Titles of Nobility
The southern kingdoms of Naples, Sicily and Sardinia, as well as the Papal states, granted the ranks typical of monarchies such as Spain, France or England: Prince, Duke, Marquess, Count, Baron. The title of Viscount was not as frequent in Italy as elsewhere.
In Northern Italy and Tuscany the situation was more complex, because there were many kinds of authorities granting titles.
Typically, Italian comunes (also in the Kingdom of Naples) and Republics granted or recognised the title of Patrician, which was only regarded as a rank of nobility in Italy. The patriciate was an urban aristocracy, as opposed to a feudal one.
However, the Republic of Venice also granted feudal titles. In the republics of Venice, Genoa and Ragusa, the head of state had the title of Doge, a variant form of Duca (Duke) or Rector.
In the Middle Ages,
| “ | The majority of feudatories were simply signori (from the French seigneur, a title introduced into Italy by the eleventh-century Normans), vassalli (vassals) or cavalieri (knights). Eventually, this class came to be known collectively as the baroni (barons), as in Italy barone was not always a title descriptive of a particular feudal rank. During the fourteenth century, most minor feudal lands became baronies, their holders barons. It must be observed that the use of these titles usually required some form of sovereign sanction or feudal tenure. | ” |
During Renaissance the monarchs conquered all the city-republics except Venice, Genoa, Lucca, San Marino and Ragusa. So, in most of Italy, patricians were integrated into the low ranks of aristocracy.
Until 1806, Northern Italy (except Venice and Ragusa ( now Dubrovnik)) and Tuscany formed the Kingdom of Italy, belonging to the Holy Roman Empire. The Emperor retained for himself the right of creating dukes and princes. The Northern Italian monarchs had received from the Emperor the right of granting the lower feudal titles (from Marquess downwards), since these monarchs often were princes and dukes themselves.
When in 1871 the King of Sardinia conquered the other Italian states, the Consulta Araldica (the Italian college of arms) integrated these different and varied systems in the hierarchy described below. In practice, this took decades.
The official ranks under the Kingdom of Italy (1871–1946) were:
| Italian | Translation | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Masculine | Feminine | Masculine | Feminine |
| Re | Regina | King | Queen |
| Principe | Principessa | Prince | Princess |
| Duca | Duchessa | Duke | Duchess |
| Marchese | Marchesa | Marquess | Marchioness |
| Conte | Contessa | Count (Earl) | Countess |
| Visconte | Viscontessa | Viscount | Viscountess |
| Barone | Baronessa | Baron | Baroness |
| Cavaliere (Cav.) | Dama | Baronet | |
| Patrizio | Patrizia | Patrician | |
| Nobili, or Nobiluomo (N.H.) | Nobildonna | Nobleman | |
This hierarchy resulted from the overlapping of those set by the pre-unitarian states, which were strongly different from each other. As a consequence, titles were not homogeneously distributed throughout the country and, respectively, in each region some title was completely absent.
Unfortunately, by 1946, with abolition of the monarchy, a number of titles borne by families in the pre-unitary states (Two Sicilies, Papal State, etc.) still had not been matriculated by the Consulta Araldica. This explains the use of certain titles by families (and "claimants") whose position was not regularised between 1860 and 1946.
Read more about this topic: Nobility Of Italy
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—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
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