Questions about British Styles and Titles 1: Ending 2022


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When you look at the title Princess William, Duchess of Cambridge, the duchess title is the higher title.

Of course we're always going to have places like the Daily Fail that will still use Kate Middleton, Princess Kate and Duchess Kate and even Camilla Parker-Bowles. If I remember correctly, Diana used to correct people that called her "Princess Diana" as that was never her title.

She did that on many occasions as she knew she wasn't Princess Diana but HRH The Princess of Wales etc or simply Diana but never Princess Diana.

I suspect another reason for correcting people was that she also knew that calling her Princess Diana was actually demeaning her by calling her a commoner and giving her such a low ranked title as Princess.
 
So why not use their highest titles rather than their lowest?

I want to know why you would demote them?

I call them Camilla and Kate but would never call them Princess Charles or Princess William. I use their highest titles rather than lower their status to that of princess - the lowest rung on the ladder below even that of Baroness.

I don't think it is demotion. It's their legal names. To show respect to them and their husbands. The same for Sarah, the former Princess Andrew. It is a sign of respect. They are princesses by marriage. To respect them, I call them Princesses Charles and William.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-13099871

People call them "Princess Diana", "Princess Kate", "Princess Catherine" because it is what the rest of the world knows them as although they are a princess by marriage.
 
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It isn't their legal names but rather their titles. It has been stated by LPs that if and when any of the Queen's descendants have a need of a legal surname, it would be Mountbatten-Windsor. This is the surname that William used filing a lawsuit in Paris as in France, his titles are not recognized.

Both Charles and Anne, I believe signed their marriage registries "Mountbatten-Windsor" also.
 
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I don't think it is demotion. It's their legal names. To show respect to them and their husbands. The same for Sarah, the former Princess Andrew. It is a sign of respect. They are princesses by marriage. To respect them, I call them Princesses Charles and William.

Royal wedding: What do we call her? - BBC News

People call them "Princess Diana", "Princess Kate", "Princess Catherine" because it is what the rest of the world knows them as although they are a princess by marriage.


It is a demotion.

Their husbands have higher title than that of Prince. Prince is the lowest title not the highest.

To use the lowest title rather than the highest is to deliberately demote them - from wife of a peer of the realm to commoner.

As a mere Prince they are commoners while as a Duke they are a peer of the realm and thus to refer to the wife of a peer of the realm with a style that is that of a commoner is a clear demotion.

William was promoted from commoner to peer of the realm when he went from Prince to Duke and so his wife went with him from wife of a commoner to wife of a peer. To use the style of a wife of a commoner is to say that he husband was never promoted to peer of the realm.

I suspect that like many Americans you think that Prince/Princess is the highest title when it is in fact that lowest.

The only married in wife who uses Princess is Princess Michael of Kent whose husband has no higher title for her to use because he was only the second son. The current Duchess of Gloucester used to use Princess Richard but then her husband became the Duke and so she stopped using Princess Richard because he husband went from being a commoner to being a peer of the realm.

Peers of the realm are most assuredly higher in rank than any commoner and so using the style of a commoner is a demotion.
 
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It is a demotion.

Their husbands have higher title than that of Prince. Prince is the lowest title not the highest.

To use the lowest title rather than the highest is to deliberately demote them - from wife of a peer of the realm to commoner.

As a mere Prince they are commoners while as a Duke they are a peer of the realm and thus to refer to the wife of a peer of the realm with a style that is that of a commoner is a clear demotion.

Umm a peer is not higher than a prince there is hundreds of peers of the realm but there is only ten princes of the united kingdom even the premier Duke in the peerage of England The Duke of Norfolk wouldn't be higher than the title of prince michael of ken .
 
The difference lies in the fact that the Duke of Norfolk is a peer of the UK while Prince Michael of Kent is not and is a commoner.

For the most part, all princes are royal dukes with the exception of Michael and Edward who is titled as an Earl with the understanding that in the future he will be created The Duke of Edinburgh.
 
