignty and identity.

Since a significant part of the Canadian population is made up of immigrants or children of immigrants, many of the people who apply for a grant of heraldic emblems from the Chief Herald of Canada need to determine how to balance representations of their original culture with references to their chosen new country, as well as how to adapt or retain traditional heraldic forms. Heraldry thus provides individuals with an opportunity to reflect and to represent their own journey from one society to another.

In my presentation, I shall focus particularly on differences of approach to this question within the families of aspiring armigers themselves, as I have observed that subsequent generations having a somewhat different perspective on cultural representation to that of the original immigrants.

The lecture will draw on my experience in working with new and second-generation Canadians seeking grant of arms, several of whom will be contacted to provide their perspectives on the design process of which they were a part. The lecture will be illustrated with examples of grants of arms to Canadian of several different cultural backgrounds, taken from the Public Register of Arms, Flags and Badges of Canada, and a particular focus of the lecture will be on arms granted to Canadians of Chinese background.

In 1843, the Colonia Tovar was founded due to the agrarian colonization program promoted by President José Antonio Páez, who after having sponsored the separation of Venezuela from Gran Colombia, wanted to rebuild the country's economy using immigration. His government, aware of the benefits of immigration—particularly observing what was happening in the United States of America—tries to favor the entry of non-Spanish Europeans, previously prohibited by laws issued from Madrid. The idea is directly due to Agustín Codazzi, who, as an expert on the country's geography, indicated the appropriate place, mostly for reasons of the temperate climate. Codazzi's stay in Paris, where his Atlas of Venezuela was published, allowed him to strengthen relations with the surveyor and lithographer Alexander Benitz, a native of Endingen, Germany. Thanks to this, to the credits advanced by the government of Caracas and to the donation of land offered by Martín Tovar y Ponte, a group of 387 people from the Black Forest was brought to Venezuela. This situation creates a community closed in its own customs, with an archaic language (Badense dialect), ethnically pure and related to each other in an ever-closer way. The opening of the modern highway that connects the town with Caracas, in 1951–1963, allowed its greater integration with the rest of the country and the gradual penetration of Venezuelan culture within the group, previously closed in on itself. Nevertheless, they have preserved some specific elements, such as the language, relatively good conservation of the natural environment, high productive rates obtained from intensive agriculture. One of the essential components of the Tovar landscape is its architecture, German forms, and construction techniques. The proximity of Caracas has turned it into an important mass tourist center, well equipped with hotels and restaurants, which transform its agrarian economy into that of tourist and hotel services.

Through the study of the genealogy, we can trace the preservation and creation of a new kind of cultural German-Venezuelan identity.

From the 17th century onwards, several noble families from the British Isles, or individual members of such families, came to the Holy Roman Empire and the Habsburg lands. The reasons for the migration varied. They were predominantly political, but they were also economic or purely adventurous. A large proportion of these noble families integrated into the noble society of the Empire. Individuals assumed prominent positions in the military, political, and social spheres, and married into to the German nobility. Integration was also reflected in the “translation” of British titles of nobility into those of the Holy Roman Empire. On the other hand, continuity with the British homeland was shown by the retention of the family coat of arms and the old predicates associated with the British estates. In most cases, the British families kept the old coat of arms and were allowed to use it in the new homeland, but some were given a completely new coat of arms when they were admitted to the “Reichsadel”.

Using selected noble families of English, Irish, or Scottish descent as examples, this paper will present the reasons for their migration from the British Isles, the ways in which they were integrated into the “Reichsadel”, and the changes or continuities in their identity, including through their heraldic imagery. The focus will be on the British nobility in the Habsburg hereditary lands, with a particular emphasis on the territory that is now part of the Republic of Slovenia.

