So, at my aunt's thrift store a donation came in, a wooden plate, with 9 German cities coat of arms on it. It took a while for me to figure out what the centre one was (it was heavily faded), but even after figuring it out, I still don't know the whys of the plate.

The plate itself, is wood. It has 8 coat of arms around the edge, and one in the centre. It has some etched designs on it, with a helmet in the centre above the coat of arms. Going from the top and going clockwise, ending with the one in the centre, the cities are:

Rüdesheim
Rüsselsheim
Hanau
Bingen A/RH. (Bingen am Rhein)
Darmstadt
Bad Nauheim
Heidelberg
Wiesbaden
Frankfurt

It has nothing written on the back, but it was obviously meant to hang on a wall, since there is a decidedly modern hanger attached to it.

So, what is this, when is it depicting, and why?

Well, they all lie pretty close to each other... can't they be cities of some historical region like Hessen?

That's what I was thinking, but I'm not certain when it was, looking for maps of Hessen gives me a bunch of maps of modern day Hesse.

[url=http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Datei:Image-Wappen-HD.jpg&filetimestamp=20080205210358]Is it this?[/url]

Großherzogtum Hessen.

EDit: I see that Frankfurt is supposed to be in the center, so nevermind and this doesn't even contain most of them at all. Sorry.

Have you tried finding it on this list?

Here's a picture of the plate.

Edit: And another.

Yeah, it's not that. If it was related to the Großherzogtum Hessen (Grand Duchy of Hesse) it would probably have had Darmstadt in the center as it was the capital. Also Heidelberg was a part of the Grand Duchy of Baden. It has to be something different.

I can't for the life of me figure out what all those cities have in common, apart from being in roughly the same area of Germany. They're not in the same federal states (Hesse, Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate), not all of them have universities, they are part of different Metropolitan Regions (Rhine-Main, Rhine-Neckar), some rather important cities from the same area are missing (Mainz, Mannheim,...),...


Generally speaking, I wouldn't attribute it too much significance. It seems to be a decorative piece from around the 1950s give or take. The coat of arms could probably be chosen individually and applied before purchase. For all we know it could be from a choral society which happened to sing in all of these cities or any other club which had a reason for touring cities. It certainly looks like something you would find hanging on a club house wall...

I'm from the area this plate is depicting and I can't think of anything those cities have in common. Frankfurt is in the middle, which would mean that this could come from the middle 19th century, when Frankfurt was very important. But most of the other cities are rather unimportant (Bingen, really?) while more important once are missing.

The closest I can think of is that many of these cities have somewhat important Jewish communities. But the much more important jewish cities in the area are missing.

Maybe a catholic connection? Probably this.

Whoever made this probably just took some nice coat of arms from a certain region and put them together in a semi-cordial way to make it look like a heraldic antiquity. It's nice to look at (or at least was), but I agree with everyone here that it probably has no other significance to speak of.

My mother is an antique dealer (been one for 50 years) and if you'd like I can show her the picture. I make no promises but she tends to know more about this stuff than god.

Thanks guys, I figured it probably wasn't particularly old, but I figured it would be good to check it out anyways. Sure, that'd be great!

It looks like a memorablia you could buy from a souvernirshop in the 1950's or 1960's I think.

I love looking through charity shops and junk shops, I haven't see that plate before but I saw a china one similar just before Christmas, I have to agree with Strijkbout, I think it is a tourist piece, Its a nice enough plate but I would be doubtful of it having any real value

Yep, that looks about right, thanks!