If Prince/princess is lower, was Diana subordinate to Sarah Ferguson then? Diana was Princess of Wales. Sarah Duchess of York. Prince Daniel of Sweden is Duke too, but everybody calls him Prince Daniel. I would rather be called princess than duchess. Princess means you are a member of the royal family. Lots of dukes and duchesses are not members of the royal family event the Duke of Norfolk. They are usually cousins only at the closest.

Of course this tradition, whether you like it or not, is extremely historical. Before he was king and was just the king's brother, Richard III was referred to as the Duke of Gloucester, even though he was of course a prince.

I don't like calling a lady by a man's first name though. That's misogyny. I do think the husband of a princess should be a prince if they both so wish, just as much as a prince can make his wife a princess.
 
On the Diana angle, she was styled as The Princess of Wales but she also had the right to use the feminine version of any of Charles' titles. She could have opted to use, like Camilla does, the style of The Duchess of Cornwall. :D

The fact remains that in the UK, a woman takes her titles and styles from her father as a maiden (such as Lady Diana Spencer when her father became The Earl Spencer) and then her husband's on marriage. Even Princesses of the UK that married nobility were styled such as HRH Princess Alexandra, The Honorable Lady Ogilvy.

Prince and Princess just denote that those that carry that style are children or grandchildren of the monarch. They take that title from their parent/grandparent the same way that Master and Miss do.

Calling The Duchess of Cambridge "Princess William" is very similar to looking at a married woman in the US and calling her Mrs. Robert or Mrs. Mike or Mrs Joseph. In the UK though, women do use Princess (husband's) name if that husband does not hold a higher title that Prince hence how we get Princess Michael of Kent.

Perhaps with the birth of George and the rule of primogeniture change that the first born, regardless of gender, will be heir, the other titles eventually will follow suit. I'm not holding my breath on that one though.
 
Princess of Wales is a title and thus different to Princess Anne as Princess then is a style.

Diana was never Princess Diana but HRH The Princess of Wales. If she was Princess anything she was Princess Charles. She was also Duchess of Cornwall and Duchess of Rothesay. Of course she wasn't subordinate to Sarah because Sarah was Duchess of York.

Both were princesses but their titles came from their husbands.

The UK does styles and titles differently to the Europeans so comparing any of the Europeans to the UK isn't appropriate.

Princess though is a lower styling than Duchess as I said regardless of whether one is royal or not.

A non-royal Duchess still the wife of a peer of the realm while a Princess is a commoner and that is the important distinction e.g. Harry can stand for election to the House of Commons but William can't anymore. He could while a mere Prince but not as a peer of the realm.

The British don't believe in making the husbands of princesses princes unless the princess concerned is going to be the future monarch.

They also don't pass HRH through the female line under the existing rules and that isn't going to change any time soon. It is more likely that the HRH will be more restricted by the time George and Charlotte are having children so that only George's children will be HRH's anyway (limiting the HRHs to the children of the heir to the throne and that direct line rather than the collateral lines - so not for Harry's kids)

Richard III was Duke of Gloucester because his father had given him that title.

By the time of George III and Queen Victoria is was a very important thing to do - to stop the younger sons from standing as elected members of the House of Commons and so they were given peerages.

The Duke of Norfolk is the senior Duke. When the present Dukes of Gloucester and Kent pass on their sons will take their positions as Duke basing their precedence on the date of the titles and so will be behind many of the existing Dukes. Like many of the other Dukes etc they are descendants of kings in the past.

The UK has only just allowed for gender blind succession and yet they were one of the first to allow a woman to inherit the throne - after her brothers had had their turn or if there were no brothers. They are ahead of Spain in passing that legislation - they haven't yet done so.

Traditionally all women take their husband's names on marriage - either as a surname or a title. Why stop at objecting to a woman taking a man's first name? Why not regard it as sexist for a woman to take any part of a man's name at all? It is just as sexist to call a women Duchess based on her husband's title as to call her princess husband's name.
 
The difference lies in the fact that the Duke of Norfolk is a peer of the UK while Prince Michael of Kent is not and is a commoner.

