Hello,I have run into conflicting information regarding our coat of arms.One source I found 9 years ago provides the Coat of arms and states at the bottom of the description and picture "The grant of arms is recorded in the "Libro d'oro della Nobilita" (Italy) and "Das Grosse Wappenbuch" (Germany and Austria). A second source I found yesterday on www.wappenbuch.com has a different spelling of Bisantz and a different coat of arms. Can anyone recommend to me a professional or website location that can help me with this? I can easily email the original coat I received to anyone who might help. Thank you..I want to put the accurate one on the cover of my family book I am giving out as Xmas gifts this year. Shannon

There is no easy answer to your quandary. I'm not at all surprised that you are having problems with conflicting information. The image that you have provided with your query has no provenance whatsoever and is what is referred to as a 'potted history' of a family name - more often than not something that is spewed out by tapping a couple of computer keys and getting generic info from a 'potted' database. This is a typical 'tool' used by unscrupulous heraldry-mongers trying to sell their fraudulent wares to the gullible members of the public. They're referred to as 'bucket shops'.

First of all, Arms are personal, just like a passport or driving licence and unless you are in the direct male lineage of the original grantee, you wouldn't be entitled to use those arms. Arms do not belong to a name - it's the other way round - a particular person's name belongs to specific arms.

I quite often use as an example someone by the name of Smith looking for "their family arms". There are well over 500 different designs registered in the surname of Smith or its derivatives. Just because you might happen to also be a Smith does not give you any right to use any one of those registered arms as your own unless you can produce documentary evidence of a paternal pedigree linking you to a specific Smith armiger (person entitled to bear arms).

However, that said, if the original letters patent for the grant of arms stipulated that they were to be used by the male heirs of the original armiger, then all his sons, grandsons, great-grand sons, etc., would be entitled to use those arms which, in regulated heraldic jurisdictions, have to be 'differenced' from the original arms.

Secondly, may I direct your attention to the Most Frequently Asked Questions (MFAQ) on personal arms that you will find on Francois Velde's excellent heraldic website at http://www.heraldica.org/faqs/mfaq - it may well give you a better idea of things heraldic. Also available for perusal is the Society of Genealogists Information Leaflet #15 which can be viewed at http://www.sog.org.uk/leaflets/arms.pdf

To know IF you are entitled to use 'such and such' arms, you would have to do the paternal genealogy research back to an original armiger (and all the children in between). I am willing to do some limited research on the arms that you already have if you could send me a copy by email to gjksau at yahoo dot com dot au.

<< A second source I found yesterday on www.wappenbuch.com has a different spelling of Bisantz and a different coat of arms. >>
Those arms displayed at that web-reference are those of the bishop of the one-time (RC?) diocese of Bisantz.