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  1. #1
    Senior Member Beruin's Avatar
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    Does Aeric Boeruine rank higher in station than Darien Avan?

    Just a small bit I came across when reading up on heraldry

    From Robert Innes-Smith, An Outline of Heraldry in England and Scotland:

    "Dukes are technically 'princes' and although at first sight it seems that in this country a prince is higher in rank, it must be remembered that Royal children are born princes but are raised to the rank of Duke..."
    The Archduke would certainly approve...

  2. #2
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    Based on European heraldry, princes out-rank dukes. Prince means First, as in Principal. Augustus Caesar adopted Principus as his title, and Prince derives from that. Dukes are only "princes" in a technical sense. First there is the Imperial case, where the dukes are soveriegn and may act as soveriegns despite the Emperor. The second case, as in England or France, duke is a royal title, where the only dukes are royals. If we look at the three ancient duchies of France, Burgundy, Brittany, and Aquitaine, each has its own royal pretensions. Each was occupied by a Capetian prince, a brother of a king. When Edward III created duchies, he only made his sons dukes. Again duchy is used as a royal office.

    But at other times and in other circumstances, dukes who are not royal (say the Duke of Wellington compared to Prince George, Duke of York), the non-royal dukes are clearly inferior to non-ducal princes. So in modern England, Prince Harry outranks Richard, Duke of Gloucester, who is the grandson of George V. Prince Harry is the son of a Prince. Duke Richard is the son of a Duke. Both are the gransons of Kings.

    The reason princes can be created dukes is that as the son of a king Prince is an honorary title. The Prince of Wales has no lands. But the Prince of Wales has been the Duke of Cornwall since Edward the Black Prince, and has lands and income as Duke. So you make your sons, princes, dukes because you are giving them incomes, not titles.

  3. #3
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    My head hurts...

    This is the reason most of my D&D Fighters are
    Warlords that don`t give a dump about nobility! LOL

    It is too complicated for their sword weary arms to
    worry about lifting a book to read when they can just
    take the land...and use the Duke or Prince`s Heraldry
    as the necessity in the privy afterward!

    I suppose that comes from my U.S. origins though, with
    little knowledge of how nobility and royalty work in
    the day to day lives of others in the world.

    I think that is also the reason many fantasy fans of
    the D&D game have little understanding of what true
    feudalism is all about at any rate...we just aren`t
    from a country where such things happened (though our
    ancestors are).


    --- kgauck <brnetboard@BIRTHRIGHT.NET> wrote:

    > This post was generated by the Birthright.net
    > message forum.
    > You can view the entire thread at:
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    >
    > kgauck wrote:
    > Based on European heraldry, princes out-rank dukes.
    > Prince means First, as in Principal. Augustus
    > Caesar adopted Principus as his title, and Prince
    > derives from that. Dukes are only "princes" in a
    > technical sense. First there is the Imperial case,
    > where the dukes are soveriegn and may act as
    > soveriegns despite the Emperor. The second case, as
    > in England or France, duke is a royal title, where
    > the only dukes are royals. If we look at the three
    > ancient duchies of France, Burgundy, Brittany, and
    > Aquitaine, each has its own royal pretensions. Each
    > was occupied by a Capetian prince, a brother of a
    > king. When Edward III created duchies, he only made
    > his sons dukes. Again duchy is used as a royal
    > office.
    >
    > But at other times and in other circumstances, dukes
    > who are not royal (say the Duke of Wellington
    > compared to Prince George, Duke of York), the
    > non-royal dukes are clearly inferior to non-ducal
    > princes. So in modern England, Prince Harry
    > outranks Richard, Duke of Gloucester, who is the
    > grandson of George V. Prince Harry is the son of a
    > Prince. Duke Richard is the son of a Duke. Both
    > are the gransons of Kings.
    >
    > The reason princes can be created dukes is that as
    > the son of a king Prince is an honorary title. The
    > Prince of Wales has no lands. But the Prince of
    > Wales has been the Duke of Cornwall since Edward the
    > Black Prince, and has lands and income as Duke. So
    > you make your sons, princes, dukes because you are
    > giving them incomes, not titles.
    >
    >

