Attributed coat of arms of Satan

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       The coat of arms attributed to Satan is Gules a fess Or between three frogs proper, which appears painted in the folio of a mediæval manuscript known as the Douce Apocalypse, created in England c. A.D. 1270. The arms are inspired by chapter 16, verse 13 of the Book of the Revelation of Saint John, which reads, as quoted from the Douay–Rheims translation, "And I saw from the mouth of the dragon, and from the mouth of the beast, and from the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs."
       As Satan is often given the rank of prince, twice referred to as the "prince of this world" in the Gospel According to Saint John, known as the "prince of the power of this air" in the Epistle Of Saint Paul to the Ephesians, described as being the Prince of the Grigori in the Second Book of Enoch, his arms are presented here in the same fashion of a sovereign prince, the crown that of a German fürst.

Attributed coat of arms of Gaius Julius Caesar

Alexander © September ANNO DOMINI 2011

       Centuries after the fall of Rome as a Western European power, it was resurrected by Pope Leo II when he conferred unto Charles I the Great, King of the Franks the title of Imperator Romanorum,
or Emperor of the Romans. The symbol of these emperors became, after the prevalence of heraldry in European culture, Or an eagle displayed sable, which was borne by the emperors separately from the personal arms as a mark of their highest seat. By as late as 1401, the imperial coat of arms was altered, replacing the eagle with one of two heads, which was from then on occasionally found haloed. Beginning in 1437 the personal arms of the emperor, which were displayed previously in their own right, began to appear on an inescutcheon on the breast of the imperial eagle.
       So then, it was assumed the heraldic achievement used by the Emperors of the Romans as a mark of their rank and title was also the coat of arms of Gaius Julius Caesar, the man who laid the foundations of the first Roman Empire and whose heir became the first Augustus of Rome.
       The coat of arms are borne upon the breast of another black two-headed eagle, the heads haloed each by a nimbus, symbolic of the unique and curious position Julius Caesar holds within the Holy Roman Catholic Church. For it is by him which, by consolidating all power and establishing precedent which would one day lead to Constantine the Great declaring the Christian faith valid, inadvertently created the earliest foundations from which could be built the Church.

Attributed coat of arms of the House of Palaiologos

Alexander © September ANNO DOMINI 2011

       During the late European Mediæval period, the reigning family of the Roman Empire in Constantinople was attributed by Western European scribes a coat of arms which comprised the two-headed eagle emblem of the emperors with the Empire's naval ensign, the naval ensign assumed to have been the imperial family's coat of arms.
       The heraldic achievement of the Palaiologi is attested, then, to be either Gules a cross between four flints Or or Gules, a cross between four β Or in manuscripts; a crest was even devised being Issuant from a crown of three leaves and two pearls a tub of the arms filled with peacock feathers. The arms are markedly similar to those of the Palaiologi's predecessors, namly Philip of Courtenay, whose escutcheon is Gules a cross between four crosses encircled between four crosslets Or, and those attributed to the House of Lakarsis, whose escutcheon is Gules a cross between four crosses pattée encircled.
       As for the eagle as am imperial emblem, a black eagle in profile on a golden field all within a red annulet had been used as a symbol of the Roman Emperors in Constantinople since as early as A.D. 578, during the co-regency of Tiberius II Constantine. A golden two-headed eagle on a red field latter appeared as a symbol of the emperors during the reign of Theodore II Lascaris, which began in A.D. 1254, which may have actually been usurped from the Seljuqs of Rum as it was earlier the emblem of Kaikhosrau II of Ikonion, until the Seljuq sultan had to abandon the emblem in A.D. 1243 as a result of military losses to the invading Mongols.
       Michael VIII, the first emperor of the House of Palaiologos, adopted a golden single-headed eagle with halo on a red field as his imperial symbol when he took the throne in A.D. 1261. Michael  VIII appointed his son Andronicus II as co-emperor, whose emblem was a red single-headed eagle on a golden field. After the death of Michael VIII, Andronicus II reverted the imperial emblem to a golden-two headed eagle on a red field once again, and also used a crowned golden two-headed eagle on a red field between three ciphers as his personal banner.

Proposed coat of arms of the Rothschilds

Alexander © May ANNO DOMINI 2011

On 25 September and 21 October 1816, Amschel, Salomon, Carl and James Rothschild were enobled by the Imperial Court of Austria. The proposal, which was a political move to gain the favour of the influential banking family, came from Count Franz Stadion von Warthausen, the Minister of Finance, and approved by Prince Klemens Wenzel von Metternich-Winneburg zu Beilstein, the Minister of State. The fifth brother, Nathan, who resided in Great Britain, was not ennobled as he was under foreign jurisdiction.

The Imperial Court heralds requested a design proposal for the family's coat of arms, and Solomon submitted a design that can be described as, Quarterly (I) Or an eagle sable surcharged in dexter by a field gules, (II) gules a leopard Or, (III) a lion rampant gules and (IV) azure an arm bearing five arrows proper, overall-in center an inescutcheon gules. The crest as, Issuant from a crest coronet a demi-lion Or. The supporters of Solomon Rothschild's design are a greyhound and stork.

The design underwent major revision by the heralds of the Imperial Court. The supporters were rejected out right. The crest was also refused for use of the crest coronet, which was improper in Germanic practice for untitled nobles to display (the Rothschilds would later be created barons and display crest coronets). The escutcheon was also altered quite extensively. The first quarter was slightly changed, with the gules surmount being removed. The second quarter with the leopard was pulled from the arms altogether, the Austrian heralds believing it improper to grant use of a charge taken from the British Sovereign's personal arms without permission. The third quarter with the lion rampant was kept but moved to the fourth quarter. The fourth quarter with the arm and arrows was then moved to occupy the second and third quarters, though with only four arrows to exclude Nathan Rothschild (when the Rothschilds were later created barons, Nathan was included in the patent and a fifth arrow added). A patent for the modified arms was granted on 25 March 1817.