I suppose there’s one more part of the puzzle- unless everything was inherited by the primary heir, family assets would end up diminished over time just by virtue of descendants having more than one kid in each generation.
The dukedom wasn’t created until 1874, but before that there was a marquessate in 1831, an earldom in 1784, a barony in 1761 and a baronetcy in 1622. The Grosvenors have been in the aristocratic ranks for almost 400 years.
It was the 3rd Baronet, Sir Thomas Grosvenor, who started the family on the road to spectacular riches by marrying the 12 year old Mary Davis, heiress to a lot of swampy meadow land which subsequently became Mayfair, Park Lane and Belgravia in London.
In some cases (not for the UK AFAIK) it is the other way around: the property carries the title. It’s how it worked for my family in Spain. Selling the stronghouse meant losing the title that goes with it (it now belongs to the Marqués de la Real Defensa, itself one of those late titles which come with no land - the first one wasn’t even alive to enjoy his new title).
This isn’t really all that uncommon. There are some notable examples from history. For instance, Archduchess Louise of Austria (1870 - 1947) became the Crown Princess of Saxony and ended up selling flowers on the streets of Brussels.
Princess Viktoria of Prussia (1866 - 1929), a granddaughter of Queen Victoria and sister of the German Emperor Wilhelm II married a Russian man 34 years her junior who worked as a waiter at a restaurant in Luxembourg. The restaurant ran ads like: “You are being served by the brother-in-law of the Kaiser!”
Princess Marie-Auguste of Anhalt became so destitute late in her life that she ended up adopting adults in exchange for money, among them Robert Hans Lichtenberg aka Frédéric Prinz von Anhalt (the husband of Zsa Zsa Gabor).
From my childhood, I remember a boy in the neighbourhood who bore the name of a noble family from Austria. His father (actually, I don’t even know if the man was the kid’s real father) didn’t have a job and he was drunk most of the time. The boy had lots of trouble at school and I’m not sure if he ever graduated. They lived in a decent house, though.
Michael Abney-Hastings, 14th Earl of Loudoun, lived in the small NSW country town of Jerilderie and worked as a fork-lift driver until his death in 2012. His son the 15th Earl works in a fabric factory in Wangaratta, VIC.
The Anglo-Saxon earldoms and ealdormanries were never hereditary. True, often they passed in some form from father to son, but they were always directly awarded by the Crown. Hence the last three earls of Northumbria came from three different families and earldoms were regularly sliced up or reassigned.
My high school Latin teacher was, unless everyone was lying to us, the Countess Esterhazy.
No, the upper middle class were expected to work, or at least they boys were. The girls were expected to marry well and, if that failed to come off, they might well live out their days on modest annuities supplemented by the charity of their families.
The aristocracy, by contrast, were not expected to work, and in general considered it disgraceful to do so. There were some exceptions - service in the army was acceptable, for example - but in general the builk family wealth passed to the eldest son, but he recognised an obligation, out of his vast income, to make allowances to his relatives, or provide houses for them to live in, or whatever, so that they would not have to work.
I have finished the Poirot books [mainly between the 2 wars] and moved on to the Miss Marple [post ww2]
Very odd how the ‘family dynamics’ changed pre WW2/ post WW2.
Though I do have to admit, a full on house of servants pre WW2 style would be nice. Although I was raised with a governess in the house until I was 8, and my mom had day maids. I noticed watching an episode of House Hunters International set in India [um, Mumbai I think] where the American couple passed on a fantastic house complete with a cottage in the back garden that had a family living in it that were servants attached to the property because the wife couldn’t wrap her mind around having live in servants. <shrug>
[URL=“http://www.pinterest.com/pin/create/extension/”]
Quite a few Russian noblewomen ended up working as dance hostesses in Shanghai nightclubs in the '30s ala The White Countess (in which the title character is the breadwinner for her entire family, who in turn regard her as a prostitute).
When a title goes extinct due lack of heirs it reverts to the Crown and the monarch and recreate it for another person. This is what usually with the Dukedom of York (traditionally given to the monarch’s 2nd son); either it goes extinct because the incumbent Duke doesn’t begat a son, or it merges with the Crown when he becomes King.
The Lady Frederick Windsor had a recurring role on Two and a Half Men for 2 seasons. Her father-in-law is the Queen’s first cousin, and her husband could one day become King if the 42 people ahead of him in the line of succession suddenly die. She also played a conniving British princess trying to usurp the throne in a truly horrible ITV series a few year’s ago.
The only socially acceptable occupations open to middle-class women were; teaching (at a private girls’ school or as a governess), writing, and being a lady’s companion.
Two different things going on here.
A title merges into the Crown when the holder succeeds to the throne (e.g. when the Duke of York became King George VI on the abdication of his brother) or when the holder dies and the heir is the monarch (which happens less often, but will happen if the present Duke of Edinburgh outlives the Queen - when he dies, the title will pass to his heir, who will almost certainly be king at the time, in which case the title will merge into the crown).
In either case, the title ceases to exist, and the monarch or a future monarch may subsequently grant a similar title to someone else. (It is expected that, when the Duke of Edinburgh title merges into the crown, it will immediately be regranted to the Earl of Wessex.)
But that’s quite different from simple extinction, which is due to a failure of heirs. Luke Plunkett, for example, was created Earl of Fingall in 1628. He had two sons, Christopher and George. On Luke’s death in 1637 the title passed to his eldest son Christopher, and from there to Christopher’s son Luke, and so forth. The title didn’t always pass from father to son; at one point Christopher’s male heirs died out, so the title then passed to the senior male descendant of the first Earl’s second son, George. So, although George never got to be Earl of Fingall like his father, several of his descendants did. But eventually - in 1984 - George’s male heirs also died out, at which point there were no male heirs of the first Earl, and the title became extinct. But it didn’t “revert to the crown”.
Traditionally, the three main career paths open to the aristocracy were government, military, and the clergy. But intellectual occupations were also not considered disgraceful. For instance, the 3rd Baron Rayleigh did some blue sky research.
And if the family didn’t have vast wealth anymore, marrying the daughter of a wealthy industrialist was not uncommon. The family got money; the industrialist got social status. Everyone was happy except maybe the woman, who may not have had a choice in her marriage partner.
The last Emperor of China worked as a gardener after he was deposed. He later worked as a writer and editor for modest wages.
Didn’t del Bosque just get some sort of patent of nobility? Did he get land, or just the fancy name?
Just the fancy name. Adolfo Suárez’ title of Duke is also the fancy name only (is, because he’s dead but the title is inheritable). Spain’s kings haven’t given out land along with a title in centuries.