Here’s another possible solution: let those who would become armigerous assume their own respective arms; those who decline to be armigerous have that right as well. However, if the goal is to make every family member armigerous, then the idea of differencing the Baker Arms, IMHO, seems to be the best approach, except that the differencing would likely have to be more significant than mere tincture changes. Replacing/adding/dropping various charges would also be neccessary to accomodate the entire Baker Extended Family.
My only problem with changing the arms too much, is that at some point you might as well just design new arms for them, because any resemblance to the "Baker Family" has been lost.
If you were to do that though, I would think it could have a canton, escutcheon or something similar with the Baker Badge to express that relationship.
Linusboarder;46764 wrote:
My only problem with changing the arms too much, is that at some point you might as well just design new arms for them, because any resemblance to the "Baker Family" has been lost.
If you were to do that though, I would think it could have a canton, escutcheon or something similar with the Baker Badge to express that relationship.
Except that badges are meant to mark people, not shields. Everyone in the Baker clan can (including grandchildren, cousins 17 times removed, etc.), with approval of the head of the family, wear the badge now. But one doesn’t include the badge on another shield, even in escutcheon. Maybe even, particularly in escutcheon. Jonathan’s neices and nephews (the children of his sisters) are amongst the family goup and therefore could, with permission, wear the badge. But they aren’t entitled to the badge as an heraldic charge, just as they aren’t entitled to the Baker arms.
Indeed, Colin, I do think that new arms should be devised for these poor, non-armigerous souls, and that these new arms not be based around the Baker arms. They are, if I’m guessing correctly, not named Baker.
Patrick Williams;46774 wrote:
...But they aren’t entitled to the badge as an heraldic charge, just as they aren’t entitled to the Baker arms.
But they are entitled to the Baker arms. In American society, all children bear equal rights of inheritance. The problem arises from the fact that the shield would no longer be tied to the Baker surname.
Patrick Williams wrote:
Indeed, Colin, I do think that new arms should be devised for these poor, non-armigerous souls, and that these new arms not be based around the Baker arms. They are, if I’m guessing correctly, not named Baker.
You are correct that their surname is not Baker, but as I pointed out before, I feel that they are entitled to the arms. They are, genetically, just as much a Baker as I am…I just happen to carry the surname, as well. My thinking is that if they wish to bear the Baker arms, that they should be suitably differenced. (At this point, I’m thinking that charges on the chief should be changed.) This, in effect, creates a new coat of arms for the new surname of the cadet branch, yet is still clearly linked to the Baker arms.
Of course, if the father should choose to become armigerous, quartering of the undifferenced arms would be permissible, as would the assumption of completely new and unrelated arms, however this last option disregards the basic familial identification that is part of the purpose of heraldry.
Jonathan R. Baker;46782 wrote:
But they are entitled to the Baker arms. In American society, all children bear equal rights of inheritance. The problem arises from the fact that the shield would no longer be tied to the Baker surname.
Simply because something is allowed does not always make it the path to follow. On the chat program we have been discussing religiously provocative decadent ‘art’. Just because one can make ‘art’ from elephant dung or combine a religious symbol with bodily fluids and call it ‘art’ does not make it right. It is my opinion that arms divorced from the surname name, unless they are an inherited quartering, are no longer a coat-of-arms but some type of collective clan symbol. Traditionally a maternally inherited coat-of-arms is always accompanied by a change of surname or a combining of surnames. Only in Canada has this 900 year old rule been circumvented.
I don’t know if the Baker’s are doing this, but what if the children used the Baker crest with different (i.e. their surname’s) arms. Now if Jon was planning on changing crests, as some do, then this could be a problem, but iof he was planning staying with the same crest for all then the clear "Baker" stamp would be on the arms, while the arms themselves wouldn’t "Say" "baker" when the child is "Smith"
Jonathan R. Baker;46782 wrote:
But they are entitled to the Baker arms. In American society, all children bear equal rights of inheritance. The problem arises from the fact that the shield would no longer be tied to the Baker surname.
Once again, Jonathan, look at our own guidelines:
3.4.4. A person who takes his or her spouse’s name upon marriage may continue using the arms to which he or she was entitled by birth, but transmits these arms to his or her own offspring only under one of the following conditions:
The child’s legal surname is the same as the parent’s birth surname, in which case the arms may be inherited without difference. So unless the kids in question change their name to Baker ...
