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arkol
2009-05-27, 07:54 AM
Ok so we all know that medival fantasy is full of titles. King, Prince, Duke, Baron, Count and of course the female counterparts of those and I'm pretty sure there's like 50 other more.

My question is, how do you organize this into your world? Who's above who? Who controls what? How big is a duchy (or dukedom)?

Crazy Scot
2009-05-27, 08:22 AM
I think the big answer to this is: ask the DM.

If you are the DM, your way is right. If the players complain, explain that it works your way in your world and not the same as the real world. That is why it's called fantasy.

Real world titles could be used again in any order wanted with no effect on the game play. So the big question is: how does the DM want it to go?

As to who controls what. --(see above)

As to the size of a certain person's holdings. -- that would rely on how big the world is, how big the country is, and other such things. Again, this has to have no relation to the real world, and i think in the real world these things differ too. For example, the governor of Rhode Island is still a governor like the governor of Alaska, but one has a slightly larger area of responsibility.

All in all, it is fantasy and can be organized however the DM wants. If you are the DM, go crazy, just don't make it too difficult for the players to understand. :smallsmile:

arkol
2009-05-27, 08:31 AM
I am indeed asking the question for DM usage. I know I can do whatever I want but as Rich himself as said I don't wannt do whatever I want. I can already fo whatever I want :P

I'm just looking for some guidelines on how the whole process goes.

Shademan
2009-05-27, 08:41 AM
I've organized it like this:
King>prince(the sons of the king)>Duke>Count>Earl>Knight>squire

cirka.

bosssmiley
2009-05-27, 08:53 AM
Pendragon is your gaming go-to for feudalism.

Generally the hierarchy goes:

Emperor > King > Prince > Duke > Marquis > Count/Earl > Viscount > Baron > Baronet (fake title) > Knight > everyone else
(switch out names with local equivalents - bey, boyar, pfalzgraf, doge, etc. as required)

Land holdings aren't usually measured in area; they're measured in ability to raise revenue and - vastly more importantly in old-style feudalism - troops. An 18th century(!) Scottish chieftain, upon being asked how much his annual rents yielded, once famously answered: "Four hundred fighting men."

Dhavaer
2009-05-27, 08:56 AM
In the British system peers are ranked: Duke/Duchess > Marquess/Marchioness > Earl/Countess > Viscount/Viscountess > Baron/Baroness.

Narmoth
2009-05-27, 09:01 AM
Well, mostly, you've got the King who rules some land, and rules the kingdom
The prince might rule some land independently (prince of Wales), but most likely simply is have inheritor rights to the throne (if the king isn't chosen, like the king of France was)
The duke (Hertzog, Marqui, Kniaz, Jarl) normally pay lip service to the king, but is powerful enough to fight the king, at least if allied with someone else (duke of Burgundy, duke of Bretagne, Jarl of Trondheim, Kniaz of Novgorod). The duchy is independent from the kings law, but has feudal obligations to the king. There would be a few, 3-10 duchies in a country, depending on the size. Cities will often swear fealty to a duke or king, remaining largely independent.
The count is either vassal of the king directly, of vassal of a duke
He owns land, and often several towns and villages.
Knights might have a town or a village as their land. They swear fealty to anyone of the above, since the knight or duke often maintained their own separate knights, not wanting to depend on his vassals suppourt

Some regional notes:
Kiev rus (modern day Russia/Ukraina/Belarus) had the following titles:
Velikij Kniaz (great prince) ruling the kingdom
Kniaz - ruling a city or fortified town. All in theory equal, and all with claim to the throne (the Kniaz of Novgorod got chosen by the citizens, so he often held another city as well)
Boyar - advisor. Not a feudal title, although would own land
Dvorianin - landovner. Title of nobility in Russia, but not really emerged before the 16th century
Drushinnik - warrior in a band of warriors, usually under a kniaz, opposed to
Opolchenec - man at arms, that is band of warriors gathered when defending the town

bogatir - is a turkish word that was adopted into russian with a meaning translatable as "warrior-hero". it's not a formal title at all

arkol
2009-05-27, 09:07 AM
Ok now we're getting somewhere. Thanks guys!

About the land however. Are the smaller sections part of bigger sections or are they independent but just smaller? To put it in a exemple: is a barony part of a Duchy? or just smaller (or less lucrative, or with less manpower or whatever) then a Duchy?

Custos Sophiae
2009-05-27, 09:07 AM
The English order is King>Duke>Marquis>Earl>Viscount>Baron. Marquises weren't invented until feudalism was over though - by then it was jsut another empty title for the king to hand out. Viscount is slightly earlier, but still easily droppable. Dukedoms in England were originally just created for junior members of the royal family. Count is the continental equivalent of Earl.

The basic system is King>Earl>Baron. At the bottom, each Baron has one castle, and the land it immediately controls. The Earls sit in the middle, governing areas that make some kind of sense - historical, military or geographical. Over them, you've got the king. Most barons are responsible to an earl, except for those on the royal families private estates. If the country is too large for a three tier system to work, stick an extra layer of nobles in.