When the Soviets occupied Lithuania in 1940, its centuries-long history of statehood was shaken to its foundations, as was its heraldic heritage. Soon, Lithuania's state symbolism was replaced by the Soviet one, and the use of heraldry, its development, science, and art were stopped. Soon after the occupation, mass deportations of the Lithuanian population to Siberia began, where people were housed in deplorable conditions, suffered hunger and cold, and were forced to do hard physical labor. Parallel to this process, a Lithuanian anti-Soviet resistance movement developed, both in exile and in Lithuania. A few years later, the Lithuanian guerrilla war began. Residents who were determined to fight abandoned their homes and moved into the forests, living in underground bunkers and carrying out organized resistance actions. The heraldic figures of Lithuania, such as the Knight of Lithuania, the Pillars of the Gediminaitis dynasty, the Double Cross of the Jagiellonian dynasty, as well as other coats of arms and national symbols, have become the symbols of hope, of survival, of the strengthening of one's identity, and of the faith in freedom. In Lithuania and Siberia, those who used them were persecuted and severely punished. The paper will present the forbidden heraldry used by the Lithuanian inhabitants who left their homes, the places where it was used, the occasions of its use, the techniques of its creation, and other peculiarities. This is not fine heraldry as we understand it. Coats of arms and heraldic symbols were often depicted on the most unexpected materials. For example, they could be carved on birch bark, or embroidered using fish bone. However, in this case, it is more important to reveal what message the banned heraldry shapes, how it is perceived by groups of people, and what its main function was.

While researching an elusive family ancestor, the presenter bridged several typical dead ends faced by amateur genealogists by recognizing how historical events affected family fortunes and uncovered surprising links to the great American westward migration along the National Road in the early 1800s and an earlier mass exodus from Scotland to the shores of a fledgling colony called Maryland.

Rediscovered in the Castle Howard archives ten years ago after lying in obscurity for 180 years, the farewell testimonial to Lord Morpeth on the part of the citizens of Ireland in 1841 consists of hundreds of sheets of paper joined together and wrapped around a large bobbin to form a roll that is 420 meters in length and containing more than 160,000 signatures. It is possible to identify many of the signatories, especially those who appear in sheets organized by town or parish. Not only is it an invaluable window into pre-Famine Ireland, but it also offers enormous genealogical scope. Just before the calamities of the 1840s this record acquires a very special status, and one might ask of these names “What sort of famine did they have?” For many people the answer lay with emigration especially to North America, and preliminary research in collaboration with Maynooth University in Ireland has begun to identify emigrants and their descendants in the USA. Not only can communities in Ireland be reconstructed with the aid of historical mapping but the trajectories of new lives across the Atlantic can be uncovered. At the same time the Roll presents formidable logistical and intellectual questions as to how one researches a document which, if unrolled, measures just 30 meters shorter than the Empire State Building. Digitization goes part way to answering these issues. This paper will explain the background to this extraordinary record, illustrate some of the early fruits of genealogical investigation, and discuss the challenges behind comprehending a document that is also a mechanical object. 

In various heraldic periods shields created in one country have been taken by conquerors, mercenaries, and settlers from their original country of origin to a new land where descendants or adherents continued to use the devices. The origin of these shields became forgotten over time and they acquired the characteristic of being “home grown.” It became forgotten that the origin of these shields had not been the current domestic land.

This paper will look at examples of the true origin of what are now thought of as intrinsically Scottish coats of Arms. The mirror image will look at shields of Scottish origin now found well beyond the British Isles. The paper will explore how this creation in one country led to the preservation of the coat in another with the original link forgotten. Whilst heraldry has its origins in one part of Europe it has developed throughout that continent and is now found all over the world.  However certain shields are still regarded as being distinctive to one jurisdiction. The paper will examine how true that proposition might be and whether the migration of the designs has actually resulted shields acquiring new characters by being regarded as a distinctive examples of the heraldry of their acquired home.

By the end of the XV century, Bemoin, prince of the Jalojs in Guinea, went to Lisbon to request King D. João II of Portugal's political and military support against a usurper of his royal rights. He was received with all the honors due to his sovereign state and was granted a coat of arms following his conversion to the Catholic Faith. The military expedition was organized, but sadly, when arriving in Guinea, the prince was murdered under suspicion of treason.

After the discovery of the Zaire River estuary in 1482, a significant travel took Portuguese royal emissaries and missionaries to the Kingdom of Congo. Years later, in 1512, King D. Manuel I sent an embassy to D. Afonso, King of Congo. This embassy started a long emigration of missionaries, and merchants to the Kingdom of Congo. D. Manuel proposed to the Congolese King the adoption of models of political organization, laws and namely the adoption of Heraldry, which was accepted and used for centuries.

In the XVI century, D. Leonor de Ataíde, in her father's company, went to India and, after some political arrangements, she became Queen of the Maldives, marrying Sultan Hassan IX after his conversion to Catholicism. The King of Maldives asked the Portuguese King, D. João III, for a coat of arms with the Cross, the Wounds of Christ, and the Crown of Thorns.

