The British nobility is made up of the peerage and the (landed) gentry. The nobility of its four constituent home nations has played a major role in shaping the history of the country, although the hereditary peerage now retain only the rights to stand for election to the House of Lords, dining rights there, position in the formal order of precedence, the right to certain titles, and the right to an audience (a private meeting) with the monarch. More than a third of British land is in the hands of aristocrats and traditional landed gentry. [1]
The British nobility in the narrow sense consists of members of the immediate families of peers who bear courtesy titles or honorifics. [2] Members of the peerage carry the titles of duke, marquess, earl, viscount or baron. British peers are sometimes referred to generically as lords, although individual dukes are not so styled when addressed or by reference.
All modern British honours, including peerage dignities, are created directly by the Crown and take effect when letters patent are issued, affixed with the Great Seal of the Realm. The Sovereign is considered to be the fount of honour and, as "the fountain and source of all dignities cannot hold a dignity from himself", [3] cannot hold a British peerage.
Descendants in the male line of peers and children of women who are peeresses in their own right, as well as baronets, knights, dames and certain other persons who bear no peerage titles, belong to the landed gentry, deemed members of the non-peerage nobility below whom they rank. The untitled nobility consists of all those who bear formally matriculated, or recorded, armorial bearings. [2] CILANE [4] and the Sovereign Military Order of Malta [5] both consider armorial bearings as the main, if not sole, mark of nobility in Britain.
Other than their designation, such as Gentleman or Esquire, they enjoy only the privilege of a position in the formal orders of precedence in the United Kingdom. The largest portion of the British aristocracy has historically been the landed gentry, made up of baronets and the non-titled armigerous landowners whose families hailed from the medieval feudal class (referred to as gentlemen due to their income solely deriving from land ownership).
It is often wrongly assumed that knighthoods and life peerages cannot grant hereditary nobility. The bestowal of a peerage or a knighthood is seen as due reason for a grant of arms by Garter King of Arms or Lord Lyon, and thus, those who make use of it attain hereditary nobility. The eldest son of a Knight and his eldest sons in perpetuity attain the rank of Esquire.
The only form of non-hereditary nobility in Great Britain is that associated with certain offices, which give the rank of Gentleman for the duration of tenure, or for life. Some offices and ranks also give the rank of Esquire for life.
The Monarch grants Peerages, Baronetcies and Knighthoods (nowadays mostly Life Peerages and Knighthoods) to citizens of the United Kingdom and Commonwealth Realms at the advice of the Prime Minister. Honours lists are published regularly at important occasions.
Untitled nobility, i.e. gentility, being identical to armigerousness, falls into the jurisdiction of the College of Arms and Lyon Court. Part of the Monarch's fons honorum—the power to grant arms—has been de facto devolved to Garter King of Arms and Lord Lyon King of Arms, respectively. A grant of arms is in every regard equivalent to a patent of nobility on the Continent; depending on jurisdiction and circumstances it can be seen as either an act of ennoblement or a confirmation of nobility.
Thus, along with Belgium and Spain, the United Kingdom remains one of the few countries in which nobility is still granted and the nobility (except for the hereditary peerage and baronetage) does not form a closed, purely "historical" class.
