Family Crest: Attacking Baby Swans

My cousin Tonya (of Pauline's Cookbook, a blog devoted to our grandmother's cookbook specifically and Slovak food, family history, and culture more generally) is in Eastern Europe doing a little research. Recently she visited Orava Castle* in Slovakia, where she found this Medzihradne family crest. Our great-grandmother's sister married into that family. So the crest is not technically ours. But the image of those baby swans attacking their poor mother (apparently a symbol of sacrifice)... well, it sure does feel somehow familiar some days. 

I'm not at all sure what to make of that bodiless head impaled on a sword brandished by a floating arm. But it's giving me a headache.

*Cool fact: Many scenes from the 1922 film Nosferatu, thought to be filmed in Transylvania, were actually filmed at Orava Castle.

Comments

[aaron]

I was kind of into bestiaries last year (specifically urged on by ACM's "Bestiary" issue) and was fascincated by how many birds (and their supposed sacrifices) were symbols for Christ. The above reminded me of this: http://bestiary.ca/beasts/beast244.htm

[Nathalie]

They aren't attacking their mother. She has pierced her own breast in order to feed them. She is a pelican. It is a traditional image of Christian sacrifice.

[Steph]

Ah! Thanks for the info, you two. Will have to do an update on this.