Jonathan R. Baker;46782 wrote:
You are correct that their surname is not Baker, but as I pointed out before, I feel that they are entitled to the arms. They are, genetically, just as much a Baker as I am…I just happen to carry the surname, as well. My thinking is that if they wish to bear the Baker arms, that they should be suitably differenced. (At this point, I’m thinking that charges on the chief should be changed.) This, in effect, creates a new coat of arms for the new surname of the cadet branch, yet is still clearly linked to the Baker arms.
Yes, Jonathan, I know you feel that way, but according to our guidelines, they do not. Now, certainly, if they were differenced well enough to functionally be a different coat of arms ... but in that case why not make a new coat of arms? Remember this concept: arms follow the name. When your sisters married and took the name of their spouses (assuming they did) they left the Baker family to become a member of another. And if their children do not bear the Baker surname, despite the fact that you consider them as much a Baker as you are, they are in fact not Bakers. Therefore, their families, no matter how well loved, are not cadet branches of the Baker family, they do not bear the name surname. And let’s not get genetics into this: in fact, genetically, your sisters are a mix of your mother and your paternal grandmother. They do not have Baker dna at all and therefore, neither do their children.
Jonathan R. Baker;46782 wrote:
Of course, if the father should choose to become armigerous, quartering of the undifferenced arms would be permissible, as would the assumption of completely new and unrelated arms, however this last option disregards the basic familial identification that is part of the purpose of heraldry.
Sorry, Jerbs, that isn’t accurate either. Once again from the same guideline: If either parent is an original bearer of arms, the arms are inherited by his or her children regardless of the surname, in quartered form if the children are also entitled to inherit the other parent’s arms. Your sisters are NOT original bearers of the arms (you, upon inheritance will be) and only have courtesy use. They will not be able to pass an undifferenced quarter of Baker to anyone, unless and until all the male progeny and male descendants of your grandfather die (which we call: "the male line fails") or one of them somehow is named the heir to the arms (in which case you should stop using them) or the kids take the Baker surname.
Now, to steal an old phrase from Joseph, this is America and because their is no legal standing to arms, you can do whatever you want. However, the AHS has accepted these guidelines and until such time as they change this must be the answer to your question here in the fora: your sisters’ children have no real claim to the Baker arms. They are not named Baker and they are not the children of the ‘original’ armiger.
Isn’t playing Devil’s Advocate fun? :D
Jonathan,
I think you’re getting yourself unnecessarily tangled up here. What everyone is advising you is
(a) your cousins do not, under any traditional understanding of heraldic rules, have a right to quarter the Baker arms. They are not Bakers, and a line is alive that does perpetuate the Baker arms assumed by your grandfather
and
(b) the kind of minor differences you propose to introduce are appropriate for more remote kin of the Baker name (your grandfather’s brothers or their children, for example) but not for maternal-line cousins.
(An aside: DNA has nothing to do with this. Everyone, whether male or female, has the DNA of both parents, but it doesn’t matter. We’ve drafted our guidelines to conform to legal practice, not genetics, just as traditional heraldic inheritance was based on law, not genetics.)
But that doesn’t prevent your aunts and cousins from bearing arms that are visually related to the Baker arms. In doing so, they would be following a custom that was quite prevalent in the dawn of heraldry. Here’s an example of what you might do.
Let’s suppose that one of your father’s sisters married a man named Smith (and is now divorced), while the other married a man named Barney (and is still married).
Your Smith aunt, while entitled to use the Baker arms undifferenced, might choose instead to adopt arms of her own, or her children might each do so separately. An appropriate design might be "Sable an anvil Or, on a bordure Vert 13 estoiles Argent." Thus you preserve the color scheme of your arms, the "stars fell" motif, and the baker’s dozen reference.
Your Barney uncle could assume arms of his own of a radically different design, and he and your aunt could then impale those with the undifferenced Baker coat. If their children desired to commemorate the Baker in their own arms, each of them could compound a coat with Barney and Baker elements.
