Vassals, Lieges and Fiefdoms - hierarchy of fiefdoms

[Roman]

Now, I know that Feudalism was complicated and lords owed allegiance to higher lords, but what I have not been able to find was how many layers of allegiance generally existed. E.g. Serfs/peasants/inhabitants would owe allegiance to a knight or thane who owned a manor controlling the surrounding local area of the countryside. The knight, in turn, along with other knights, would owe allegiance to a local baron or earl/count. The count would then swear fealty to a king or a duke (who would owe allegiance to a king). That would correspond to 4-5 levels in the hierarchy (3-4 layers of allegiance) + one if there was an emperor as a king of kings. Is this about right?

Note that the hierarchy of allegiance and fealty is not the same as the ranks of nobility, as nobles of a slightly lower title would not owe allegiance to a noble with a slightly higher one. For example, barons would probably not swear fealty to a count or an earl. The general hierarchy of nobility I am aware of (and this too differed by place and era and some titles had further gradations - e.g. Margrave, was sort of a higher count) is the following from lowest to highest rank:

Knight/Sir/Thane
Baronet
Baron
Viscount/Viscomt
Count/Earl
Marquis
Duke
Archduke
Prince
King
Emperor


Now, I know that how many levels of allegiance existed among those ranks of nobility differed by era and location, but a if there is information on that nonetheless, it would be great to see it.

 

[Roman]

I would probably envision five (5) categories of nobility in terms of layers of fiefdoms/allegiance/fealty.


1) Knights and Sires

Knight/Sir/Thane
Baronet


2) Full Nobles

Baron
Viscount/Viscomt
Count/Earl
Marquis


3) Higher Nobility/Lesser Royalty

Duke
Archduke
Prince


4) Full Royalty

King


5) Imperial Royalty

Emperor


Nobles from each category can have fiefs within the fiefs of the nobles in the higher category of nobility, but not in the fiefs of higher-ranked nobles in the same category of nobility (and obviously not in the fiefs of any lower-ranked noblemen, regardless of category).

 

[Bluenose]

This doesn't just vary from place to place, from different time periods, and also within the same time and place. There are places and periods where a Baron would owe allegiance directly to the King with no-one in-between, and other Barons who would be in the hierarchy under a Count/Earl who also owes something to a Duke and onward to the King. Then there's Knights, some of whom have no land of their own (Household Knights) and others who have a manor granted to them by their liege-lord who might have any rank. Kings and Emperors did that, as well as lesser nobles.

For the most steps you might get:

Vassal Knight, owning his own manor
>
Baron, with their own lands and several vassal knights
>
Earl/Count, with their own lands, and several Barons and Knights
>
Duke, owning the allegiance of several Counts, and again with their own lands and some vassal knights
>
King, with various people holding lower titles from them.
>
Emperor, the only Western example (the Holy Roman Emperor) not having any Kings as direct vassals (if you except the King of Italy, sometimes the title of their heir) but having some Kings who owed him allegiance for their lands within the Empire - all either Duchies or Counties, I think.

Note that those titles have a variety of names. I've used Count and Earl interchangeably, for example, but that's not entirely accurate. They're just a couple of the titles between Duke and Baron. And for that matter Baron and Duke aren't the only equivalents. Nor does Viscount mean the same thing in England and France.

Probably the best explanation of this I've seen in gaming products are in various Pendragon supplements. Lordly Domains is very good in that respect, though I haven't seen the newest pdf products from Nocturnal.

 

[1of3]

Yeah, emperor is a weird thing. The title was originally awarded to the German king by the pope, making the German king the spiritual successor of the Roman emperors. Later the German kings stopped caring about popal approval and became emperors just because.

 

[Grogg of the North]

Peerage is a weird thing. I remember, years ago, reading up on this when creating a character back story. I mostly was looking at the English system but it went something like:

King > Duke > Marquess > Earl > Viscount > Baron > Knight > Commoners

Barons were just a slight step above a knight. Unless it was the title given to a son of a duke and then it's more important than just a regular baron. And now you can understand why all those little lords had to spend so much time learning who was who and why you should respect them.

In terms of the layers of allegiance, I don't think that's something the common folk really concerned themselves with. There's their local lord and that's fine and dandy and with any luck they'll have a good enough harvest to make it through the winter with no problems.