Crown (headgear) - Terminology

Terminology

Three distinct categories of crowns exist in those monarchies that use crowns or state regalia.

1. Coronation - worn by monarchs when being crowned.
2. State - worn by monarchs on other state occasions. (Note that similar headgear, worn by nobility and other high-ranking people below the ruler, is in English called a coronet, however in many languages the same word is used, e.g., French couronne, German Krone, Dutch kroon);
3. Consort crowns - worn by queens consort, signifying rank granted as a constitutional courtesy protocol.

In Classical antiquity the crown (corona) that was sometimes awarded to people other than rulers, such as triumphal military generals or athletes, was actually a wreath or chaplet, or ribbonlike diadem.