Prince Charles of Edinburgh.
Have to bear in mind that there’s the social connotations, and then the legal meaning, of nobility.
At law, prior to the reforms to the House of Lords, only individiauls who had a title which gave them the right to sit in the House of Lords was a noble. That was the legal definition of “noble” or “peer”. Everyone else, except the monarch, was a commoner.
Socially, “the nobility” had a much broader meaning, and included the extended family of a peer.
The “Royal Family” has no legal meaning, and like other families, it’s a social construct: do the members of the family consider you a member of the family?
And, someone can be considered a member of the Royal Family by that family, but does not have the right to “His/Her Royal Highness”, which is an honorific reserved for the immediate family of the monarch.
Yes. Look at Anne’s children, both grandchildren of a monarch but having no titles. Peter Philips, the son, never did any Royal duties. His sister Zara, has done so on occasion. But both always considered by the Royal Household as part of the Royal Family.
Some of George V grandchildren aren’t considered part of the Royal family, some are. Princess Alexandra, one of the Queens cousins, was. Her siblings weren’t. Alexandra actually was promoted above Camilla in the Order of precedence by the late Queen in 2005.
Actually no, only Peers from the Peerage of England, Great Britain and the United Kingdom had such a right. Peer from the Peerage of Ireland didn’t and only some from the Peerage of Scotland did. All were Nobility.
The Lord Chancellor wasn’t necessarily a Peer but could sit in the House of Lords (and the woolstock doesn’t count).
Good points!
Gah. I still don’t really get it, but never mind. It’s not very important.
One thing to consider is that as mentioned, “commoners” refers to everyone who is not a hereditary title-holder in his own right, or in clergy everyone below Bishop. It does not mean that you are of the Lower Classes.
As I understand it, below the titled nobility there was the category of “Gentlemen”, involving those who without being peers or nobility were still of higher station by birth. These were people who were not expected to engage in manual labor or the trades; within them there was in turn the Landed Gentry which refers to the subset of them who would hold such estates as allowed them to live off the rents and proceeds thereof and not need to hold any job but managing that estate. Those gentlemen who could not just live off estate (second sons, small or diminished estates) would go into the educated professions such as Law or Clergy, or go into the King’s service.
So ISTM, Princes who do not have substantive titles of their own would be “gentlemen”.
We have our own celebrities too. The celebrity phenomenon is no different from one side to the other. We see no need to combine them with government to form (in my view) an immoral and outdated system.
You must be using an eccentric definition. I think most of us would say that “being born into the royal family” = “in their own right.” After all, Prince is the very highest title after King/Queen. According to your definition, there are untold millions of people running around who have as much right to the title of Prince as the royal family.
I am using the actual legal definition under English law.
While I agree with your point as to formal constitutional arrangements, I think we in the US, and folks in many other countries, are now seeing a perversely similar situation developing informally in our own countries.
Specifically, that when our own politics is invaded by celebrities trading on their name recognition to be elected, disaster soon follows. Former TV pitchmen (US), comedians (Italy), athletes (Pakistan, etc.) have all parlayed celebrity plus amoral incompetence into actively harming their own country for their personal benefit.
I mean, I can think of at least one example of a comedian parlaying their celebrity into a political career to the benefit of their country.
Yes, and while there are rare exceptions (Zelenskyy of Ukraine, former actor/comedian) in general I think running a country requires a bit more than just “I’m a popular person”.
I should point out, as well, that Zelenskyy was not universally popular and had a lot of critics prior to the current war. He was smart enough to let the military run the war while he has handled the PR in regards to the rest of the world, playing to his strengths.
Okay, looks like I’m not the only not-native Brit who finds this all confusing.
In my case, it looks like the root of my misunderstanding is that I didn’t understand that Prince/Princess apparently ISN’T a title? Which strikes me as utterly weird. My background for this is mainly historical fiction, and all those Harlequin type romances made a big deal out of precedence, and how Barons are virtually lower than earthworms while Dukes get to, er, lord it over Earls and so forth. At least in terms on what order they line up in and who gets the better seat at the dinner table.
But always, always a Prince was top of things, except for kings, of course, but they rarely show up in those books, being off doing kingly things and not having romances.
So what is Prince, if not a title? Maybe its a “Style” thing, another category I’ve never really understood.
I’m not sure what you’re saying. “Prince” fails as a title because it ISN’T one, or because they don’t hold it in ‘their own right’? Because, well, aren’t the hereditary titles also just inherited by being born to the right person in the right order, and that’s exactly what the princes did?
