especially following upon the assembly of the Great Sanhedrin under Napoleon’s command, caused a distinct change in Jewish customs in Europe.
In 1808 Napoleon sent out a decree commanding all Jews to adopt family names. In Austria a list of surnames was assigned to the Jews, and if a Jew was unable to choose, the state chose for him. The names were devised from precious stones, as Rubenstein; precious metals, such as Goldstein, Silberberg; plants, trees and animals, such as Mandelbaum, Lilienthal, Ochs, Wolf, and Loewe.
The German Jews created surnames by the simple method of affixing the syllable “son” to the father’s name, thus making Jacobson, Isaacson; while others adopted the names of the localities in which they lived, the Jew resident in Berlin becoming Berliner, and the Jew resident in Oppenheim becoming Oppenheimer.
Now, in the region of Schoenberg, in the German Rhine country, a settlement of Jews had lived for several generations. When the order to adopt surnames went forth, Isaac Simon, the head of the settlement, chose the name of Schoenberg. It signifies in German, “beautiful hill.” It is very easily Frenchified into Belmont, which also means beautiful hill or mountain. A Columbia University professor once tried to make it appear that the Belmonts originated in the Belmontes family of Portugal, but found it impossible to harmonize this theory with the Schoenberg facts.
It is noteworthy that a Belmont became American agent of the Rothschilds, and that the name of Rothschild is derived from the red shield on a house in the Jewish quarter of Frankfort-on-the-Main. What the original family name is has never been divulged.
The Jewish habit of changing names is responsible for the immense camouflage that has concealed the true character of Russian events. When Leon Bronstein becomes Leo Trotsky, and when the Jewish