Comments on: The difficulty of preserving private capital

By: Susan Fenner Latshaw

Susan Fenner Latshaw — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 01:03:03 +0000

The Grosvenor family is descended from Raoul Le Veneur who shot the arrow that pierced King Harold’s eye during the Battle of Hastings and saved William the Conqueror’s life. There are many names including: Fenner, Venner, Vennor, Le Venables, Le Gros Veneur that are derivatives of the name. The name, Le Gros Veneur, meant the great hunter and not fat hunter because of the skill involved with the longbow. I am an ancestor of this family.
Susan Fenner Latshaw

By: observer

observer — Fri, 29 May 2009 14:28:04 +0000

Felix, how about giving Zero Hedge a hat tip – after all that is where you took the Sohn conference notes from.

By: Myles SG

Myles SG — Fri, 29 May 2009 14:27:20 +0000

In fact, Hugh Lupus le Gros Veneur was the nephew of William the Conqueror. He is also the originator of the Cheshire cat, it being a degeneration of his heraldry.

By: Myles SG

Myles SG — Fri, 29 May 2009 14:24:21 +0000

I should note that the Grosvenor family (the Dukes of Westminster) have been wealthy, in one form or another, since the Battle of Hastings. Their ancestor crossed the Channel with William the Conqueror, and among the original family were the chief huntsman to William. (Hence the name Grosvenor, i.e. le Gros Veneur, or The Great/Fat Hunter)

I note that the Duke of Westminster is currently the richest non-expatriate Briton, topping the Sunday Times Rich List.

By: Nadav Manham

Nadav Manham — Fri, 29 May 2009 02:33:20 +0000

As well as the Rothschilds have done in preserving and growing their wealth over centuries, it’s interesting to note that only two of the five Rothschild branches have lasted at all, the English and the French. The other 3–the Italian, Austrian, and the German–died out rather quickly.

Your point about the sobering reality of buy and hold is well-taken, but as always there are counterexamples: The Antinori family of Italy tends the same vineyards its ancestors did during the time of the Medici. And the Fuggerei housing settlement in Germany, originally endowed by Alex Fugger nearly 500 years ago, still draws much of its income from forestry holdings initiated in the 17th century.

I know Paul Singer a little, and although he doesn’t have the highest returns of the speakers at the conference, to him alone would I have entrusted super long-term capital in, say, Paris in 1811, or Vienna in 1913, or Budapest in 1940, or . . . New York in 2009.