In late Anglo-Saxon England, the most powerful secular magnates were earls. Originally an office evolving from the earlier ealdorman, earls were second only to the king in authority and governed multi-shire regions whose responsibilities included keeping the peace, dispensing justice, and raising armies in the king's name. During Edward the Confessor's reign (1042–1066), there were four principal earldoms: Wessex, Mercia, Northumbria, and East Anglia. [6] By 1154, the earldom had lost its original character as a royal office and was an honorary title. [7]
Below the earl was the thegn. Thegns were the leaders of local society, described by historian David Carpenter as "the country gentry of Anglo-Saxon England". [8] The most important thegns served in the royal household, while others might serve a powerful lord. They gave judgment in the shire courts and formed the core of the royal armies. The sheriff was usually a local thegn. In 1066, there was an estimated 5,000 thegns in England. Earls and thegns, along with bishops and abbots, advised the king in the Witan. [9]
After the Norman Conquest of 1066, the old Anglo-Saxon nobility was replaced by an Anglo-Norman aristocracy. The baronage—consisting of between 150 and 250 feudal barons—was the highest rank within the medieval nobility. [10] Originally, the word baron described a social status, not a title. [11] A small number [note 1] of barons were granted the title of earl, which was the only hereditary title in England before 1337. [13] The lower ranks of the nobility consisted of the knightly class or gentry, which numbered around 3,000 landholders by 1300. Half of these were dubbed knights, while the other half were styled esquire. [14] The banneret was ranked below a baron but above a regular knight. [15] There was overlap between the gentry and the "lesser barons". [note 2]
The baronage (including barons, earls, and high-ranking churchmen) had a duty as tenants-in-chief to provide the king with advice when summoned to great councils. [17] During the reign of Henry III (1216–1272), the great council evolved into Parliament, a representative body that increasingly asserted for itself the right to consent to taxation. Initially, participation in Parliament was still determined by one's status as a tenant-in-chief. Earls and greater barons received a writ of summons issued directly from the king, while lesser barons were summoned through the local sheriffs. [18] In the reign of Edward I (1272–1307), the first hereditary barons were created by writ. Overtime, baronies by writ became the main method of creating baronies, and baronies by tenure became obsolete. [19]
Non-hereditary positions began to be created again in 1867 for Law Lords. In 1958, the Life Peerages Act 1958 enabled (non-hereditary) life peers to sit in the House of Lords, and from then on the creation of hereditary peerages rapidly became obsolete, almost ceasing after 1964. This is only a convention, and was not observed by prime minister Margaret Thatcher, who asked the Queen to create three hereditary peerages (two of them, to men who had no heirs). Until changes in the twentieth century, only a proportion of those holding Scottish and Irish peerages were entitled by that title to sit in the House of Lords; these were nominated by their peers.
Until constitutional reforms soon after Tony Blair came to power (the House of Lords Act 1999), possession of a title in the peerage (except Irish) entitled its holder to a seat in the House of Lords. Since then, only 92 hereditary peers are entitled to sit in the House of Lords, of which 90 are elected by the hereditary peers by ballot and replaced on death. The two exceptions are the Earl Marshal (a position held by the Dukes of Norfolk), who is responsible for certain ceremonial functions on state occasions, and the Lord Great Chamberlain (a position held in gross and one of a number of persons can hold it), who serves as the monarch's representative in Parliament and accompanies them on certain state occasions; both are automatically entitled to sit in the House. Typically, those due to inherit a peerage—or indeed have done so, in recent times—have been educated at one of the major public schools, such as Eton, Radley, Oundle, Winchester or Harrow.
A member of the House of Lords cannot simultaneously be a member of the House of Commons. In 1960, Anthony Wedgwood Benn inherited his father's title as Viscount Stansgate. He fought and won the ensuing by-election, but was disqualified from taking his seat until the Peerage Act 1963 was passed enabling hereditary peers to renounce their titles. Titles, while often considered central to the upper class, are not always strictly so. Both Captain Mark Phillips and Vice-Admiral Sir Timothy Laurence, the respective first and second husbands of Princess Anne, do not hold peerages. Most members of the British upper class are untitled.[ citation needed ]
The name adopted by the grantee of a title of nobility originally was the name of his seat or principal manor, which often had also been adopted as his surname, for example the Berkeley family seated at Berkeley Castle had the surname "de Berkeley" ("from Berkeley") and gained the title Baron Berkeley, amongst many others. Dukes were originally named after counties, the earliest one being Duke of Cornwall (1337) followed by Duke of Norfolk (1483) and Duke of Somerset (1547). The Duke of Wellington (1814) is an early example of a dukedom being named after a mere village, or manor, after Wellington in Somerset.
Earls, being in reality the "Count" of Continental Europe, were also named after the County over which they exercised control. The range of names adopted for titles gradually expanded from territorial names alone. Later titles used a wide variety of names, including surname (unrelated to territorial designation indicated by the French particule de), for example in 1547 Richard Rich, 1st Baron Rich. Edward Russell in 1697 was created Viscount Barfleur after a naval victory in foreign territory, setting a precedent which has been repeatedly followed. [20] Later earldoms also adopted family names, and omitted the preposition "of", an early example being Earl Rivers [21] created in 1466 for Richard Woodville, 1st Baron Rivers. The title was not derived from the name of a place, but from the family name de Redvers, or Reviers, Earls of Devon. Earl Ferrers was created in 1711 for Robert Shirley, 14th Baron Ferrers, whose earlier title was named after the de Ferrers family, or Norman origin. Another early example of a surname being used as a title is Earl Poulett (1706).
Modern life peers do not generally own large estates, from which to name their title, so more imagination is required, unless the simple option of using the surname is selected.