For the most part, all princes are royal dukes with the exception of Michael and Edward who is titled as an Earl with the understanding that in the future he will be created The Duke of Edinburgh.

The last successive Governments have created Peers with an astonishing speed. Anyone who has seen the BBC documentaries a few weeks ago, will have seen that the once so distinghuised House of Lords has become an absolutely overcrowded geriatic reserve.

In your way of thinking a Prince Henry of Wales or a Prince Michael of Kent are "lower" than any (Life) Peer. That is a framework which has as a starting point that the Constitution constitutes of the King, the Lords, the Bishops and the commoners.

The fact that "real lords" have become rare in the House of Lords (it are almost all commoners given a life peerage) and the fact that Peers can run for any local council or the European Parliament and sit together with "commoners" but is not allowed to run for the Commons as a Peer, is on of those strange "logics" of the British system. The BBC documentary series was worth watching. It looks nice, those scarlet-dressed Lords and Ladies during a State Opening of Parliament but the closer look was pretty desillusioning. Such a scarlet cladded "Lord" can be a mumbling former MP which walks in sneakers, had his tie hanging in the soup during lunch but nevertheless puts on smelly scarlet rags over it to see the Queen. Any idea you had of the House of Lords will need adjustment after this documentary.

That Prince Henry and Prince Michael are "lower" than a Peer may be technically true but everyone knows that real life is different.
 
Thanks for the heads up Duc and I'm definitely going to keep an eye out for it if it is ever shown here in the States. I'm just learning and I do find the subject fascinating with all the ins and outs and how it all works.

For the most part, royal princes are created royal dukes as they reach their majority (or in the case now, marry). There is a big difference between a royal duke and a noble duke when it comes to precedence. Precedence is really where the rank and file come in. As I said, as far as princes go, now in the UK its only Prince Michael of Kent (his brother Edward inherited the peerage)who is not an hereditary peer and the case of Edward who is the Earl of Wessex and eventually will be created The Duke of Edinburgh - also a hereditary peerage. For the most part now, hereditary peerages are few and far between.

It is most reasonable to assume that if and when Harry marries, he will be created a duke at that time.
 
Yes of course he will.. no question.. problaby Duke of Sussex. And yes a royal duke is not the same as a "noble" Duke. He does not have a seat in the Lords.. it is a mark of honour given on arrival at years of maturity usually when a prince marries.
 
I just typed a long reply but it disappeared when my train company ended its 15 minutes of free WiFi!

Long story short, no it's not the same thing taking a husband's surname as taking his first name too. A family all having the same surname makes sense, whether the husband's the wife's or a combination of both. Taking his first name too means you just become an extension of him, you no longer have your own identity. My husband agrees and hates it when his older relatives call me Mrs Mark Oursurame. If you like it, you are welcome to it, but I hate it.
 
Yes of course he will.. no question.. problaby Duke of Sussex. And yes a royal duke is not the same as a "noble" Duke. He does not have a seat in the Lords.. it is a mark of honour given on arrival at years of maturity usually when a prince marries.

Actually, before the House of Lords Act 1999, a royal duke could, if he wanted to, sit and vote in the House of Lords. Currently, no hereditary peer can sit in the House unless he holds the offices of Earl Marshal or Lord Great Chamberlain, or is elected by the House to take one of the 90 additional seats still reserved for hereditary peers.

For all intents and purposes, a royal dukedom is equal then to an ordinary hereditary dukedom in the peerage of the UK. The only difference is that a royal duke is also a prince of the United Kingdom and, therefore, an HRH. The Earl of Ulster and the Earl of St Andrews, who are not princes themselves, will be ordinary Dukes of Gloucester and Kent respectively ("His Grace" , not "His Royal Highness") when they succeed their fathers in the peerage.

Note the difference then between what happens in the UK and the situation, for example, in Spain where the dukedoms awarded to the infantas or infantes are personal (i.e non-hereditary) titles which can be actually revoked at any time by the king, as was the case with Infanta Cristina. Whereas new hereditary dukedoms in the Spanish nobility may be currently still awarded by the king under Art. 61 of the Spanish constitution, royal dukedoms are awarded separately, and exclusively to members of the king's family, under the royal decree 1368/1987. In the UK, as I understand it, a new hereditary peerage is awarded by Letters Patent whether the recepient is royal (i.e a prince) or not.