Amid the XVI century, the Singhalese Emperor Parca Pandar, after being baptized as D. João Paria Pandar, bequeathed his kingdom to the Portuguese King. And it was agreed that his last male relative, his nephew, D. João de Cândia, would be sent to Lisbon to enter a canonical order and trusted to the protection of the Portuguese Monarch. D. João lived in Lisbon princely, and founded a convent where he was buried under his coat of arms granted by the King. 

These are interesting examples of migrations among people and heraldry.

Heraldic traditions and noble lineage have played significant roles in defining family histories. In the former country of Austria-Hungary, the title plemeniti ljudi (pl) or the "people of valuable origin" carry a distinguished history tied to the Hungarian Magyar tribe. Over time, families awarded the title lost their social standing but retained their strong identification of belongingness and a deep-rooted sense of importance for the status they once held. This lecture delves deeply into methodologies and strategies to validate a family's claim of descent from this noble lineage.

Through a comprehensive blend of genealogical and historical methodologies, the lecture aims to provide a detailed plan for others who would like to research their ancestral claim of noble descent in Central Europe. Establishing such lineage not only validates a treasured family tradition but also places the family within a larger tapestry of European history. Information to be disseminated will begin with the crucial importance of recording and validating oral family history, insightful heritage trip planning tips, techniques for researching in the Croatian State Archives, and effective ways to locate heraldic records. Also to be explored and discussed will be practical solutions to overcome language barriers and strategies to make meaningful connections with knowledgeable professionals, such as genealogists, historians, and archaeologists.

There are few Coats of Arms that came to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania from abroad during the 16th to 18th Centuries. Primarily, these constitute the coats of arms received by the so-termed indigents, who relocated to Lithuania and received citizenship. Such indigents came from Germany, Italy, Hungary, Scotland, and other countries. A research by Edmundas Rimša, the famous heraldry and sphragistics historian, shows that from the latter half of the 16th century, immigration was primarily from Livonia. The more distinguished of these families include the Tyzenhauzas (Tiesenhausen) with a coat of arms bearing a black ox on an (gold) field, the Römeris (Roemer) family with merits to Lithuanian culture with one bearing two pilgrims’ staffs, and the Plater family with another bearing three shortened bars with a bend. The coat of arms of the Landsbergis (Landsberg) family of German descent displays a gules fess with argent latticework on field. The coat of arms of another well-known family, Morykoni, of Italian descent visualizes two symbols. Per pale at the shield's chief dexter is a fess wavy (river), and at its base sinister, an eagle.

The heraldry brought by foreign families had no major influence on Lithuanian heraldry although many assimilated in Lithuania and upheld local traditions. Generally, only those relocated families used those coats of arms. Thereby, they upheld a Western tradition—one family, one coat of arms. These contain more heraldic charges (differently colored fields partition the shield by accurate lines; they are more decorative and their helmet crests more varied). Naturally, part of the foreign coats of arms did not avoid the effects of polonization or the influence of local heraldry either. In some places, the colors changed and the helmet crest simplified.

My paper will provide more details about coats of arms and seals of Tyzenhauzas (Tiesenhausen), Römeris (Roemer), Plater, Morykoni, Korff, Schwerin, Doenhoff, Krispin-Kirschenstein, and other families.

The Lithuanians who settled in Lawrence, Massachusetts were no exception. It was a large and young community. Eventually they started families, their children grew up and moved to other cities in the U.S., resulting in the community growing old and slowly diminishing. They had a church which they maintained, but because of the small size of the Lithuanian community and the lack of funding, it was unable to survive and had to close. The church had accumulated a rich and varied collection of material, which was preserved and taken over by Jonas Stundžia, one of the famous historians of the time. If not for the effort this man, all the material would have been destroyed. He not only preserved these sources, but also arranged for them to be brought back to Lithuania.

The Lithuanian Academy of Sciences holds many hundreds of documents related to this community. One of the documents is a preserved copy of the 1906 list of the Lithuanian community of Lawrence with Lithuanian names and surnames (LMAVB RS F382-201). The document is also unique in the way that it contains a lot of unique genealogical material, such as the age of the person, where they were born and grew up, if married and how long ago, if they had children, how long they lived in Lawrence and America, where in America they lived before coming to Lawrence (e. g. New York, Boston, Pittsburgh, etc.), their current and previous occupation (e.g., wool worker, weaver, factory worker, etc.), their level of education, and whether they could read and write Lithuanian. Importantly, the documents give us more information about their children, their names and ages.

