Titled characters (WAS Voldemort's "lordship")

[pengolodh_sc]

No: HPFGUIDX 86184

--- In HPforGrownups, "Geoff Bannister" wrote:
[snip]
> Christian Stubø:
> > 1.  A Baroness is a wife of a Baron, so I don't expect
> > Baronesses to be significantly more common or rare than
> > Barons.
> 
> Geoff:
> You may well be right that Barons are often styled "Lord" but
> you have overlooked that a Baroness can also be "A woman
> holding the rank of baron". Quite what the parameters for this
> to occur are, I cannot say.

Either she has been granted the title by the Queen (inwhich case it 
is normally a life peerage these days), or else she has the 
distinction of holding one of the relatively few hereditary titles 
which are not inheritable only by males - most peerage-titles are 
inherited through exclusively male primogeny, and if no male heir can 
be found, then such titles become extinct.

As for the title of Lord, any male peer - be he a Baron, a Scots Lord 
of the Parliament (the only rank where Lord is an inherent part of 
the title, to distinguish it from the Scots Feudal Baronies, which 
are a different thing from the Baronies of England, Wales, and 
Ireland towhich the Lords of Parliament are equals), a Viscount, an 
Earl, a Marquess, or a Duke - is a Lord - by courtesy (in the case of 
Barons, Viscounts, Marquesses, or Dukes) or by inheritance.  Dukes 
are formally addressed "Your grace" or "My Grace", so the term isn't 
heard quite as often in reference to them, but nevertheless it is so.

--- In HPforGrownups, Carol wrote:
[snip]
> Thanks for the information. My thought that he was German or
> Austrian was based solely on the title "Baron," which to my
> knowledge doesn't exist in Britain. (I'm also assuming that
> the good baron attended Durmstrang in his youth. How he ended
> up at Hogwarts is anybody's guess.)

--- In HPforGrownups, KT Waters wrote:
> Nothing pointed it out, but I guessed it too. it's just Baron
> is more Austrian or German. In England or Scotland there are
> more Lords and Earls and Dukes.

In Germany, I think you will find "Freiherr" being at least as common 
as Baron - and the rank of Baron stems from France originally, and 
came to Britain with the Norman invasion.  As I pointed out in an 
earlier post, the rank of Baron is by far the most common in the 
English, Scots, British, Irish, and UK peerages, outnumbering all 
other titles counted together.  Barons in fact outnumber Earls and 
Dukes by nearly 3 to 1 (and they outnumber Dukedoms alone by 
somewhere around 28 to 1).

As such, I still see nothing to point at the Bloody Baron not being 
British.  I think it is also unlikely that the House Ghost of 
Slytherin was not originally himself a Slytherin, or at the least 
once a Hogwarts student - I believe Durmstrang's ghost tend to stick 
to Durmstrang.

Best regards
Christian Stubø