The baronies and earldoms will be smaller if they're near the capital, near a hostile border, or in the productive areas of the kingdom. 10,000 square miles of desolate moorland might be split over a couple of barons, each with a castle on one edge - 10,000 miles of rich farmland near the capital could get two or three earls with a few dozen barons under them.

All the king's sons are princes by right of birth. They may also get additional titles, ranking above the normal nobility, which can be passed down to their heirs. In the English system, this would be a dukedom. There's often a territory reserved for the crown prince, where he can get some practice governing.

Another_Poet
2009-05-27, 09:10 AM
Ok now we're getting somewhere. Thanks guys!

About the land however. Are the smaller sections part of bigger sections or are they independent but just smaller? To put it in a exemple: is a barony part of a Duchy? or just smaller (or less lucrative, or with less manpower or whatever) then a Duchy?

No, they don't stack, so to speak. A barony is separate from a county or duchy. The only exception is that normally they are all part of a kingdom.

Narmoth
2009-05-27, 09:13 AM
Ok now we're getting somewhere. Thanks guys!

About the land however. Are the smaller sections part of bigger sections or are they independent but just smaller? To put it in a exemple: is a barony part of a Duchy? or just smaller (or less lucrative, or with less manpower or whatever) then a Duchy?

Mostly, you have some land that you use yourself, and some land you give your vassals (except Norway, where you gave gold).
Thus, the king distributes part of the land to vassals, who again distribute a part of their vassals and so on.
This is why you need to wage war as well: you need to give new gifts, often land, to your vassals to ensure loyalty.

Satyr
2009-05-27, 09:25 AM
And just to confuse it all a bit more, titles and actual influence are often diverging and there are both high-ranking nobles with insignificant lands but boisterous titles and supposedly minor nobles with a lot influence.

In the traditional, original structure of the Karolingian and Ottonian Empire, there were two seperate hierarchies of nobility, one who hold lands and titles (knights, barons, dukes and kings) and those who were actually more like administrative clerks who had no or only little power on their own and drraw their whole influence from the moarch whom tey represented (ministerials, counts and paladins). The second type of nobles were normally appointed by the sovereign and their title - and the included lands - were not inherited. Later, this changed and more and more counties were entailed.

Dervag
2009-05-27, 09:26 AM
Ok now we're getting somewhere. Thanks guys!

About the land however. Are the smaller sections part of bigger sections or are they independent but just smaller? To put it in a exemple: is a barony part of a Duchy? or just smaller (or less lucrative, or with less manpower or whatever) then a Duchy?Could go either way, I suspect.

The smallest feudal holdings are one warlord with one castle and the surrounding land. A holding that small isn't sustainable; too much can go wrong. So on that level, most lords are vassals of some higher-level lord with enough collective strength to guarantee their security. The vassalage may sit lightly on their shoulders, but they at least pay the idea lip service.

A barony could be a small independent holding that owes fealty only to the king. But I suspect there were plenty of baronies that wound up being subsets of a duchy.


All the king's sons are princes by right of birth. They may also get additional titles, ranking above the normal nobility, which can be passed down to their heirs. In the English system, this would be a dukedom. There's often a territory reserved for the crown prince, where he can get some practice governing.Which is why for centuries the heir to the British throne has been the "Prince of Wales."

Dienekes
2009-05-27, 09:33 AM
One way, that I'm pretty sure is accurate for most historical settings (though this is off the top of my head so I'm sure I messed up the order somewhere)

In terms of political dominance
King / Prince (If ruled by a princedom) / Emperor
King or Princes or Emperor's family (Heir apparent of Kings are confusingly also called princes)
Archduke (these are very rare, I think in the Holy Roman Empire there was only 2 families)
Duke
Margrave
Landgrave
Count/Earl (An earl is just an english count)
Viscount
Baron (a knight with land)
Baronet (a knight with very very little land)
Knight
Esquire
Gentleman
Townsman
Peasants
Serfs
Slaves

Now in land size, though these are often fluctuating as I'm sure there is a Barony somewhere that's bigger than a County.
Archduchy
Duchy
County
King's Lands (were generally small compared to other nobles direct lands)
Viscounty/Margraviate/Langraviate
Barony
Baronetcy

For the Holy Roman Empire whenever a new Emperor needed to be elected there would be a rank of Elector not tied to land but whose prestige would rise higher than an Archduke.

Now obviously the land size and the peerage doesn't match up too well. Which can be explained by how some nobles gain their lands and what their purpose is.
Archduchy, Duchy, and County are rather straightforward. Margraviates are militarized zones on the borders of countries so even though they are smaller than counties they are considered more important. Langraviates are different in that the Landgraves are given land directly from the monarch and were not directly subsidiary to anyone else.