Outside the United Kingdom, the remaining Gaelic nobility of Ireland continue informally to use their provincial titles, few are recognised as royal extraction by the British Royal Family such as O'Donovan family. As Ireland was nominally under the overlordship of the English Crown for between the 12th and 16th centuries, the Gaelic system coexisted with the British system. A modern survivor of this coexistence is the Baron Inchiquin, still referred to in Ireland as the Prince of Thomond. The Prince of Thomond is one of three remaining claimants to the non-existent, since the 12th century, High Kingship of Ireland, the others being The O'Neill, MacCarthy Mor dynasty and the O'Conor Don.
Chief of the Name was a clan designation which was effectively terminated in 1601 with the collapse of the Gaelic order, and which, through the policy of surrender and regrant, eliminated the role of a chief in a clan or sept structure. This does not mean there is no longer a Chief or a sept today. Contemporary individuals today designated or claiming a title of an Irish chief treat their title as hereditary, whereas chiefs in the Gaelic order were nominated and elected by a vote of their kinsmen. Modern "chiefs" of tribal septs descend from provincial and regional kings with pedigrees beginning in Late Antiquity, whereas Scottish chiefly lines arose well after the formation of the Kingdom of Scotland, (with the exception of the Clann Somhairle, or Clan Donald and Clan MacDougall, the two of royal origins). The related Irish Mór ("Great") is sometimes used by the dominant branches of the larger Irish dynasties to declare their status as the leading princes of the blood, e.g.MacCarthy Mor dynasty, lit. (The) Great Macarthy or Ó Néill Mór, lit. (The) Great O'Neill.
Following the Norman invasion of Ireland several Hiberno-Norman families adopted Gaelic customs, the most prominent being the De Burgh dynasty and FitzGerald dynasty; their use of Gaelic customs did not extend to their titles of nobility, as they continuously utilized titles granted under the authority of the English monarchy.
Earl is a rank of the nobility in the United Kingdom. The title originates in the Old English word eorl, meaning "a man of noble birth or rank". The word is cognate with the Scandinavian form jarl, and meant "chieftain", particularly a chieftain set to rule a territory in a king's stead. After the Norman Conquest, it became the equivalent of the continental count. Alternative names for the rank equivalent to "earl" or "count" in the nobility structure are used in other countries, such as the hakushaku (伯爵) of the post-restoration Japanese Imperial era.
The peerages in the United Kingdom are a legal system comprising both hereditary and lifetime titles, composed of various noble ranks, and forming a constituent part of the British honours system. The term peerage can be used both collectively to refer to the entire body of nobles, and individually to refer to a specific title. British peerage title holders are termed peers of the Realm. The peerage's fundamental roles are ones of government, peers being eligible to a seat in the House of Lords, and of meritocracy, the receiving of any peerage being the highest of British honours. In the UK, five peerages or peerage divisions co-exist, namely:
Baron is a rank of nobility or title of honour, often hereditary, in various European countries, either current or historical. The female equivalent is baroness. Typically, the title denotes an aristocrat who ranks higher than a lord or knight, but lower than a viscount or count. Often, barons hold their fief – their lands and income – directly from the monarch. Barons are less often the vassals of other nobles. In many kingdoms, they were entitled to wear a smaller form of a crown called a coronet.
Earl of Cork is a title in the Peerage of Ireland, held in conjunction with the Earldom of Orrery since 1753. It was created in 1620 for Richard Boyle, 1st Baron Boyle. He had already been created Lord Boyle, Baron of Youghal, in the County of Cork, in 1616, and was made Viscount of Dungarvan, in the County of Waterford, at the same time he was given the earldom. These titles are also in the Peerage of Ireland.
The Peerage of Ireland consists of those titles of nobility created by the English monarchs in their capacity as Lord or King of Ireland, or later by monarchs of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. It is one of the five divisions of Peerages in the United Kingdom. The creation of such titles came to an end in the 19th century. The ranks of the Irish peerage are duke, marquess, earl, viscount and baron. As of 2016, there were 135 titles in the Peerage of Ireland extant: two dukedoms, ten marquessates, 43 earldoms, 28 viscountcies, and 52 baronies. The Crown of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland continues to exercise jurisdiction over the Peerage of Ireland, including those peers whose titles derive from places located in what is now the Republic of Ireland. Article 40.2 of the Constitution of Ireland forbids the state conferring titles of nobility and an Irish citizen may not accept titles of nobility or honour except with the prior approval of the Irish government. This issue has not arisen in respect of the Peerage of Ireland because no creation of titles in it has been made since the constitution came into force.
