Counts of Luxburg
Coat of arms of the Counts of Luxburg "Wappen der Grafen von Luxburg"
The Luxburg, also known in the 18th century as Girtanner de Luxburg, is the name of an aristocratic family originally from St. Gallen (Switzerland), who once immigrated from the House of Girtanner, located in the canton of Appenzell and who, after 1813, became a noble lineage of Bavaria that was mentioned for the first time in 1386 in a document with the name Girtanner. As examples of ennoblement of this lineage the following are mentioned:
Nomination as Knights of the Empire on March 18, 1776 in Vienna with the name "Nobleman of Luxburg" for Johann Girtanner (1705-??) of St. Gallen as general agent for the salt mines of Lorraine, who had previously acquired the palace of Luxburg in Egnach on Lake Constance. - Appointment as Baron on January 29, 1779 in Vienna with the protocol treatment "Magnifi cus" and the raising of the coat of arms for Johann Knight of Girtanner and Nobleman of Luxburg himself. - Appointment as Count of the Empire on September 24, 1790 in Munich by Prince Elector Karl Theodor von Pfalzbayern [of Palatine Bavaria] as Imperial Vicar for his son Johann Friedrich Count of Luxburg as privy councilor and chief cupbearer of the Palatine County of Zweibrücken and Langrave of Hesse and Darmstadt. Registration in the Kingdom of Bavaria in the class of counts on January 11, 1813 for the latter son Friedrich Count of Luxburg as Bavarian royal treasurer and messenger of Kassel as well as for his brothers and sisters.
The family coat of arms of the Counts of Luxburg, dated 1790, is documented and is described as "a silver St. Andrew's cross diagonally divided into four parts in red and blue and bearing a scutcheon in which a lynx seated in a natural form can be seen; the left diagonal band of the St. Andrew's cross is endowed with six brown horns inclined and with golden applications; the right diagonal band has six brown arrows one after the other with red feathers and steel tips. Two helmets: on the right helmet with blue and silver lambrequins appears the seated lynx; on the left helmet with red and silver lambrequins an eagle's wing divided in red and blue, with a diagonal band right showing a fl echa like the one on the shield. Chief: two natural lynxes facing in opposite directions."