Male/Female names
King/Queen
Emperor/Empress
Prince/Princess
Archduke/Archduchess
Duke/Duchy
Margrave/Margravine
Count/Countess
Earl/Countess
Viscount/Viscountess
Baron/Baroness
Baronet/Baronetess
Knight/no other term

Ok, I think that's all I know. I hope it helps.

shadzar
2009-05-27, 09:45 AM
Emperor/Empress
King/Queen
Royal Prince/Princess
Duke/Duchess
Prince/Princess
Marquis/Marquise
Count/Countess
Viscount/Viscountess
Baron/Baroness
Baronet
Knight
Serf

bosssmiley
2009-05-27, 09:52 AM
Archduke - duke from an imperial ruling family. Basically a duke, only moreso (for bragging and pecking order purposes). Confined to the Habsburg & Romanov monarchies AFAIK.

Custos Sophiae
2009-05-27, 10:00 AM
Grave is the german equivalent to Count/Earl, at least in origin, though it no longer appears unprefixed. The random chances of history left modern-day Germany with several different grades of count, hence Margrave, Landgrave, Burgrave.

Baronets are another late invention, like Marquises. They're effectively hereditary knights, but are only an optional extra when world-building.

In theory, every knight reports to a baron, who in turn reports to a earl, who himself reports to the king (possibly with more layers), but the system was never planned, it just grew, so there were exceptions everywhere.

To start with, nobles often held titles at multiple tiers. The Duke of Devon might also be the Earl of Emsworth and the Baron of Bradford. As Earl, he is responsible to the Duke of Sussex; as Baron he reports to the Earl of Hallam who reports to the Duke of York. If the Dukes of Sussex and York fall out, this technically means the Duke of Devon has to go to war with himself.

There were also nobles, and areas which skipped layers of the hierarchy - barons or even knights who reported directly to a duke or the king, and towns which are outside the territory of the local nobles.

Each fiefdom isn't necessarily a compact blob either, far from it. A Earldom might consist of four unconnected territories, one of them an island inside a rival earldom. Even today, there are bits of Belgium which are entirely inside Dutch territory, which in turn is completely surrounded by Belgium.

A lot of these complications arise when territory changes hands, by marriage or conquest. Unless the internal borders are all new - a young country or a reforming king - there should be some of this messiness around.

Doug Lampert
2009-05-27, 10:38 AM
Pendragon is your gaming go-to for feudalism.

Generally the hierarchy goes:

Emperor > King > Prince > Duke > Marquis > Count/Earl > Viscount > Baron > Baronet (fake title) > Knight > everyone else
(switch out names with local equivalents - bey, boyar, pfalzgraf, doge, etc. as required)

Second the recomendation of Pendragon. It covers a specific version of a fuedal system, but it gives the basics of how it works and has source books with plenty of detail.

One thing that confuses the issue is that meanings changed over time.
As someone else mentioned Count was originally a non-hereditary appointed office (meaning something like "King's companion"). Culturally we're most familiar with the titles as they existed arround 1700 or so. Earlier is different, different countries are different.

All that said:

Most times and places a knight isn't actually noble, he's upper gentry. There are LOTS of titles that go with the gentry, it's as complicated as the nobility and even less clear who's senior to who.

Many emperors and kings were elected (probably more than were hereditary in actuallity). Generally the election went to the oldest son of the previous king, but not always. Note that these WEREN'T popular elections, normally only a subset of the nobility got to vote. The Norman Conquest was actually "officially" an election dispute.

Even hereditary titles often weren't. Look at a list of Kings of England following the conquest someday and count just how rarely it ACTUALLY went father to son for more than two generations running. Same thing for Emperors of Rome (and Byzantine emperors).

Emperors are an oddity. The title was exclusive to the ruler of the Holy Roman Emperor and the Emperor of what we now call the Byzantine Empire up till the fall of the eastern empire. But you can get away with thinking of it as meaning powerful King.

Prince is also officially a soveriegn title, it could be held independently rather than going to the son of a king (see Monaco for a still existent example). Calling a King's son a prince is normally a courtesy title granted based on giving the heir a title one rank lower than his fathers, but in Britain officially the crown prince actually is the Prince of Wales.

Courtesy titles can further confuse the issue of who's actually senior to who.

Traditionally the nobles (Baronet to Duke) all swear direct fealty to a King or Prince. A Duke is higher than a Count, but a Count normally doesn't actually answer to a duke, he just gets seated lower at the table.

But note that MANY people hold multiple titles often from multiple princes/kings and it's perfectly possible for one noble to hold some lands from the king and most of his lands from other nobles. This lead to things like the King of England being at one time the most powerful noble in France, with the County of Anjue, and the Duchies of Normandy, Britiany and Aquatain as hereditary holdings (I'm not actually sure they ever actually HELD all those lands at once, but they had the titles).

All of this tends to get very messy in practice, for instance a British Earl is officially equivalent to a continental count, but most British Earls were stronger than most continental Dukes even. In many places all sons of a noble were noble, and the holding was split, in post Norman conquest England the entire holding normally went to the oldest son.

Narmoth
2009-05-27, 10:55 AM
Archduke - duke from an imperial ruling family. Basically a duke, only moreso (for bragging and pecking order purposes). Confined to the Habsburg & Romanov monarchies AFAIK.

In the Romanov family, an archduke (rus.: velikij kniaz) had claim to the throne, as opposed to the other dukes (kniaz), who could also be of the Romanov family, but to far removed (I think it was 4 generations away from the emperor or something)