Coat of Arms & Family Crests Store
 Rothschild Coat of Arms / Rothschild Family CrestThe associated coat of arms for this name are recorded in J.B Rietstaps Armorial General. Illustrated by V & H.V Rolland's. This Monumental work took 23 years to complete and 85,000 coats of Arms are included in this work. This surname of ROTHSCHILD is an Ashkenazic Jewish house name from a house which was distinguished with a red sign. The famous banking family of the name took it from a house marked in the Jewish quarter of Frankfurt-am-Main. The name has also been adopted by many Jews unrelated to this family. Other spellings of the name include ROTHSCHILD, ROTSCHILD and ROTHCHILDE. When traditional Jews were forced to take family names by the local bureaucracy, it was an obligation imposed from outside traditional society, and people often took the names playfully and let their imaginations run wild by choosing names which corresponded to nothing real in their world. No one alive today can remember the times when Jews took or were given family names (for most Ashkenazim this was the end of the 18th century or the beginning of the 19th) although many remember names being changed after emigration to other countries, such as the United States and Israel in recent years. The ROTHSCHILD dynasty of bankers was founded by Meyer Amschel ROTHSCHILD (1744-1812). He abandoned his intention to become a rabbi after his father's early death, and became a factor to the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel. His five sons established branches of the banking business, and of the family, in several European counties. They were made barons of the Austrian Empire; successive generations in Britain produced the first practising Jew to sit in Parliament, and the first to be raised to the peerage. The eagle depicted in the crest is emblematical of fortitude and magnanimity of mind. The Romans used the figure of an eagle for their ensign, and their example has been often followed. It is the device of Russia, Austria, Germany and the United States of America. |