The Peerage Act 1963 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that permits women peeresses and all Scottish hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords and allows newly inherited hereditary peerages to be disclaimed.
The Peerage of Scotland is one of the five divisions of peerages in the United Kingdom and for those peers created by the King of Scots before 1707. Following that year's Treaty of Union, the Kingdom of Scots and the Kingdom of England were combined under the name of Great Britain, and a new Peerage of Great Britain was introduced in which subsequent titles were created.
The Peerage of England comprises all peerages created in the Kingdom of England before the Act of Union in 1707. In that year, the Peerages of England and Scotland were replaced by one Peerage of Great Britain. There are five peerages in the United Kingdom in total.
The Peerage of the United Kingdom is one of the five Peerages in the United Kingdom. It comprises most peerages created in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland after the Acts of Union in 1801, when it replaced the Peerage of Great Britain. New peers continued to be created in the Peerage of Ireland until 1898.
Earl of Shrewsbury is a hereditary title of nobility created twice in the Peerage of England. The second earldom dates to 1442. The holder of the Earldom of Shrewsbury also holds the title of Earl of Waterford (1446) in the Peerage of Ireland and Earl Talbot (1784) in the Peerage of Great Britain. Shrewsbury and Waterford are the oldest earldoms in their peerages held by someone with no higher title, and as such the Earl of Shrewsbury is sometimes described as the premier earl of England and Ireland.
Baron Inchiquin is one of the older titles in the Peerage of Ireland. It was one of two titles created on 1 July 1543 for Murrough O'Brien, Prince of Thomond, who was descended from the great high king Brian Boru. The grant of the English titles was conditional upon the abandonment of any Irish titles, the adoption of English customs and laws, pledging of allegiance to the Crown, apostasy from the Catholic Church, and conversion to the Church of England. Murrough was made both Earl of Thomond in the Peerage of Ireland, with remainder to his nephew Donough O'Brien and Baron Inchiquin, with remainder to his male heirs.
The hereditary peers form part of the peerage in the United Kingdom. As of April 2023, there are 806 hereditary peers: 30 dukes, 34 marquesses, 189 earls, 110 viscounts, and 443 barons.
The history of the British peerage, a system of nobility found in the United Kingdom, stretches over the last thousand years. The current form of the British peerage has been a process of development. While the ranks of baron and earl predate the British peerage itself, the ranks of duke and marquess were introduced to England in the 14th century. The rank of viscount came later, in the mid-15th century. Peers were summoned to Parliament, forming the House of Lords.
The British Peerage is governed by a body of law that has developed over several centuries.
In the United Kingdom, life peers are appointed members of the peerage whose titles cannot be inherited, in contrast to hereditary peers. With the exception of Prince Edward, who was made Duke of Edinburgh for life in 2023, all life peerages conferred since 2009 have been created under the Life Peerages Act 1958 with the rank of baron and entitle their holders to sit and vote in the House of Lords, presuming they meet qualifications such as age and citizenship. The legitimate children of a life peer appointed under the Life Peerages Act 1958 are entitled to style themselves with the prefix "The Honourable", although they cannot inherit the peerage itself. Prior to 2009 life peers of baronial rank could also be so created under the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876 for senior judges.
In Scotland, a baron or baroness is the head of a feudal barony, also known as a prescriptive barony. This used to be attached to a particular piece of land on which was situated the caput or essence of the barony, normally a building, such as a castle or manor house. Accordingly, the owner of the piece of land containing the caput was called a baron or baroness. According to Grant, there were around 350 identifiable local baronies in Scotland by the early fifteenth century and these could mostly be mapped against local parish boundaries. The term baron was in general use from the thirteenth century to describe what would have been known in England as a knight of the shire.
A feudal lordship is a feudal title that is held in baroneum, which Latin term means that its holder, who is called a feudal lord, is also always a feudal baron. A feudal lordship is an ancient title of nobility. The holder may or may not be a Lord of Regality, which meant that the holder was appointed by the Crown and had the power of "pit and gallows", meaning the power to authorise the death sentence.
In England, the baronage was the collectively inclusive term denoting all members of the feudal nobility, as observed by the constitutional authority Edward Coke. It was replaced eventually by the term peerage.
A peerage is a legal system historically comprising various hereditary titles in a number of countries, and composed of assorted noble ranks.
John Richard Boyle, 15th Earl of Cork and 15th Earl of Orrery is a British hereditary peer and a member of the House of Lords, where he sits as a Crossbencher. Boyle was an officer in the Royal Navy and then had a career in the sugar industry before inheriting his titles in 2003.
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