I’ve begun a Regency Trivia post three times a week on my FB page, but thought why not add it to my almost defunct blog. So here we go. If you’re interested in past posts, please visit my FaceBook page http://bit.ly/2jvAZdP and search for #RegencyTrivia. Alternatively, you can join the Regency Romance Fan group on FB . Please tell me If you like these posts. If so, I’ll keep it up.
Let’s take up some miscellaneous title stuff.
Absent a female becoming a peer or some strange name change along the way such as being adopted, any man inheriting a title must have the same family name as the old peer.
The grandson of the eldest son of a marquis or duke would also have a courtesy title. The grandson of an earl would not. Why? Because the earl’s son has the courtesy title of viscount, therefore, like actual viscounts, the eldest son is a Mister.
When a peeress remarries she takes her new husband’s rank and title if he has one. (Although, there have been rare cases where the peeress held the title for so long she was still called by her previous title. This happened with a dowager duchess, mother of 13 or 14 children, when she later married her sons’ tutor and remained on the estate.)
A peer could not disinherit his heir from the title. The only thing he could do was refuse to leave him any unentailed property.
Although, a peer could not be sent to debtor’s prison, his unentailed property could be seized to pay his debts. There’s only one problem, any court action taken against a peer had to be heard in the House of Lords.
A peeress (except a peeress in her own right) lost her privilege if she married a commoner, including a gentleman with a courtesy title.
An interesting question came up recently concerning a gentleman who had a courtesy title of marquis, but was subsequently made a baron. The question was which title would he (and his wife) use. I thought he would give up the courtesy title. Silly me. This actually occurred once. The gentleman was a baron when he was in the House of Lords, but used his courtesy title socially.
Please feel free to ask questions regarding titles and the peerage. Next up is illegitimacy.
#RegencyTrivia #HistoricalRomance
ellaquinnauthor
Ella Quinn ~ Author 