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  4. #4
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by dalor View Post
    It is too complicated for their sword weary arms to worry about lifting a book to read when they can just take the land...and use the Duke or Prince`s Heraldry as the necessity in the privy afterward!
    Surely once your warlords have won their states they hope to leave them intact to heirs, who having not won their states by force of arms are forced to make arguments of birthright and lineage. If your bold and ready warlord is contemptuous of titles and heraldry he makes the task of his heirs much harder.

  5. #5
    Senior Member Beruin's Avatar
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    First off, Anuirean titles have been discussed quite a few times before here, so sorry for opening this can of worms again, but I think there are some new ideas here.

    IIRC, in early medieval Europe 'duke' was a military title going back to the time when the Germanic peoples elected their (military) leaders. When things settled down after the fall of the Roman Empire and the Germanic peoples, notably the Franks, settled down on former Roman territory, powerful dukes became kings as their position became hereditary. In this sense, the title duke precedes the title king.

    I see a similarity to the Anuireans here. The dukes were the leaders of the Andu clans when they came to Cerilia and the most powerful of them later became the first emperor.

    AFAIR Octavian, better known as Augustus, adopted the title princeps to denote his position within the senate as primus inter pares ('first among equals'), i.e. to show for propaganda reasons that even if his position was superior he was still part of the crowd so-to-speak. He received the title Augustus, meaning 'The Divine', only later, shortly before his death, IIRC.

    Also see these links:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princeps
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primus_inter_pares
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princeps_Senatus

    If we follow this example for the Anuireans, it becomes possible to explain the title 'Prince' for Darien Avan, provided you use a kind of Imperial Senate in your campaign:
    The Avan family has traditionally held the presiding seat in the senate and after a few generations the title prince went along with this office.
    Last edited by Beruin; 04-17-2007 at 02:18 AM.

  6. #6
    This is the reason most of my D&D Fighters are
    Warlords that don`t give a dump about nobility! LOL
    You are talking about non-BR settings, I should hope.

  7. #7
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    The only two pure fighters I ever played were both
    humans (in birthright); and didn`t care much about
    what happened to their kingdoms after they died.

    One, Barak, was a Vos Mercenary warlord. He used
    human mercenaries, goblins and gnolls to establish his
    Warhold upon the remains of the Chimaeron (after
    killing the resident Awnsheigh). He had perhaps
    dozens of children, and didn`t care about any of them
    more than the others...it was up for them to establish
    who took control after he died...he was Vos and
    believed that might made right. He went on to invade
    Coeranys and take it as well as large parts of
    Rhormarch (sp?), but made the fatal mistake of
    becoming overly greedy and invading the dwarven
    kingdom in alliance with Orogs...he got bogged down
    and lost his head as well as his holdings against the
    Dwarves and their elven allies and other human
    mercenaries that their massive gold stores hired.

    The other, name I can`t remember, carved a holding for
    himself in the Five Peaks and then invaded Thurazor.
    The game stopped too soon and never started
    again...but he too didn`t care about his heirs because
    he had never considered that he would even live to the
    next day, let alone worry about children he never saw
    unless he was visiting one village or another he had
    conquered.

    I did play a Paladin Monarch of Talinie in Anuire as
    well as other realms; but I never played just a
    fighter who ruled a land from the start.

    That is the problem with Anuire though, why its people
    haven`t been brought out of centuries of minor wars:
    there hasn`t been a powerful ruler who came along that
    didn`t care if he had the Iron Throne or not...someone
    who just decided to take what he could and let the
    Nobles and Royals go take a flying leap. Someone
    needs to come along and establish a new order...

    But unlike Europe, there are no slavering hordes of
    "barbarians" that can sweep in and do that...(although
    I did play with the idea of a Vos Horde coming to
    Anuire and conquering it...or at least uniting what
    was left that they didn`t conquer to unite Anuire
    again).


