Court Officials
Court officials or office-bearers (one type of courtier) derived their positions and retained their titles from their original duties within the courtly household. With time such duties often became archaic, but titles survived involving the ghosts of arcane duties, generally dating back to the days when a noble household had practical and mundane concerns as well as high politics and culture. Such court appointments each have their own histories. They include:
- Almoner
- Butler
- Chamberlain
- Chancellor
- Chapelmaster
- Chaplain = Arch
- Cofferer
- Confessor
- Constable
- Cup-bearer
- Dapifer
- Doorward
- Eunuch
- Falconer
- Gentleman of the Bedchamber
- Gentleman Usher
- Grand Almoner
- Grand Panetier, Panifer
- Grandmaster
- Grand Master of the Hunt
- Great officers
- Groom of the Stool
- Herald
- Intendant of the civil list
- Jester = fool
- Keeper of the seal
- King of arms
- Knight -/ Earl Marshal
- Lady-in-waiting
- Maid of Honour
- Majordomo
- Master of the Horse
- Master of the Hunt
- Page
- Panter or pantler
- Secretary
- Pursuivant
- Seneschal
- Standard bearer
- Steward
Read more about this topic: Court (royal)
Famous quotes containing the words court and/or officials:
“GOETHE, raised o’er joy and strife,
Drew the firm lines of Fate and Life,
And brought Olympian wisdom down
To court and mar, to gown and town,
Stooping, his finger wrote in clay
The open secret of to-day.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“To name oneself is the first act of both the poet and the revolutionary. When we take away the right to an individual name, we symbolically take away the right to be an individual. Immigration officials did this to refugees; husbands routinely do it to wives.”
—Erica Jong (b. 1942)