looking back

(Scottish Rith heraldry and Rith bicycle shop in Germany, cousins back 10-15 generations...)
I had been told our ancestors had been German protestents (Mennonites) some of whom had come to America (as either Rith or Rieth---and there are still MANY Rieths in Pennsylvania Dutch country and other Mennonite communities), and some of whom, our direct ancestors, ran to Hungary, and later to New York, to escape the Catholics who were kicking the sh!t out of Mennonites in the mid-1700s.
My man Russ asks if this coat of arms from Scotland is us, and I suspect it is a family branch that predates all of that. From what my sister has told me (she has been working on it), going back to about 1100, the Rith's were originally Celts from the area around the Germany-France border, which is where a few Rith's still live. But then, as I say, most of them spread out, and according to Russ's research, a branch ended up in Scotland. Something like MacCraith or somesuch.