Let’s suppose your uncle adopts "Ermine on a bend Gules three barn owls Or" (an allusion to the bucket-shop arms of Barney, altered through a pun on "barn"). His eldest son might change the tincture of the bend to Vert. Another might do that and change one of the owls to a garb. Another might use the eldest’s brother’s version but change the ermine field to "Argent seme of estoiles Sable." And so on.
All of these would show a visual connection to your Baker grandfather’s arms while honoring the traditional conception for transmission of arms.
What do you think?
I suppose I am getting unnecessarily tangled up over this. I was confused by the fact that female children inherit the arms as the male children do, but without the right to transmit them to their children except in exceptional cases (i.e. the children take her surname rather than the father’s surname, as is usual in this country). This seems a little sexist, but it is necessary to maintain the integrity of the surname/arms connection.
I will now bow the collective wisdom of all who tried to correct my erroneous ways. :D If my cousins wish to become armigerous, I will advise them in how to do so correctly, and if they so desire, in ways that pay homage to my grandfather’s arms.
Patrick Williams wrote:
And let’s not get genetics into this: in fact, genetically, your sisters are a mix of your mother and your paternal grandmother. They do not have Baker dna at all and therefore, neither do their children.
I just wanted to clear something up here…Humans carry 23 pairs of chromosomes, half of each pair coming from each parent. However, when you pass these chromosomes to your offspring, there is a multitude of combinations that are possible. Yes, Dad must have passed Grandma’s X chromosome to my sister, as that was the only X chromosome that he possesses, but this doesn’t require that he give her the "complete set" from Grandma. It is possible that this happened, but far from likely. It is more likely that he gave my sister a combination of chromosomes from both of his parents’ genetic material.
Jonathan R. Baker;46793 wrote:
This seems a little sexist, but it is necessary to maintain the integrity of the surname/arms connection.
Actually, if anything is sexist, it’s not the arms-surname connection but the decision on what to name the children. The guidelines make provision for the social choice to give children the mother’s surname or to give them a combination of both parents’ surnames. What we say, in effect, is that people can’t have it both ways: having decided on the traditional naming practice, the parents shouldn’t then go with an anti-traditional heraldic inheritance scheme.
(Obviously special provisions have to be made in the case of families that do not follow the modern European-American system of family surnames.)
Interesting proposal regarding surnames in China…
And a better article with some history:
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/ezine/2007-06/18/content_896606.htm
Slightly off topic.
Under the heraldic rules of the Russian Empire, an heiress could transmit her arms as a quartering to her legitimate noble male heir if he bore a hyphenated surname or took her surname (if she bore a higher title or more famous surname than her husband) upon the approval of the Emperor (who as autocrat had to personally approve all changes of name).
A rather recent example of this is the only son of Stanislaw Dumin (a noble of the Russian Empire), the noted Russian genealogist and member of the Heraldry Commission of the President of the Russian Federation. The mother of his son, Princess Turkestanova is the last of her line, therefore their son known as Feodor Tukestanov-Dumin (with the approval of Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna) will become Prince Turkestanov-Dumin upon his mother’s demise. While I am not certain as to how these arms have been marshaled, they will most likely be borne impaled which has been the Russian tradition for those persons with hyphenated surnames.
As demonstrated once more, it is not normal heraldic practice to divorce the surname from the arms, even in Tsarist Russia.
one more reason i like the ‘arms follow the surname’ argument joe settled on for the AHS guidelines.
Patrick Williams;46774 wrote:
Except that badges are meant to mark people, not shields. Everyone in the Baker clan can (including grandchildren, cousins 17 times removed, etc.), with approval of the head of the family, wear the badge now. But one doesn’t include the badge on another shield, even in escutcheon. Maybe even, particularly in escutcheon. Jonathan’s neices and nephews (the children of his sisters) are amongst the family goup and therefore could, with permission, wear the badge. But they aren’t entitled to the badge as an heraldic charge, just as they aren’t entitled to the Baker arms.
Indeed, Colin, I do think that new arms should be devised for these poor, non-armigerous souls, and that these new arms not be based around the Baker arms. They are, if I’m guessing correctly, not named Baker.
Hmm ok then, but if you wanted to incorporate the bakers arms into these new arms, a black canton with a gold garb may still be a good way to do that. So maybe not putting the badge, but putting an element of the Baker Arms in the shield wouldn’t be a bad idea.