Grant of arms; family memory; aristocracy; heraldic gallery; visual communication; visual heraldic sources

Heraldic symbols were one of the most important elements in the tradition of noble families. The family coat-of-arms was one everyday means by which members of the nobility presented themselves. Thanks to its stable, unchanging form, the coat-of-arms acted as a visual expression of the family’s intergenerational memory. Members of the nobility were constantly surrounded by coats-of-arms – whether as part of everyday items or on ceremonial occasions. Coats-of-arms decorated grand stately homes, and they were depicted on small items such as seal matrices, coins and medals. We can also find heraldic expressions of a family’s tradition in documents and pictorial sources – including memorials, tables of ancestors (Ahnentafeln), family trees and funeral sermons, to name just a few.