Royal Decree 1368/1987, Chapter III
Art. 6.º

El uso de títulos de nobleza, pertenecientes a la Casa Real, solamente podrá ser autorizado por el Titular de la Corona a los miembros de su Familia. La atribución del uso de dichos títulos tendrá carácter graciable, personal y vitalicio.
 
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Richard III was Duke of Gloucester because his father had given him that title.
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Just a small correction: Edward IV created his then nine-year-old brother Richard Duke of Gloucester in 1461 shortly after claiming the throne; his twelve-year-old brother George was created Duke of Clarence near the same time. George, of course, would rebel against his brother the king once too often and paid for it with his life.
 
Oops - of course it was his brother and not his father.

Age catching up and forgetting that Edward IV and Richard III were brothers.
 
Oops - of course it was his brother and not his father.

Age catching up and forgetting that Edward IV and Richard III were brothers.
I hear you about the age :lol: It's also easy to forget just how young the York Kings were: Edward IV was only 19 when he won the throne and only 40 when he died, and Richard III became King at 30 and died at 32.
 
Is it possible that Kate could be a future Queen Mother?

Catherine (Kate), the Duchess of Cambridge and Countess of Strathearn, is widely expected to be Queen consort once William becomes His Majesty King William V. If William dies, and George becomes king, do you see Kate being the next Queen Mother as her great-grandmother-in-law?
 
Catherine (Kate), the Duchess of Cambridge and Countess of Strathearn, is widely expected to be Queen consort once William becomes His Majesty King William V. If William dies, and George becomes king, do you see Kate being the next Queen Mother as her great-grandmother-in-law?

I think that when George becomes King, Kate will be known just as Queen Catherine (providing William served as monarch). The sole reason that Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother was used so much was that she shared the same name as her daughter.
 
Catherine (Kate), the Duchess of Cambridge and Countess of Strathearn, is widely expected to be Queen consort once William becomes His Majesty King William V. If William dies, and George becomes king, do you see Kate being the next Queen Mother as her great-grandmother-in-law?

Legally she would be. If you are the mother of the king you are queen mum. If you are the wife of the late queen, but not the mother of the new, you'd be dowager queen. Camilla will be dowager, as the former queen consort but not the mother of the new king. Kate will be queen mum, as mother of the new king, when George is king,

But that said they will both be addressed the sane way. When you are the current queen consort you are simply HM the Queen. When you are dowager or queen mum, you use your name. They would be Queen Camilla and Queen Catherine. When William is king there will be HM the Queen Consort and Queen Camilla if she outlives her husband.

The queen mum is not usually used in address. The queen mum did because her abd the new queen shared the same name. Unless George marries a woman named Catherine, it's highly unlikely Kate would be actively called queen mum.
 
If the Edinburgh title is recreated for Edward

This has been discussed for years and I love this discussion because of the Edinburgh title.

If it is to be recreated for Edward, will Edward and Sophie be known as Their Royal Highnesses The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh? Will their Wessex titles be included?

Will Viscount Severn be known as H.R.H. Prince James of Edinburgh and Wessex?, or just H.R.H. Prince James of Edinburgh?
 
This has been discussed for years and I love this discussion because of the Edinburgh title.

If it is to be recreated for Edward, will Edward and Sophie be known as Their Royal Highnesses The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh? Will their Wessex titles be included?

Will Viscount Severn be known as H.R.H. Prince James of Edinburgh and Wessex?, or just H.R.H. Prince James of Edinburgh?

My understanding is that Edward will hold both titles , i.e Duke of Edinburgh and Earl of Wessex (as the latter won't be revoked), but he will probably be referred to only by his highest title in the peerage, i.e Duke of Edinburgh, whereas Earl of Wessex would become a subsidiary title.

