family crests - COOPER

[zowster]

i would like to write up what i have so far of my family tree maybe present it in a scrapbook quite how i don't know yet, i would like to put the cooper family crest at the beginning i thought that you would google cooper family crest and hey presto there it would be but no about 10 different crests appear how do you know which belongs to your family.

[Guy Etchells]

First I assume you are referring to the achievement rather than the crest, the crest was the embellishment on top of the helmet?

You trace your male family line back to the armiger who used that particular achievement and that is the one you are entitled to use.
Cheers
Guy

[sillgen]

Hi
I think Guy is baffling us with science here but I almost replied earlier to say that you are not automatically entitled to use a family "crest".    Armorial bearings are extremely complicated - way beyond my knowledge.   Those who sell your family coat of arms are really conning all of us into believing we have a right to them whereas on the whole we do not.    With luck someone who can explain this better will join this thread.
If I were you I should choose the one you like best and go for it!
Andrea

[behindthefrogs]

I must agree with Guy.  We must stop using the American term Crest when we mean the shield part of the Coat of Arms.  The crest is what is mounted on the top of the helmet.

This is important to genealogists because the shield, crest and motto are derived from the history of the family and a lot of family history can be derived from them once descent from the person to whom they were granted has been established.  They also show very strictly the relationship between the individuals who bear them

What worries me is not so much the use of a coat of arms to which we are not entitled, and for which we could in theory be prosecuted, but the fact that we are misleading our children about our ancestry.

I hope you wouldn't dream of adding a famous person to your tree for the sake of it so why make a similar claim by usurping a coat of arms.  Even if you are encouraged by people with commercial interests.

David

[Guy Etchells]

Here in England the use of a Coat of Arms as they are commonly called is permissable in a number of ways.

1: A person may design and use their own unique Coat of Arms (this is called assumption) this is borne out by the fact that even the Heralds in their visitations recognised Arms "upon strength of usage".

2: A person may acquire Arms by a "Grant of Arms"

3: A person may inherit Arms. In England Arms are inherited by the children of the armiger. All his descendants have a right to bear his arms, (yes even the daughters but the daughters do not (generally) pass on that right as sons do).
Note also under the English system of heraldry there is no requirement to "difference" arms, as there is under other systems.
Cheers
Guy

[behindthefrogs]

Here in England the use of a Coat of Arms as they are commonly called is permissable in a number of ways.

3: A person may inherit Arms. In England Arms are inherited by the children of the armiger. All his descendants have a right to bear his arms, (yes even the daughters but the daughters do not (generally) pass on that right as sons do).
Note also under the English system of heraldry there is no requirement to "difference" arms, as there is under other systems.
Cheers
Guy

Whereas you may be right that there is not a requirement to difference the arms this usually only applies to the single person inheriting them or when that inheritance is by daughters, all of them.  However there are standard methods for younger sons to difference their arms.  This is unlike some other countries where they are differenced at each generation

When arms a granted by the College of Arms to other than the direct line they insist on creating a difference and also in replacing the crest by one from any more prominent female line.

For example the fifteenth century arms of the Edlin family in my avatar:  The arms granted to the USA branch were differenced in both the shield and crest while when granted to Sir Peter Edlin in the 19th century the crest was replaced by that from his mother's ancestors and a difference applied which was derived from their coat of arms

Specifically in the former case a german cross was added to the shield and the same cross on a chain hung around the swan's neck.  The cross was taken from the arms of the female ancestor of the USA branch.  Incidently the swan's head crest is significant as it probably shows descent from the counts of Boulogne or Louvain, who had a female descent from Charlemaine.

David

[sillgen]

There you are.  I knew someone would explain it properly.  Thanks Guy and David.
Andrea

[Siamese Girl]

I also have to point out that having a Coat of Arms in the family for some 200 years does not actually mean that you are entitled to them - Georgians who had made it were not above "borrowing" someone else's Arms - the 1800 equivalent of sending off for a set of beer mats with "your crest" on it 

Finding out you are not entitled to the Arms can also upset currently living members of the family - as I know from experience!

Carole