I will also discuss another original source, the book of the Lithuanian National Catholic Church for the years 1934–1953 (LMAVB RS F382-210), where we can find more general genealogical material about the people (e.g., their names and the fees they paid to the Church). Although the entries are short they still allow us to identify, through genealogical material, that such a person was still alive in the community at that time.

In summary, this report will not only introduce you to the only such original sources on the Lithuanian community in Lawrence, but also to their importance for genealogical research.

Bernhard Oelreich (1626–1686) was the son of a Hamburg merchant who came to Denmark. He studied theology at Danish and German universities. After having been appointed vicar in a Scanian parish and becoming loyal to the Swedish king when Scania was ceded to Sweden in 1658, he was instrumental in the establishment of Lund University. Finally, he became superintendent (i.e. bishop) in Bremen-Verden.

Bernhard Oelreich and his family used a partly canting coat of arms with one (sometimes three) olive tree(s) (representing Oel-). This can be seen from seals, images, and a description of Bernhard Oelreich's tombstone (now lost).

His grandson professor Niklas Oelreich (1699–1770) claimed that the family was noble and asked the King of Sweden for a confirmation of the nobility, a confirmation that he received in 1749. But the details of his coat of arms were not clarified until 1755, when he wrote a new supplication to the King. He then also claimed supporters to represent his Swedish mother and Danish paternal grandmother, but no supporters were granted.

Based on archival sources not hitherto used, I can analyze how a Swedish professor in the 1750s considered his right to nobility and how he thought about the design of his coat of arms. This is done in the specific context of how German burghers’ heraldry in Sweden came to be understood as a sign of noble status, and how the heraldic traditions of the Oelreich family (and the maternal ancestors) evolved in Sweden.

I will be speaking as Althea A. Olin, my great-grandmother, and pioneer, which will also include the life of her husband, Emery L. Fuller, and their three migrations from 1845 to Wisconsin, then their second migration in 1850 and their last migration in1856 to Minnesota. Their daughter May Fuller Eckles migrated further west in 1876 to southern California.

My Olin ancestors were among the first settlers to Rhode Island who arrived from Wales in 1678. Emery L. Fuller’s ancestors were among the first settlers of Massachusetts who arrived from England in 1638. It was of high importance that these families were among the first settlers in a new area.

Thomas Olin and John Fuller were among the first settlers who arrived in Canton, upstate, New York in 1803 and 1805. The use of historical records captures Althea’s and Emery’s grandfather’s living in Canton after serving in the American Revolutionary War. They participated in the Great Migration West in 1835 and 1845 to Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

A timeline of the American Frontier from 1829 to 1870 reflects the movements of the pioneers. Information about three slaves, Caroline, Joshua, and Lewis found their freedom on the Underground Railroad to Canada in the years 1842 to 1859 with the help of Chauncy Olin. A rendition of an anti-slave song, “The Man for Me” by George Washington Clark is also included.

The Fuller's next migration followed Althea’s older brother, Nelson Olin to Omro in 1850. A newspaper article provided the details of Nelson Olin and others arriving in Omro in 1846 as early arrivals to the area. Althea and Emery’s two daughters were born in 1850 and 1853. The death of Emery’s father prompted their last migration west to Northfield, Minnesota in the spring of 1856.

Emery was once again recorded as an early settler in Northfield, Minnesota in 1856. Charles served in the Civil War, was married twice, and had six children; Mary Fuller Eckles married a Civil War soldier they had two children and migrated further west from Minnesota to California in 1876. John Olin Fuller married and had nine children remained in Northfield his entire life and died in 1939. The Fuller family over time had migrated across the entire US continent in one hundred thirty-eight years, from 1638 to 1876.

Panta rhei—everything flows. The words of Heraclitus 520 to 460 BC would be formulated today as follows: "Nothing is more constant than change."

This statement applies to one area of our planet, namely southern Africa, to a particularly high degree. This does not mean the Republic of South Africa, but the southern part of the African continent, which today comprises several states.