We don't know if Edward's children will be HRHs in the future, although they have been actually legally entitled to have such style from birth. If they become HRHs, I assume their titles would be Prince/Princess [xxx] of Edinburgh, rather than "of Edinburgh and Wessex". If, however, James continues to be styled simply as the eldest son of a duke, then I assume he might use the courtesy title of Earl of Wessex or some other other subsidiary title that may come together with the dukedom award for Edward.
 
My understanding is that Edward will hold both titles , i.e Duke of Edinburgh and Earl of Wessex (as the latter won't be revoked), but he will probably be referred to only by his highest title in the peerage, i.e Duke of Edinburgh, whereas Earl of Wessex would become a subsidiary title.

We don't know if Edward's children will be HRHs in the future, although they have been actually legally entitled to have such style from birth. If they become HRHs, I assume their titles would be Prince/Princess [xxx] of Edinburgh, rather than "of Edinburgh and Wessex". If, however, James continues to be styled simply as the eldest son of a duke, then I assume he might use the courtesy title of Earl of Wessex or some other other subsidiary title that may come together with the dukedom award for Edward.

ALso When titles are shared, ie Duke of Cornwall and York (this example applies to George V) when his father became king), the titles are of equal rank, ie both Dukedoms.
 
My understanding is that Edward will hold both titles , i.e Duke of Edinburgh and Earl of Wessex (as the latter won't be revoked), but he will probably be referred to only by his highest title in the peerage, i.e Duke of Edinburgh, whereas Earl of Wessex would become a subsidiary title.

We don't know if Edward's children will be HRHs in the future, although they have been actually legally entitled to have such style from birth. If they become HRHs, I assume their titles would be Prince/Princess [xxx] of Edinburgh, rather than "of Edinburgh and Wessex". If, however, James continues to be styled simply as the eldest son of a duke, then I assume he might use the courtesy title of Earl of Wessex or some other other subsidiary title that may come together with the dukedom award for Edward.

Viscount Severn, Earl of Merioneth? Some see Charles as technically "Earl of Merioneth" since he is Philip's heir as his eldest son. William should also be technically "Baron Greenwich".
 
Viscount Severn, Earl of Merioneth? Some see Charles as technically "Earl of Merioneth" since he is Philip's heir as his eldest son. William should also be technically "Baron Greenwich".

He wouldn't be Viscount Severn, Earl of Merioneth as Earl trumps Viscount. His fathers primary subsidiary title is Earl of Wessex which is what James will most likely take on.
 
He wouldn't be Viscount Severn, Earl of Merioneth as Earl trumps Viscount. His fathers primary subsidiary title is Earl of Wessex which is what James will most likely take on.

So when Edward becomes Duke of Edinburgh, the Earldom of Wessex will fall to James automatically?
 
What becomes of the Edinburgh title if Edward decides to remain Earl of Wessex?

Does his son get it, or will it be given to someone else in the family?
 
Questions about British Styles and Titles

So when Edward becomes Duke of Edinburgh, the Earldom of Wessex will fall to James automatically?

Doesn't work like that. James doesn't become The Earl of Wessex, Edward is still the holder of the title. James just uses the title. But as EOW is now Edwards first subsidiary title, that's the one James would use.



What becomes of the Edinburgh title if Edward decides to remain Earl of Wessex?

Does his son get it, or will it be given to someone else in the family?


Seeing as Edinburgh isn't automatic, it has to go through the motions before Edward gets it. If he decided he didn't want it, it would never be issued to him. Merging with the crown and remaining there until its re-issue for George's children possible.
 
What becomes of the Edinburgh title if Edward decides to remain Earl of Wessex?

Does his son get it, or will it be given to someone else in the family?


It probably merges in the Crown when Charles is king, or it goes to William or George.

It would be nice to see Edward as a Duke, and James as a prince of Edinburgh.
When James marries, his wife should be Princess James of Edinburgh.
 
What becomes of the Edinburgh title if Edward decides to remain Earl of Wessex?

Does his son get it, or will it be given to someone else in the family?

If he did not want it, it would be free after Philip was gone.. to be given to another royal male..but He's sure to accept it...
 
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