You can opt to stand for ‘election’ to the remaining 90 hereditary peer seats in the House of Lords.
It probably helps with restaurant bookings.
The Dukes of Richmond and Lennox (two titles, one Duke) are descendants of a son of Charles II and his mistress, Louise de Kerouaille: Duke of Richmond - Wikipedia
The other surviving Charles titles are the Dukes of St Albans, descended from Charles’s son with Nell Gwynn: Duke of St Albans - Wikipedia – and the Dukes of Grafton, via one of his sons with Barbara Palmer: Duke of Grafton - Wikipedia
For a change, except for one nephew and a jump to a grandson or two, it looks like there’s been pretty much direct father to son lines for these since the 1600s.
At the time he got to sit and vote in the House of Lords.
I seem to recall hearing that British titles are dying out at the rate of dozens per year.
Royal weddings no, but yes to coronations. All adult peers (& their wives) get invited to the coronation to pay homage to the sovereign. They have to pay for their own ceremonial robes though, and it’s not clear where life peers would fit in.
Most peers these days are life peers, and they skew old. The House of Lords has 760 eligible members, there’s maybe a quarter the same again of ineligible hereditary ones and others who don’t participate/have resigned.
I hold, let us pretend, the baronetcy of Greenback, and that dies with me, regardless of my spawn. But there’s new peers created twice a year, so the total number stays stable, but yeah the death rate will likely be a dozen or so a year.
No, they don’t even get an automatic invitation to a coronation. In 1953 some peers were guaranteed seats because they fell into certain special categories (privy counsellors, Knights of the Garter etc.), but the rest had to enter their names into a ballot.
Although even in 1953, they had a special bargain-basement robe and cap for barons who couldn’t afford the full robe and coronet.
The article is slightly erroneous. Lady Fellowes is not “descended” from Lord Kitchener, the first Earl of that name. It was known that he did not consort with females, so the title was created with the intention that his younger brother would inherit. Still, the Kitchener line did not run to males; the title has gone extinct since the article was written.
Lady Fellowes is the great-granddaughter of the second Earl Kitchener. Lord Fellowes is only a Life Peer–his son will not inherit. He’s a great fan of Ancient Tradition–unless it works against him; the “unfairness” of females generally not inheriting noble titles in England was used in Downton.
Well they did in the past. There’s no guarantee that every aspect of a coronation will remain unaltered as it was in 1953.
The Duke of Windsor is another example of a created then extinct dukedom. Created in 1937, ended in 1972 with the death of the sole holder, who, btw, had no children.
Not likely to be re-created anytime soon given the notoriety of the holder.
Carrying out royal duties is not contingent on getting a title; Zara Phillips; Peter’s sister does infact carry out some royal duties; despite not having a title. This is due to the fact that their are currently few younger adult female royals and its likely to continue under her Uncle and cousin. As she actually has done stuff in real life which would get a ordinary person some recognition; I suspect her Uncle/cousin will grant her some sort of title to make here sound more "royal like. A Baroness perhaps.
Here’s a good example of an extinct dukedom:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duke_of_Suffolk
In my view Suffolk needs a duke. I was born in Suffolk. Just a thought.
Maybe Harry can be made that? Or Duke of Belfast. Just to make N Ireland interesting again.
Well that was lucky. So if Cambridge and Gloucester would have been booked–and forgive me if the answer was made clear in this bewildering discussion*–they would have to create a new Dukedom (even an underwater one), rather than anything lower?
*As must occasionally arise with differing topic threads to different readers, I smiled when I saw a [nitpick] post above which, to me, was as salient and of a level as any other sentence in any “main” post.
Is there a requirement that Duchies created by Her Majesty need be British-held? Field Marshall Harold Alexander was made Earl Alexander of Tunis. Could H.M. create a Duke Windsor of California?
I wasn’t thinking of Harry.
Thanks for the update and information. You know the subject quite well.
Yes, at the very least some of the “branches” are bound to die off.
The Imperial House of Japan was facing a succession crisis until the birth of Prince Hisahito in 2006, despite there being multiple sons born into recent generations of the family. After WWII the line of succession was limited to male-line descendants of the Taisho Emperor. (Under previous law then in the absence of other heirs the throne could have passed to a cadet branch of the family.) If this Imperial family tree on Wikipedia is accurate, the Taisho Emperor had four sons (including the Showa Emperor, Hirohito), five male-line grandsons (including the current Emperor), two male-line great-grandsons (the current Crown Prince and his brother), and only the one male-line great-great grandson (young Prince Hisahito).
Of these 12 male-line descendants six are already dead, three are at least 80 and married to similarly elderly women, and two are at least 50 and also married to women of similar age. So it seems very unlikely that there will be any more male-line descendants of the Taisho Emperor other than whatever sons Prince Hisahito might someday have, even though it’s a big family and the Taisho Emperor has plenty of other living descendants.