Also, the Duchy of Cornwall owns land all over England and Wales - it’s not just in Cornwall.
The Duchy of Cornwall does indeed have some special legal privileges, ranging from salvage of shipwrecks to the right to review draft bills affecting the Duchy’s interests, and the Duke (instead of the Queen) appoints the High Sheriff of Cornwall and some other officials.
That is more than I appreciated. Although I think I’m right in saying that while “High Sheriff” of a county may sound important, it is essentially a ceremonial role rather than a legal office.
We really need to find a worthy person, with family roots in both Twatt, Orkney, Scotland and Twatt, Shetland, Scotland, and [del]bribe[/del] persuade the Crown to make him a Lord of Parliament.
In 1860 “Bertie”, the future Edward VII, toured Canada and America. Originally they wanted Victoria, she refused, and they got the 18 year crown prince. Prince Albert and Lord Palmerston pushed for it. Eventually Victoria agreed, if for no other reason than to get rid of Bertie for a while.
But for some reason he was advised as Lord Renfrew. Didn’t matter, he drew huge crowds of mostly adoring people (except for some Irish in New York City). Not sure why they used one of his lesser titles, maybe they weren’t sure how the first royal visit would go over.
The commanding general of the British forces in the War of 1812, who burned down the White House, was granted the family name extension of “Ross of Blandenburg” for the battle of Bladenburg, Maryland. And his arms were extended to include a broken US flag of fifteen stars and stripes.
The oldest Ducal title in existence is that of the Duke of Norfolk, which was created in 1483. It has been inherited through the Howard and FitzAlan-Howard family ever since. As hereditary Earl Marshal, the Duke of Norfolk is one of the few members of the House of Lords who do not have to run for election. Ironically, the Fitzalan-Howards are Catholic, despite being the oldest Ducal title holders in the Protestant kingdom.
Other Ducal title holders have died with their heads chopped off, or without heirs, along the way.
I think it’s even worse in Italy.
There is also a title of Marquess, which ranks between Duke and Earl. There are not a lot of them, but the oldest still-existing Marquess is the Marquess of Winchester, created in 1551.
There is a Baronetcy in my family though I come from a younger sibling’s line so have never shared space with the current holder, for some reason I still get named in Burke’s Peerage which is a regular source of amusement as I am scrambling to pay for groceries. http://www.burkespeerage.com
On the other hand its actually quite common for desendants of younger sons to evetually inherit.
Big deal…I’M the DUKE Of Earl!
I understand he used ‘Renfrew’ in order to try to travel relatively incognito. When Bertie when to Biarritz on one of his many ahem holidays, he tended to travel under this name.
Lord Renfrew is one of the Prince of Wales’ subordinate titles. His Royal Highness’ full achievement is:
Earl of Chester, Duke of Cornwall, Duke of Rothesay, Earl of Carrick, Baron of Renfrew, Lord of the Isles and Prince and Great Steward of Scotland.
That would be “achievement” in the purely heraldic sense, of course…
Of course 
I was about to write about the Japanese royals, but **Lamia **scooped me… I’ll just add that Japan has found a way to deal with Acsenray’s issue, though less for ruling and more for commerce. There are several businesses in Japan that claim to have been held by the same family for centuries. To manage this, however, the families have adopted a male heir whenever there is no suitable candidate to inherit the business. Sometimes, for good measure, they will then have one of the family’s daughters marry the young man. So ways can be found, even in cases of male-only inheritance.
As an aside: Alfred was king of the kingdom of Wessex (and certainly not the first king of Wessex). It is just that Wessex was the last major kingdom in England to survive intact from the assault of the Northmen - except for half of Mercia and a bit of what became Northumbria. That made him the only Anglo-Saxon king left standing: but while he certainly would have liked to be king of England, he only ever ruled a part of it. After his death, his equally-remarkable daughter ruled in the kingdom of Mercia but not as queen - her title was “Lady of the Mercians” (presumably so as not to annoy her brother, who ruled as king of Wessex).
The first person to have a reasonable claim to be king of all England was his grandson, Æthelstan.
Is there any sort of Japanese nobility below the Imperial family?
Yep, there is. Traditionally the Japanese nobility proper ( the Kuge ) were royal cadets that made up the court and were behind-the-scenes actors.
This was somewhat distinct from the provincial daimyo/shugo that everyone knows from Shogun who wielded power more directly. They too generally had a descent from the royal house, but more often much more anciently.
For more, see this: Japanese imperial succession debate - Wikipedia
Later biographers also suggested he wanted to keep open the possibility of his son Randolph serving again in the House of Commons. British peers couldn’t decline a their titles until later: Peerage Act 1963 - Wikipedia
Well, that’s just mean… but it was quite an abject defeat of the U.S. forces there. Are you sure there wasn’t an “s” in the title?: Battle of Bladensburg - Wikipedia
Note, from those links, that they lost their official status and standing in the Imperial Court after WWII.
That was the theme in “Tess of the D’Urbervilles”. the D’urbervilles were extinct-a rich guy (one of the rising class of English industrialists) bought the estate and the title came with it. Of course, as Thomas Hardy suggests, it would have been better (for tess) if she had never found out that she was (in fact) an aristocrat (albeit a poor one).