While searching the Internet for other images, I came upon an 18th century English chart of minor brisures as they were to have been used in theory. Obviously the system depicted here has it limitations after the second generation but also in how one can differentiate the arms of the sons of the first son from those of their uncles.

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A chart of the system of minor brisures developed by the Canadian Heraldic Authority for use by women.

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A Portuguese mark of difference on the arms of the noble family of Miranda, on a demi-canton Or, a bend Vert, indicating that the arms were inherited from the maternal line.

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Another example of the use of a mark of difference to indicate the path of inheritance of a quartering, this time of the Portuguese noble family of Soares. The mark of difference being a bend Gules on a demi-canton Argent indicating inheritance from the maternal line. These arms are those of Coronel Antonio Soares Brandão and depict the paternal arms, those of the noble family of Brandão, in the second quarter.

A scan from the book Heraldry, Customs, Rules and Styles by Carl Alexander von Volborth, in which the author describes the Portuguese system of differencing in the most basic terms.

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Thanks for that post, David.  I am intrigued by Iberian differencing, however, it doesn’t seem suitably systematic for my tastes.  The option of mixing and matching arms with names is what seems…unorthodox to me.  If the choice of surname determined the arms used it would be more acceptable to me.  Perhaps I just need to escape my narrow heraldic worldview :D

Jonathan, in Iberia, one traditionally adopts both one’s mother’s and father’s surname. I, for example, would be Patrick Marshall-Williams my father would have been Robert Harvey-Williams (as I understand it, this is the very Spanish form of the custom), so the idea of marshalling those arms in quarters, or with brisures when quarters are not available, still "follows the name". Indeed, I’ve read that the whole concept of quartering developed in Iberia around that naming custom.

If all four of one’s grandparents were armigerous, then the typical Spaniard would hold arms quarterly; 1st paternal grandfather, 2nd paternal grandmother, 3rd maternal grandfather, 4th maternal grandmother. So, in fact, the arms do follow the name (but if follows all the names).

The Portugese customary peculiarity of arbitrary surnames does make things a little stranger to our sensibilities, but remember-my children (as an example) would have a choice of names and arms of Williams, Marshall, Harvey, Colclough, Hinshaw, Robinson, Swanson, Scott, etc., etc., as far back as my and my wife’s genealogy can be proven. They could choose any surname and any arms (or mixture thereof) that any of those ancestors were entitled to. Obviously, in Portugal, the arms follow the family, not necessarily the name. It’s quirky, but so is Portugal.

Patrick Williams;48221 wrote:

Jonathan, in Iberia, one traditionally adopts both one’s mother’s and father’s surname. I, for example, would be Patrick Marshall-Williams my father would have been Robert Harvey-Williams (as I understand it, this is the very Spanish form of the custom),

Patrick, you are correct in that this is a Spanish custom, however, the names in both cases you mentioned would be Patrick Williams-Marshall and Patrick Williams-Harvey respectively.  So everytime the family name is written, it would start with your paternal family name then the maternal surnames.

The way you have it above is the way it is done in other western traditions, but not the Spanish tradition.

Regrads,

Thanks for the clarificiation, Hassan. :D

Here is a link to basic information regarding Spanish naming practices as they are now employed, it should be noted that the practices of the Spanish nobility, those actually bearing coats-of-arms, are more complicated.

http://www.tarver-genealogy.net/aids/spanish/sp_naming_conv.html#basicpractice

Here is link to surname practices in Brazil:

http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/Rg/guide/Brazil24.asp#surnames

An excellent article on Spanish surnames by Don Jos&#233; Casas y S&#225;nchez:

http://users.panola.com/AAGHS/ARTICLES/SURNAMES.html

Jose’s article is quite good indeed.

Until mid XIX century in Spanish and Portuguese individuals use to pick up from any of their surnames (paternal line or maternal line) and this makes genealogy a little bit complex. Sometimes sibling could have total different surnames and similar arms…

I’ll post later an example with some ancestor of mine who actually took a different surname than his father.

As per cadency marks, they are rare in the Hispanic world except for the royal family, particularly the Prince of Asturias.

Somewhere I have a book with the &#8220;infantes&#8221; cemetery&#8217;s heraldry and you can see how the Coat of arms changes (not only with cadency marks which ususally are placed on Borbon) a great deal. . I&#8217;ll look for it later today.

As promised an example of the confusing uses to transmit surnames in the Iberoamerican society.

I know this is not a genealogy site but it is interesting as an example of how Spaniards use to have different choices at the time to pick up a surname

Antonio Diaz Garavito (1580)  - Maria de Vasquez

Antonio Diaz Vasquez (1618)  -Maria Rodriguez de Rivadeneira

Diego Diaz de Rivadeneira y Garavito (1642)-Maria Guerrero de Salazar y Morillo

Basilio Antonio Rodriguez de Rivadeneira (1709)-Manuela de la Cruz y Ponce de Leon

Mariano Rivadeneira De la Cruz (1731) - Micaela Escobar y Alava

Maria Rivadeneira Escobar (1772) - Jose Duenas y Sanchez de Orellana (1760)

Fernando Duenas y Rivadeneira

I’ve placed the dates of documents (usually sacramental acts) that my family have for those individuals just to have an idea of the period time they lived in. After Don Fernando Duenas y Rivadeneira (my maternal great great grand father) they kept using today’s convention in the Hispanic world, this is paternal surname and maternal surname.

What it is interesting is that one of my maternal family’s quarters represents Rivadeneira (still today) because there was an agreement that forced Fernando to include this quarter in order to inherit his mother properties.

I am still working to have some pic about cadency marks in the Spanish Royal Family

Welcome back, Aurelio.  I look forward to seeing the pictures you will post about cadency in Spain.

Cheers,

Hassan

That’s very interesting Aurelio. I didn’t know Spanish has such flexibility back then. I am familiar with the custom of paternal and maternal surnames (half my family still follows this practice), but I’ve heard of case that this custom is falling slowly into disuse in some Hispanic areas.

I understand that’s true particularly in part of South America such as Argentina and Uruguay, but not in more nearby places like Mexico.

In the US this can lead to some interesting conversations when a Hispanic couple gets married.  Speaking from personal experience, it was unclear what my wife and I would do regarding her surname.  She received only her father’s surname in the US tradition, but has her mother’s maiden surname ‘Mendez’ as a middle name, as does her sister.  But her brothers have ‘independent” middle names.  She stared out hyphenating our surnames after marriage (Vargas-Olivo), but found that unsatisfactory and now goes by just Olivo.

Nothing is set in stone yet, but our kids may only be ‘Olivo’ on paper, but will carry both in reality.  This is because US legal paperwork is just not designed to carry both without creating a whole new surname, ‘Olivo y Vargas’ or whatnot.

Of course we will always have the middle name option.  It’s quite confusing!

David Pritchard;46598 wrote:

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A Portuguese mark of difference on the arms of the noble family of Miranda, on a demi-canton Or, a bend Vert, indicating that the arms were inherited from the maternal line.

Why is it called a "demi-canton"?