Government Types in the Middle Ages?

[Ed Cha]

As mentioned, sometimes a duke can actually be more powerful than a king. There is no real hierarchy.

The first edition DMG had a good list of titles for the major cultures.

 

[Agback]

Earls of English history (more or less based on the older title Jarl, kind of equivalent to a Count, but some are as powerful as Dukes, a title that was little used in England until the later Middle Ages).

That's right. Before the Norman Conquest the English earls were basically the equivalent of French ducs: successors of the rulers of formerly independent states that had been conquered and absorbed by the kingdom. The Anglo-Saxon chronicles translate William's French title 'duc' as 'earl'. But when William introduced feudalism to England about 1070 (after defeating Hereward's rebellion) he reduced the status of earls to the equivalent of French comtes: delegates of the king. And increased their number enormously. The French title 'vicomte', which in Nothern France designated a sort of administrative deputy of the comte (count), was used in Norman-French administrative records to represent the English title 'sheriff' (an administrative deputy of the King governing a shire). Meanwhile in the South of France, where they didn't have primogeniture, the title 'vicomte' was used by people who inherited part of one of the old Carolingian or Burgundian counties, or who siezed the sort of authority of a count (comte) without a royal delegation of power.

The title 'duke' got introduced into England only at the end of the mediaeval period, as a cheap gift from the King to a favourite. It gave the king's friend or relative precedence over the other earls, but no actual authority. No English duke ever had an earl as vassal, though some French ducs did have comtes as vassals.

'Marquess' was introduced later still, and following the theory that a mark-graf was a graf (count) with a borderland county and special powers, it was slotted in between dukes and earls. This despite the fact that at least one French comte (the comte de Toulouse) had had marquises (the marquises of Septimania and Gothia) as vassals.

In England in the greater part of the mediaeval period, 'lord' (represented in Norman-French records as 'messire') was a courtesy title, with no hard-and-fast rule as to whether a person was or was not entitled to it. The king's sons (before the creation of the Principality of Wales as an appanage) were always called 'lord' as were earls, bishops, abbots, and anyone who held the post of castellan of a castle (or owned one!). But a landed might be called 'lord' if the person addressing him wanted to be flattering, obsequieous, or extra-polite, but it was not an affront to address him merely as 'sir', like a landless knight or a parish priest.

Anyone with his own troops was a baron, including everyone from landed knights with multiple fees to great magnates with multiple earldoms.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Agback]

In Europe, you tended to have huge and varying amounts of nobility under the King or Emperor... here's a list of titles (in roughly hierarchical order, from highest to lowest... the actual prestige of each one depends on what country one is from)

Grand Prince
Prince
Grand Duke
Arch Duke
Duke
Count
Marquis
Viscount
Earl
Voivode
Baron

Thats off the top of my head, there was likely many many more...

Umm.

"Grand Prince" is a translation of a Russian title.

"Grand Duke" is a different translation of the same title.

"Archduke" is an Austrian title.

Marquis is a French title, with no English equivalent in the mediaeval period (it was introduced to England during the renaissance.

"Earl" is the English equivalent of 'duke" (before about 1070) or "count" (after about 1070). It is definitely not subordinate to 'viscount'.

"Viscount" (vicomte) is a French title with no equivalent in England or Germany until after mediaeval times.

"Voivode" was the title of the ruler of Transylvania, sometimes a vassal of the King of Hungerary, sometimes of the Ottoman Emperor, and sometimes sovereign. Listing this title below 'viscount' is bizarre.

Regards,


Agback

 

[CCamfield]

Even in an area with a feudal overlord, the towns and cities might have a mayor or council who could wield considerable power. I was just reading a book about a 5-year-long peasant revolt in medieval Flanders (called A Plague of Insurrection - very good, by the way), which was ruled by a Count.

There was obviously quite a lot of politicking going on in the cities, with traditional "patricians", other rich folk wanting in on the council and opportunities for privileged positions, etc. Some of the cities joined the revolt and for a time at least contributed their fairly well-trained militia forces. I remember a pre-revolt incident in which one city actually sent its troops to do something (I forget what) to counter a privilege given to another city by the Count which would have given them a control over river trade to the first city.

 

[jester47]

This may be neither here nor there, but I find it funny where the name for Germany comes from in thier own language. Deuchland, I found actually means Duke-land. An if you look at the history of Germany, there are massive ammounts of duchies. So in essence it was the land of the dukes...

