FAMILY CRESTS GOING

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21462, 8 April 1933, Page 6 (Supplement)

FAMILY CRESTS GOING

TAXATION BLAMED The possession and display of family coats of arms appears to be dying out. In London, which is probably typical of the country as a whole, the number of licences taken out has declined yearly without exception from 1912, a peak year, to 19.30, the latest time for which the figures are available. In that period of 18 years the number has shrunk to two-thirds of the prewar figure—a decrease of 2600 licences out of a total of 7437. " Overtaxation of the class that was entitled to armorial bearings is tho cause of the changed habits," it is stated. " The old families and the oldfashioned autocrats with their hosts of male-servants, carriages, and estates of pre-war days took family coats of arms and family crests as a matter of course, and knew how to display them. " But they are becoming extinct. Many have been hard hit by taxation and forced to relinquish the old costly appurtenances. So they let tho armorial

bearings go too. " Otliprs are unable through poverty, to afford even the guinea cost of the annual licence. Other families have been broken up and have migrated abroad.

" But the use of armorial bearings is unlikely to vanish completely. A few public schools and corporations will always be sufficiently proiid of their historic arms to retain them, even if personal owners should become extinct."