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Bible Encyclopedias
Coat of Arms

The 1901 Jewish Encyclopedia

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Armorial bearings of families to which the right to bear arms has been granted by the recognized heraldic authorities. This right is in a heraldic sense distinctly feudal in character; and it seems to have originated, toward the end of the twelfth century, in the international relations during the Crusades, which rendered it desirable to introduce some system into the devices on shields. As Jews had no recognized position in the feudal system after this period, they could not use these devices, though for some time they were ranked with nobles, and had the right of deciding their disputes by duel. Consequently, no Jewish coats of arms were recognized by the heralds in the Middle Ages; though rich Jewish families of means used devices, as is shown by the occurrence of heraldic Seals.

The first recorded Jewish coat of arms is that of Bassevi von Treuenfeld, which was granted by the German emperor Ferdinand II. Jan. 18, 1622. Grätz; ("Gesch." 10:37) blazons his shield a blue lion, eight red stars in a blue field, thus committing one of the most elementary heraldic blunders in thus putting color upon color. The true blazon will be found below. In the same year two Jewish envoys from Candia arrived at Venice bringing with them designs practically the same as coats of arms. One of these (Samuel Abdala) is figured below; but it is unlikely that they were granted by any heraldic authority, since one of the envoys had a device referring to his given, and not his family, name.

Sephardic Coats of Arms.

The practise of bearing coats of arms became more general among the Jews at the time of the Maranos. When a Jew became converted in Spain, he was generally adopted by some noble family, and thereby obtained the right to bear the family arms. In this way many Jewish families gained the right to shields, which they carried with them to Holland, and had carved on their tombstones, even after they had repudiated Christianity, which had given them the right to such shields. It would appear that at an even earlier period certain Spanish Jews had adopted arms; since there is on record the elaborate seal of the Halevis of Toledo, bearing the triple-turreted castle of Castile, a device afterward adopted by the earl of Beaconsfield.

In more recent times a grant of arms has lost its feudal significance; and it now merely implies that the grantee is a person of some wealth who desires to have the same external trappings as other persons in his social position. Jews have occasionally yielded to this desire, and a certain number of coats of arms have been granted in England by the heraldic authorities. Besides these, those Jews who have been received into the ranks of the nobility on the continent of Europe have, as a matter of course, been granted armorial bearings, which are recorded in the usual works on heraldry. There is rarely anything distinctively Jewish in the coats of arms thus granted. Occasionally, as with the Montefiores and the Sassoons, a Hebrew word is used; but as a rule the ordinary heraldic signs are utilized.

The subjoined list of coats of arms of Jewish families—the first that has been made—has been compiled from the standard works on heraldry of the respective countries, with occasional reference to Jewish books in which armorial bearings sporadically occur. The full titles of the works cited under names of authors at the end of each blazon are as follows:

Coats of Arms of Jewish Families.
Bibliography:
  • Lucien Wolf, Anglo-Jewish Coats of Arms, in Trans. Jew. Hist. Soc. Eng. 1894-95, pp. 153-169.
J.
H. Gut.
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Bibliography Information
Singer, Isidore, Ph.D, Projector and Managing Editor. Entry for 'Coat of Arms'. 1901 The Jewish Encyclopedia. https://www.studylight.org/​encyclopedias/​eng/​tje/​c/coat-of-arms.html. 1901.
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