[Ansteorra] Social Status (was: Odd question reguarding persona development)

[Marc Carlson]

Susan catmafia at hughes.net
>What are the other aspects that distinguish the two?  When I read and try 
>following the various aspects of titles, I get confused after awhile.  Two 
>of the biggest things that confuse me are the differentiations of titles 
>between those who are descended from royalty and those who were given 
>titles in reward for something.  Following the Dukes, Earls, and Honorables 
>gets me lost fairly quickly; let alone remembering which practices and 
>titles existed during which part of history.

Ok, lets build a simplistic model (note to nit-pickers simplistic means that 
it's not going to be universally accurate – I'm trying for generally 
accurate here.  And yes, the terms are Anglo-centric – I'm trying to not get 
too complex).  The first thing we are going to do, for the sake of this 
thread, is set aside the SCA awards and rank structure.

Roughly speaking, the Great Chain of Being as it involves humans starting at 
the bottom

1  Slaves (owned body and soul by someone else)

2  Villein or Serf (the "unfree" -- think "tenant farmer".  They are legally 
tied to land that is owned by someone else.)

3  "Freeman" (someone who may not own anything, but isn't actually legally 
tied to someone else).

4  Yeoman (the term can mean "servant" or a small farmer who owns their own 
land, or small businessman.  In modern terms, these are "Lower Class")    
There are some wealthy commoners in the Middle Ages who were technically of 
the "Yeomanry", although they owned property. They just don't appear to have 
made that requisite purchase to "Gentry".
5  Gentry or "Gentle" (The upper levels of Commoner, and includes the 
"professional" (what we would consider "Middle") class all the way up to the 
Aristocracy/"Upper Class" (i.e, the BIG land owners, Knights and so forth.  
There are grades within the class, one of which is achieving a coat of arms, 
which (originally) only the Knights could have.  The lines between it and 
the Yeomanry are hard to identify, but they ARE there, and when they've been 
crossed, it's obvious to the "trained eye".  This is the highest class a 
Commoner can really aspire to)

The break between Yeoman and Gentry might be considered "those who work for 
a living" and "those who think for a living".    In the modern work 
organization, there are sergeants, secretaries, nurses, and so on... the 
trained assistants who actually do most of the work are of the Yeomanry, and 
the professionals, officers, and administrators are of the Gentry.

Now since social class was generally fixed by birth, upward and downward 
mobility within one's lifetime was not something that could generally occur, 
or at best could only take place slowly.  The Pastons (a British family 
known for their correspondence) was an upwardly mobile family, but it took 
generations to move from 4 to 5.

Ok, enough of the vast majority of people throughout recorded history.  We 
are now at the real ceiling, the line between commoner and noble.   Breaking 
through this barrier is pretty much impossible, except under very unusual 
circumstances.  A family could marry up past it, but even so that means the 
person who married into the nobility, their children would belong, but not 
the rest of the family.

This is because Nobility were considered ontologically superior people.  
They are, as a matter of their basic existence, closer to God and therefore 
are more Godlike a commoner could ever aspire to.

6  Barons are the lowest class of Nobility, and are the lowest level of 
"Lords" and "Ladies".  In a feudal system they are in vassalage to Counts, 
Earls, Dukes and Kings.

7  Counts and Earls hold a region known as a "County", and may have several 
Barons in Vassalage beneath them.  They are in turn Vassals to the Crown.

8  Dukes hold a region known as a "Duchy", which is often just a large  and 
powerful County.  Princes are often at this social level, which is why most 
modern Dukes are of Royal rank.

9.  Kings.  Emperors are Kings who rule several countries.

10.  God.

Does this help any?

Marc/Diarmaid