Since the discovery of this terrain in the 15th century, numerous migrations, violent deportations, painful expulsions, and flight movements have changed the face of the sub-continent from the ground up. The changes in populations and cultures are reflected in indigenous signs, coats of arms, and state symbols, which have become the annual rings of the territory's history.

My presentation will cover three aspects:

• Historical-geographical developments and their population-relevant effects during the colonial and postcolonial phase
• How these developments are reflected in older and younger state heraldry and state emblems
• Which messages coats of arms and national emblems conveyed then and now and with which means they do this

The study will focus on phenotypic examples (African tribal signs, state coats of arms, state emblems) and will present and interpret them in appropriate illustrations.

The Priory in the USA of The Order of St. John (more formally The Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem), is the American branch of this British Royal Order originating from the Brothers Hospitaller (founded 1099 and perhaps best known as the Knights of Malta). The Priory will release an Armorial of its Members a month after the Congress.

Perhaps the greatest challenge in publishing an official collection of the members’ arms was reconciling their achievements, created under more than a score of heraldic systems, with the practices of England’s heraldic authority as enshrined within the Order’s governing ruleset. One might suppose this could have been done by fiat; only UK-granted arms allowed. And for some purposes, that is exactly what the Order requires be done. But the Order’s charter also requires its forty national subdivisions to adhere to the laws in which each subdivision is headquartered. As American law recognizes a right to foreign property and identity if protected by a nation with which the United States has diplomatic relations, all such heraldic systems come into play in some way.

Thus, not only the journey American Members’ families have taken must be honored, but the interpretations of stakeholders with authority or influence over the Priory’s heraldic office. The Priory’s Genealogist will relate the conflicting demands, how he wrestled with them to reach a final result, and what the volume might suggest for those called on to be an heraldic Solomon in the 21st century.

Many North and South Americans of Italian descent have lost touch with their Italian language, history, and points of origin. Using multiple internet sources, and with the support of the Museo del Cognome (Museum of the Surname) in Padula, Salerno, Campania, Italy, the presenter, whose paternal grandfather came to New York City from Padula, in 1902, has been able to trace branches of both his immediate family and the extensive worldwide Padulese diaspora. He continues to work on bringing the Padulese “superfamily” together and on trying to make the many members of this “famiglia” aware of their roots and of each other. e presenter and a number of like-minded cousins have connected lineages and living persons across three continents and multiple countries, including Italy, Spain, Belgium, the USA, Mexico, Colombia, Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil, and Uruguay. is presentation hopes to highlight both means for researching and connecting genealogical threads as well as the many benefits emotionally and socially of understanding heritage, language, and culture, and of connecting via family  and heritage across national and international divides.

Vicente Martinez Ybor established the immigrant community known as Ybor City in 1885. Soon after its establishment Ybor City became incorporated into Tampa and the port city quickly became the cigar manufacturing capital of the world receiving the moniker Cigar City. At its height, Tampa’s cigar manufacturers employed more than 10,000 immigrant workers in 200 factories producing 500 million cigars annually.

During Tampa’s golden years, 1900–1925, Cuban, Italian, and Spanish immigrants provided much of the labor force for the economy. They established social healthcare to care for members of their community and provided social opportunities for immigrants to stay connected to their homelands, their civic heraldry, and cultural traditions.

Tampa’s history is represented in her civic heraldry. Ybor City’s flag honors it’s immigrant founders and the cigar industry. Tampa’s city seal, created by an Italian immigrant, contains a representation of one the Mascotte, a ship that made regular trips between Tampa and Havanna carrying thousands of immigrants and tons of tobacco.

This session will discuss Tampa’s history, the main immigrant groups that helped establish the city, and how immigrants are intertwined in the city’s civic heraldry.

Early Modern Italy had witnessed a rise of recognizably noble artistic class, particularly when we examine regional networks such as those of the Florentine Renaissance artists. Leonardo, Michelangelo, Leon Battista, and other artists of the period had benefitted greatly from the familial ties that the Vinci, Buonarotti, and Alberti shared with local Tuscan nobility.

In the Baroque period, however, we see a series of ennoblements of artists on a scale heretofore unprecedented—a phenomenon, I argue in this paper, that suggests a campaign to create something akin to the artistic noble elite across the Apennine peninsula, very much unlike fragmentary cases of ennoblement we see in Germany, Habsburg lands, and in England (e.g., Cranach, Velasquez, Rubens, Van Dyke, etc.).

