Themiclesian nobility
The Themiclesian nobility (姓族) consists of multiple categories of individuals that enjoy varying degrees of social, political, and economic privilege.
Royalty
It should be noted that the distinction between palatine and royal prince mirrors that of Ostlandic fürst and prinz. A palatine prince is a sub-sovereign, whereas a royal prince is one borne through kinship with a sovereign.
Palatine princes
The palatine princes (諸王) are the most senior titles recognized by the Themiclesian nobility system. On a symbolic level, the relationship between the sovereign and the palatine princes is one created by a treaty between equals, unlike that with his barons, which is created by vassalage, and with his children, created by descent. This symbolic equality is punctuated by political inequality, whereby the princes have surrendered part of their jurisdiction under the terms of the Treaty of Five Kings in the 3rd century; the independence of their states, from the Tsjinh suzerain, shrank during centuries of negotiations and conflict, but their rulers' nominal parity with the sovereign was retained. This situation persisted until the end of the 10th century, when the palatine princes, by now mascots of political conservatism, were finally deposed.
Though the palatine princes no longer existed as individuals, their titles and privileges remained a useful tool to satisfy several other traditions, such as marriage between social equals. The king, or emperor after 542, customarily took a palatine princess' hand in marriage, and after deposition a noblewoman was symbolitically raised to the rank of a palatine princess. The same was done for the sovereign's biological mother, if she was of a sufficient background and not the same person as his predecessor's consort. When Camia became officially independent in 1703, the Themiclesian government framed this as an elevation to the rank of a palatine prince, which ultimately meant Camia's ruler was an equal to the Themiclesian emperor.
Royal princes
The royal princes and princesses (諸公子), or in some translations the princes and princesses of the blood, are the descendants of the sovereign that do not inherit the throne. They can be divided into two classes, the inner princes, who have not received a title, and outer princes, who have. The untitled princes are legally part of the royal family, recognizing the sovereign as their paterfamilias, while the ones with titles are considered heads of their own households. Before the palatine princes were deposed, their descendants were too considered royal princes. In terms of rank, the royal princes are junior to both palatine princes and peers of the realm.
The title of an outer prince is substantive; it is officially granted or inherited rather than be borne as a courtesy title through kinship or marriage. Like other titles of this kind, it is passed on to the holder's legitimate male heir, with preference for age. Conversely, the title "royal prince" is better-described as courtesy titles for members of the royal family.
Peerage
Modern Themiclesian laws recognize the holders of two titles to be peers of the realm, in the Tyrannian sense—ordinary peer and titular peer.
Ordinary peer
The ordinary peer (徹侯) originated in antiquity as hereditary leaders of militarized colonies bound to a sovereign, and later it came to be applied to any hereditary nobleman with independent armed forces. In this regard, it is sometimes translated as "marquis" or "baron" in historical texts. The fiefdoms of these nobles were always on the peripheries of the lord's territories, where warfare was frequent, as a baron's defining duty was to defend his lord's territories.
Titular peer
The titular peer (倫侯) literally means "equal of barons". It was originally a categorical title applied to a variety of senior nobles during the Tsjinh kingdom that did not possess military forces (or at any rate not bound by vassalage in their use) but held the same dignity as one that did. It displaced older titles (viz. below) such as the manorial elder and settlement-lord. The fiefdoms of titular peers, as a characteristic, were all located near or within the sovereign's demesne land, so they could be protected by a centralized army.
Non-feudal nobility
By definition, the peerage consisted of hereditary vassals to the crown, who recognized their lands in return; however, there were other titles in land that were either not heritable, not manorial (without rights of rulership), or not based on a specific piece of land. The rank of titular peer gravitated towards a non-feudal nature in recent history, though it remains notionally feudal.
Counsel
The title of counsel (卿) was granted to senior members of the administration. It gave the holder a fairly large piece of land and housing land, even after leaving office. The title also provided the holder's successor with privileges to enter the civil service, but it was not truly heritable. This title gave the holder a fairly large piece of agricultural and housing land, even after leaving office, but did not confer manorial rights. There were two ranks of counsels, the principal counsel (徹卿, r′jêt-sk′rjang) and adjunct counsel (介卿, krêbh-sk′rjang), the former being the senior rank. The Principal Counsels, heads of departments in the canonical bureaucracy, are thus named because they tended to be individuals who have achieved this rank in the nobility.
Officer
The title officer (大夫) was granted to relatively junior members of the administration. As with counsel, it also gave to the holder agricultural and housing land for life, without manorial rights, and to his successors preference in entering the civil service. The title is not heritable otherwise. There are three ranks of the officer, the ordinary officer, the departmental officer (官大夫), and royal officer (公大夫).
Defunct titles
Dukes
The title duke (公, klong), or "parriarch" in some translations, was used by the most senior figure in a clan-based polity. The Themiclesian duke does not have military connotations that is present in the history of the Casaterran duke, from Old Sylvan dux, "leader, commander". All sovereign princes in Themiclesia originally bore the title of duke in the native sense, and only several promoted themselves to the rank of "king" in recognition of their powers over peers; the remaining retained the title of duke, but their jurisdictions gradually dissolved in the 4th and 5th centuries, generally in favour of their subordinate barons. After the 5th century, the title of duke was only granted to the most powerful noblemen who effectively ruled on behalf of a king, and within his domain he was permitted to sub-enfeoff barons and junior nobles. Themiclesia's last duke was demoted to baron in the 15th century.
Elders
The title elder (伯, brak) came in several types on whose interconnections historians have not reached agreement. Like a duke, an elder was a clan leader with lands and political powers over his kin and dependent clans, and the lands they occupied; an elder could be a vassal or a sovereign. The principal difference between a duke and elder seemed to be perspective—a duke's ambit tended towards the kind acknowledged by the writer or by the Themiclesian state, while that of an elder was more descriptive. Within the context of the Themiclesian cultural zone, the duke was usually more powerful and higher-ranking than the elder, but beyond it, the elder was usually a powerful ruler that rivalled the writer's own state.
Precedence
| Extant | Defunct | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Emperor | |
| 2 | Palatine prince | |
| 3 | Duke | |
| 4 | Ordinary peer | |
| 5 | Titular peer | Lord of city |
| 6 | Manorial elder | |
| 7 | Royal prince | |
| 8 | Senior counsel | |
| 9 | Junior counsel | |
| 10 | Royal Officer | |
| 11 | Departmental Officer | |
| 12 | Officer |