Aaron.

 

[Dogbrain]

Umm.

[TEAL'C]Indeed[/TEAL'C]

To elaborate on your elaborations:

"Grand Prince" is a translation of a Russian title.

"Grand Duke" is a different translation of the same title.

And an interesting conclusion can be drawn from this.

"Archduke" is an Austrian title.

It's stranger than that. "Archduke" was invented by one of the Austrian Hapsburg Emperors to describe his "personal" title. It had no precedent and there was only one Archduke, ever, the Archduke of Austria. However, Austria was not an Archduchy. Likewise, the "King of the Germans" was not the "King of Germany". By custom, treaty, law, or some silly thing like that, it was not "possible" to have a King of Germany. This was a problem in the 18th century for Brandenburg-Prussia. Technically, there could be no King of Brandenburg or of Prussia. Thus, when Brandenburg-Prussia got to be big and nasty enough to force some sort of "regal" recognition from other countries, the Hohenzollern ruler was internationally acknowledged as "King IN Prussia"--I kid you not.

"Earl" is the English equivalent of 'duke" (before about 1070) or "count" (after about 1070). It is definitely not subordinate to 'viscount'.

And the specific title has a very checkered history. Originally, it was associated with a great honking piece of land. Then the Earldoms disappeared. By the time of the late Renaissance, "Earl" was a personal title handed out to monarchical favorites.

 

[Dogbrain]

This may be neither here nor there, but I find it funny where the name for Germany comes from in thier own language. Deuchland, I found actually means Duke-land.

No, it does not. It means "land of the Deutsch", and the "Deutsch" were all the German people, not just "Dukes". "Deutsch" is related to "Dutch", obviously.

Both "Dutch" and "Deutsch" come from the Proto-Indo-European root *teutaa (aa="long" a), meaning "tribe". This root is also the origin of "total" and "tutti" (as in "tutti frutti").

The word "duke", on the other hand, comes from the Latin duc-, meaning "leader", from the Proto-Indo-European *deuk-, meaning "to lead". This root is also the origin of "tug", "tow", and "taut". ("Educate" also comes from this root, in combination with the root *egh-, meaning "out".)

 

[Spatula]

This may be neither here nor there, but I find it funny where the name for Germany comes from in thier own language. Deuchland, I found actually means Duke-land. An if you look at the history of Germany, there are massive ammounts of duchies. So in essence it was the land of the dukes...

It's Deutschland, and Deutsch simply means German. Duetschland = land of the germans. The german word for duke is Herzog.

EDIT: dang! beaten by a dogbrain!

 

[Turjan]

A very popular explanation for "Deutsch-land" is "Land of the Teutons", where Teutons are a Germanic tribe, so this is similar to what dogbrain said.

The Middle Ages are a very long period. During this time, titles and their meaning changed. Around the years 900 to 1000, there were only a few noble titles in use in Germany. The kingdom consisted of 7 very powerful duchies ("Herzogtümer"), and the dukes were the leaders of their respective Germanic tribes. Usually, one of those dukes became king. There were also quite a lot of earls ("Grafen"), who were the representatives of the king in smaller administrative units (counties - "Grafschaften"). A special and more powerful earl was a leader of a newly added border province, the marquess ("Markgraf"), because there was no duke above him and he had more military responsibility.

Going on 200 years, the powerful tribal duchies had been divided up by the kings. One exceptionally insidious move on part of the kings was giving vast parts of the country to archbishops, bishops and abbots for rule. As those clerical rulers had no children, this allowed the king to place persons of his own liking as rulers of those lands. This system was kept up until 1809.

Initially, this strenghtened the position of the king. although the pope gained influence, too. With the rule of Frederic II. (1196-1250), this changed drastically. He was not interested in the German part of his empire and preferred to stay in Sicily for nearly his whole life. From this time on, most of the hundreds of territories in the empire were de facto independent.

 

[kenjib]

The Hanseatic League presents a very interesting political body, being a very powerful alliance of semi-independent city-states. It's an interesting reflection how the system of allegiance was so ambiguous in those times. Larger cities were often distinct exceptions to feudal structure.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanseatic_League

By the way, were Kings and High Kings kind of like the Celtic way of saying Kings and Dukes/Earls?