Instead, in the Seicento Rome alone, we see a large number of artists and architects made knights of the Supreme Order of Christ: Cavalier d’Arpino, Baglione, Leoni, Bernini, Lanfranco, Cortona, Borromini. Not only the Order of Christ was used as a vehicle for social mobility among the artists, but so were the Order of Malta (Caravaggio, Cigoli, Mattia Preti) – and some dynastic orders such as the Order of Sts. Maurice and Lazarus (Cairo and Miel). The first half of the seventeenth century can be securely established as the exact moment when a concerted effort was made to craft a completely new artistic nobility, permanently tied to Papal Rome – its source of patronage and loyalty.

The process continued well into Modernity, with European monarchies (e.g., Russian, British, and Austro-Hungarian Empires, etc.) bestowing nobility to artists all throughout nineteenth and early twentieth century. However, these latter efforts were no longer aiming, I would argue, at creating a recognizable artistic noble class, but rather integrated artists into a larger group of state functionaries—a far cry from the days of Seicento Rome.

This lecture will report about Andrew Whiteleather (born in 1757 as Andreas Christoph Weissleder), originated from a huge family in the German Harz mountains, who became a Brunswick soldier at 21 and was sent to America in 1776. The family name of the shoemaker is part of a much bigger story that can be traced back to the Middle Ages.

In his biography we can follow not only the marches from his enrollment to the embarkement along with 3,000 soldiers, his arrival in England, and Quebec, and in his war time. Andrew became a U.S. citizen in 1792 and moved from his settlement in Maryland to the newly established state of Ohio, where he became a patriarch of a giant family. He died in 1846 and connects the Old and the New Worlds.

Besides historic and biographic details, the lecture will show the outcome of genealogical research on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, his ancestry, and uncounted descendants in the U.S. that have been already published. There is a special sense of family in Germany and the U.S. that can be seen in American family reunions since 1898 and a German family association since 1991. Both are able to locate strong roots and also the migration of cousins worldwide.

The Scottish diaspora within North America is a thriving community that celebrates the culture and history of Scotland. Highland Gatherings are held across the United States and Canada where clan-focused societies promote their organizations while sharing their family and surname-specific history. The visual and historic nature of heraldry makes it a prominent aspect of display at these gatherings yet misinformation and misunderstanding of the practice is common. This project graphically illustrates the history of the Murray Clan as shown through the medium of heraldry while demonstrating its appropriate use. Murray arms are recorded at least as far back as the 14th century on the Balliol Roll and in countless manuscripts and registers spanning to the present. Sections of 13th-century genealogy are still debated and require the use of both modern and long-held research for their proposed arrangement. Many of the Murray arms already existed in a standardized format on an online register. Those not present were created to maintain a standardized display for easy recognition of patterns and connections to lay out the genealogy of the many Murray family branches connected to the clan chief. Fundamentally, the tree illustrates this function of "differencing" of arms across the many Murray armigers while dispelling the notion of 'family' arms in Scottish heraldry. Just as differencing distinguishes a coat of arms from its undifferenced origin, the tree also highlights the intricate tapestry of Murray armigers across Scotland separate from the clan chief. In doing so, greater awareness is brought to the complexity of our ancestry and the many individuals whose stories we treasure. Through heraldry, our society can share a nuanced history of our name and the genealogy from our ancestral homeland that we gather as a community to celebrate.

In official state occasions, almost every independent country uses five categories of state symbols: the seal is used for confirming official documents; flags and coat of arms represent political power and cultural identity of an independent state; orders and decorations reflect the country’s traditions of thanking people for special merits; national anthems are recognized worldwide as official music and are played in state ceremonies and other public events.

During state visits it is a well-established diplomatic custom to exchange orders and decorations. In case of visiting a monarchy the President of a Republic like Germany has the great honor of being appointed a member of a royal order of knighthood. Following old heraldic traditions of royal orders, it is necessary to create a stall plate with his personal coat of arms. If the President of the Federal Republic of Germany does not bear a family coat of arms, an office coat of arms sometimes can be used instead. Because no official office coat of arms exists in Germany an informal one has to be invented abroad by foreign Royal Dynasties in Scandinavia.

In this case study the President of Germany’s informal office coat of arms is presented and described in detail. I will analyze the heraldic composition and the meanings of figures and colors. The historic background of this widely unknown German state symbol is discussed.