In the context of nobility, a courtesy title is a title that is not a substantive title but rather is used through custom or courtesy.
In some contexts, courtesy title is used to mean the more general concept of a title or honorific such as Mr., Mrs., Ms., Dr., miss, sir, and madam.
Read more about Courtesy Title: France, United Kingdom
Famous quotes containing the words courtesy and/or title:
“Poe gives the sense for the first time in America, that literature is serious, not a matter of courtesy but of truth.”
—William Carlos Williams (1883–1963)
“Down the road, on the right hand, on Brister’s Hill, lived Brister Freeman, “a handy Negro,” slave of Squire Cummings once.... Not long since I read his epitaph in the old Lincoln burying-ground, a little on one side, near the unmarked graves of some British grenadiers who fell in the retreat from Concord,—where he is styled “Sippio Brister,”MScipio Africanus he had some title to be called,—”a man of color,” as if he were discolored.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)