Well, That Didn't Go As Expected!

Many of you will know, as regular readers of this blog, that I watch an HGTV show called "House Hunters International". I watch this show for several reasons: (1) It's interesting, and I can learn a lot about different places in the world; (2) sometimes I will see someplace that I have visited, and it brings back all kinds of good memories; and (3) occasionally I will see a coat of arms.

In a very recent episode, the show was in Bram, France.

As you can see from the inset map above, Bram is in Occitania, a place where I think I came closest to was when I attended a conference in Besançon, about 700 kilometers away, so not that close! But Bram is a very old town with an unusual city plan.

As you can see from the image above, the oldest part of the town is built in a set of expanding circles, the buildings facing circular streets, all centered on the church in the middle. And frankly, I don't think I've ever seen a city laid out in quite this fashion. (I have seen cities laid out within the loop of a river, like Besançon, France, but that's not quite the same as Bram here.)

Anyway, at one point during the show they showed the cover of a book entitled Decouvrir Bram: La ville circulaire, or in English, "Discover Bram: The circular city".

And the book cover had a coat of arms on it complete with supporters and surmounted by a civic or municipal coronet:

 So I thought, well, that should be easy enough to track down and get the colors and do a quick blog post.

Wrong!

I don't know whose coat of arms that is on the cover (and you can click on the image above to go to the full-size photo to see for yourself), but it is certainly not that of the ville de Bram, whose coat of arms is this one:

Nor is it the arms of the département to which Bram belongs, Aude, which is this:

And finally, it is not the (probably unofficial) arms of the region of Occitania, here:

So I don't know. Is it the arms of Bram (Or a cross gules) with possibly local buildings added to the first and fourth quarters and roundels? some kind of fruit? arranged three two and one in the second and third quarters?

Certainly the shield is topped with a turreted mural coronet, and it has two supporters of lions rampant reguardant.

So it's a bit of a conundrum. And what I thought would surely be a quick and easy identification has become something of a mystery.

Still, it's clearly a coat of arms, and one which I, once again, ran across sitting on my very own couch in my very own living room. And that is one of the main reasons I keep watching new episodes of this show!

An Armorial Memorial to a Young Man

Continuing our look at some of the armorial memorials set into the outside walls of the Frauenkirche, the Cathedral of Our Dear Lady, in Munich, Germany, we come to this lovely example.

This is the memorial of Eustace Ligsalz, a member of the prominent Ligsalz patrician family of Munich, who died at the young age of 22. The main feature of the memorial is his full-length portrait carved in bas relief, with his family's coat of arms and crest at his feet.

The Ligsalz (also spelled Liegsalz) family was one of the wealthiest and most influential patrician dynasties guiding Munich's medieval and early modern city council. The Ligsalz dynasty served continuously on the Munich inner city council and as mayors, remaining a cornerstone of the city's aristocracy from the medieval period until the family line ended in the 18th century.

Additional information about the family can be found on the German Wikipedia website at https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ligsalz_(Patrizierfamilie)

Transcription of the Latin Inscription on the memorial:

EUSTACHIO LIGSALZ IN FARCHEN NOBILI PATRICIO MONACENSI VICTIO SUPERSTITE FILIO QUEM NON SINE MAGNO DOLORE SUO QUEM PRECLARA SPEM NOMINIS EXCITAVERAT A SALUTIS M D LXXVI SUAE AETATIS XXII DECIMA SEXTA KAL DECEMBER MORS MATURA AD COELITES SUSTULIT PARENTES MOESTI HOC MONUMENTUM POSUERE

And here is the English translation:

To Eustace Ligsalz von Farchen, a noble patrician of Munich, the surviving son of Victius. Whom—not without great sorrow to themselves, as he had raised brilliant hopes for his name—ripe death snatched away to the heavens in the year of Salvation 1576, in the 22nd year of his age, on the 16th day before the Kalends of December (November 16). His sorrowful parents erected this monument.

Rietstap's Armorial Général gives us the blazon for these arms: Ligsalz de Farchach. Écartelé: aux 1 et 4, de gueules, à la bande d'argent, ch. d'une flèche de sable, posée dans le sens de la bande; aux 2 et 3, d'argent, à un garçon issant, habillé de gueules, mouv. d'une couronne d'or. 

The English blazon is: Quarterly: 1st and 4th, Gules on a bend argent an arrow point to chief sable [Ligsalz]; 2nd and 3rd, Argent a boy issuant proper habited gules rising from a crown or [Farchach/Farchen?].

The crest combines the crests of each of the component quarters of the arms: A boy issuant proper habited gules rising from a crown or [Farchach/Farchen?], wearing a hat gules turned up argent, the argent portion charged with an arrow sable, at the peak of the cap issuant from a crown or four ostrich plumes sable [Ligsalz].

It's a touching memorial to a young son by his grieving parents, as well as a lovely display of heraldry.