    --- kgauck <brnetboard@BIRTHRIGHT.NET> wrote:

    > This post was generated by the Birthright.net
    > message forum.
    > You can view the entire thread at:
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    >
    > kgauck wrote:
    > ------------ QUOTE ----------
    > It is too complicated for their sword weary arms to
    > worry about lifting a book to read when they can
    > just take the land...and use the Duke or Prince`s
    > Heraldry as the necessity in the privy afterward!
    > -----------------------------
    >
    >
    >
    > Surely once your warlords have won their states they
    > hope to leave them intact to heirs, who having not
    > won their states by force of arms are forced to make
    > arguments of birthright and lineage. If your bold
    > and ready warlord is contemptuous of titles and
    > heraldry he makes the task of his heirs much harder.
    >
    >

    >
    > Birthright-l Archives:
    > http://oracle.wizards.com/archives/birthright-l.html
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    > LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM
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  8. #8
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    In general yes...but not entirely.

    The Vos don`t care much for Anuirean Noble
    titles...they are meaningless to them...as well as to
    the Rjurik for the most part and the Khinasi as well
    (again for the most part).

    Anyone coming from those lands would bring their own
    ideas of how they wanted to rule their lands.

    No need for "putting me in my place" as if there
    aren`t examples already for nations in Anuire that
    don`t care at all for Anuirean titles:

    Medeore (Theocracy, and thus outside the "rules")

    Endier (has "nobles" but completely powerless and the
    leader there obviously has no use for a noble title)

    Aerenwe (hasn`t the ruler there forsworn the usual
    Anuirean "rules" for nobility and royalty...I could be
    wrong)

    Ilien (Magocracy)...even though I think the ruler is a
    Count, he obviously doesn`t go by the book since the
    ruler of Ilien MUST be a Wizard by tradition.

    I think there are others...but I think I`ve pointed
    out enough.

    There is no need for a ruler in Anuire to stick to the
    rules of nobility and royalty in Anuire unless he is
    FROM nobility and royalty...and not all characters
    are.

    So to answer your "question" the answer would have to
    be: Yes, in Birthright.

    ......as if I`m a dolt and need to be reminded of my
    place...sheesh!


    --- prince_dios <brnetboard@BIRTHRIGHT.NET> wrote:
    > prince_dios wrote:
    > ------------ QUOTE ----------
    > This is the reason most of my D&D Fighters are
    > Warlords that don`t give a dump about nobility! LOL
    > -----------------------------
    >
    >
    >
    > You are talking about non-BR settings, I should
    > hope.
    >
    >

    >
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    > http://oracle.wizards.com/archives/birthright-l.html
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  9. #9
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    I'd figure it would be more likely that these examples just complicate the picture, rather than standing outside the nobility. The nobility is not a closed system. Once you run domains you're in it. Participating in existing power structures is something people do because it serves a purpose.

    Quote Originally Posted by Machiavelli
    Those who by valorous ways become princes, like these men, acquire a principality with difficulty, but they keep it with ease. The difficulties they have in acquiring it arise in part from the new rules and methods which they are forced to introduce to establish their government and its security. And it ought to be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new. This coolness arises partly from fear of the opponents, who have the laws on their side, and partly from the incredulity of men, who do not readily believe in new things until they have had a long experience of them. Thus it happens that whenever those who are hostile have the opportunity to attack they do it like partisans, whilst the others defend lukewarmly, in such wise that the prince is endangered along with them.

  10. #10
    Senior Member Beruin's Avatar
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    IMC, I see Endier and Ilien as Free Imperial Cities with a bit of surrounding territory, akin to quite a few larger and wealthier cities in the Holy Roman Empire. They have been granted self-administration by the Emperor in times past and do not have to accept a land regent above them, except of course, the Emperor. In these troubled times, they are strong supporters of the Chamberlain, as the last remaining institution willing to back their claim to independence.

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