And isn’t “Prince” more or less permanent, unless the Queen/King/Parliament(?) deliberately takes it from you, or you turn into a King, I guess?
I once read a definition about a Prince being born as the direct son or grandson of the current monarch. (I’m giving up on doing Princess/Princess and he/she type stuff.) And apparently you don’t lose it just because that is no longer true. At least, I seen dozens of mentions of Princesses Eugenie and Beatrice since the queen’s death, and clearly they are no longer direct descendants of the current monarch.
Apparently you don’t lose that title for ‘marrying down’ either. I think one of them at least is married to an untitled man?
I’m also unsure of the implications of “except for a Queen Consort.” So, is it that she is a noble despite not getting her own title in her own right, versus just marrying into it? But… the women who marry Dukes become Duchesses automatically, don’t they? Or aren’t they really nobles either? (So confusing.)
There are two types of princes.
The first type of prince, as reflected by its etymology—princeps (“first”)—is the hereditary sovereign of a principality. These are rare these days, but there are a few left, such as the Principalities of Liechtenstein and Monaco.
This is also the meaning behind the somewhat archaic usage of “princes” meaning “important people.”
The second type of prince is the one that we are more familiar with in modern times and one used in Britain—is a relative of the monarch. The monarch sets the rules for how heritable it is.
I think that the current monarch’s direct descendants can mostly be counted as princes/princesses, but some of them have opted out. However, if you are descendant from a past monarch, at some point (if you haven’t inherited a real peerage, like a royal dukedom), there is a limit to how far the title “Prince” will descend.
This is a title that doesn’t really belong to you; you have it only as a relative of someone else—that’s why the wife of Prince Michael of Kent is called Princess Michael of Kent, because she is a princess only by marriage.
Prince of Wales is a somewhat special case. The British monarch may grant this title to es heir apparent. However, once the heir ascends to the throne or the holder of the title dies, the title is extinguished until the monarch decides to grant it again.
Charles was a prince in two ways. As son of the queen, he was Prince Charles. As holder of the title Prince of Wales, he was Charles, Prince of Wales. Note he was not Prince Charles of Wales.
It’s a title but it’s not a hereditary peerage. In the British system, hereditary nobility are dukes, marquesses, earls (equivalent of “counts”), viscounts, and barons (usually just called “lords”). A peerage is held by a person. That person’s relatives might be able to use titles because of that but only that one person holds the title in es own right.
Princes hold their titles just by being related to someone else (the monarch), not in their own right, so they don’t really have a fixed place in this hierarchy. That’s why the queen gave her husband and sons and grandsons their own dukedoms and earldoms.
Y’all are overthinking it. By itself Prince in the British legal sense is indeed just a designator of being child or grandchild of a monarch and not of holding a title in the peerage. Of course they are of high social rank. But in history you needed to be a “[Title] of Somewhere” to be a peer (Lord).
Back in feudal times if you were the Duke of Chumley, Earl of Nossex, etc., you lived off of the lands whose lordship was granted with that title. If you were just plain “Prince” you were a dependant of the crown. That’s why upon marriage princes would get created Duke or Earl of somewhere so they could set household.
With time it came to pass that the elder son of the king would automatically be Duke of Cornwall and Duke of Rothesay, just so that he would have estates and standing of his own.
However a nontitled Prince still holds his place in the line for succession. Not holding an actual title if your own does not annull that you are a natural heir to your father.
Nowadays it’s all just fancy class labels for determining who sits where or marches ahead of who at formal events, but people seem to dig that.
(Spain gets around this matter by designating the royal descendants as “infantes” and reserving “príncipe” to the Prince of Asturias, the designated successor)
Part of the confusion might be rooted in the fact that in the British system, titles belong to individual persons, not to families. This is different in some other European countries I believe.
But in Britain, if you are an Earl, then only you are a titled nobleman. As a matter of courtesy, your spouse and children might be able to use certain titles, but they don’t have any titles of their own. Only the one person who currently holds the title is the title holder. Yes, someday, es eldest son will probably inherit the title, but until that day comes, the eldest son doesn’t have anything that’s his, and is legally a commoner.
This is the same with a coat of arms. Americans often research their family names and claim to use their family’s coat of arms. However, in Britain, arms belong to a person, not to a family, and certainly not to a family name, which can change over time. So unless you are the one person that inherited these arms, they aren’t yours.
Sounds like one needs to become a student of Burke’s Peerage to sort it all out.
I mean, not really. I’ve never looked at it.