Wintonian nobility

See Also: List of Major Noble Families

Noble Families exist and serve in the upper chamber of the National Assembly. The term Family has come to represent large scale business conglomerates built up over time. Today their are three recognized forms of Families in Winst; Highborn, Aristocratic, and Corporate. Families are often compared to the Popular Class's Cooperatives, however, the general scale is far larger and is usually designed as a vertical monopoly.

Highborn Families

The Highborn Families of Winst trace their ancestry to the Lunder nobility and various earlier Gostic Kingdoms. Highborn Families are by far the smallest of the categories. This is due to the small initial number of Families, as well as the departure or death of Émigré and Loyalists during the Revolution, strict marriage and inheritance laws, and infertility. The laws concerning the fidelity of the Highborn Family, is tied to their pensions, which Highborn Families to this day receive from the government. In more recent times the strict laws have been removed allowing lineages following from different classes and genders to be accepted reinvigorating many Highborn Families at the expense of larger personal pension funds. Marriages have become a daunting legal affair especially between Highborn Families as the transitive nature of their name can lead to friction over inheritance.

Aristocratic Families

Aristocratic Families are Families originating from the bourgeois and the lower nobility. These Families were extremely important actors in the Revolutionary War serving as important army officers and demanded the creation of an ennobling process following independence allowing new elites to enter the National Court. Compared to Highborn Families, Aristocratic Families marriage and inheritance laws have historically been far more relaxed as they do not receive pensions. This has allowed for far more adoptions allowing for greater expansion and protection from die offs. Some Aristocratic Families were formed through marriage into bloodless Highborn Families. Aristocratic Families grow quite easily although power as a result is by in large more dissipated than Highborn Families.

Corporate Families

Corporate Families began to emerge in the aftermath of the Olympic War. Many Families established trusts to oversee their belongings and assets in times of war. If the family was left without an heir the trust would be maintained until the family name or all of its assets were purchased. The Olympic War wiped out a significant number of families and with the post war depression, purchasing power decreased significantly. This lead to the evolution of these familial trusts into corporate entities and allowed for the movement of the frozen capital and assets which were desperately needed in the economic downturn. The subsequent growth during the Revitalization pushed many of the entities outside of the price range to be purchased. Their De Facto existence was recognized in 1954 by the Corporate Families Act