Category Archives: England

The city of Manchester was a rough city in the industrial age. The history of the dukes of Manchester shares some of the underworld aspects of the great northern powerhouse, but in fact has nothing to do with the city—like most British dukedoms, the title does not align with the geography. Three modern dukes ofContinue reading “Like feuding Montagus: the troubled history of the Dukes of Manchester”

Kent is one of the most familiar names for an English county—but also unique in that it is one of the few that are never appended ‘-shire’ when giving historic names. It is also said to be one of the oldest place names still in use in England, named by the Greeks as Kantion inContinue reading “Kent—From Saxon Kingdom to Royal Dukedom”

One of the least known dukedoms in the peerages of Great Britain is that of Cleveland. After starting off as a title for one of the most famous duchesses in Europe, Barbara Villiers, the second and third dukes, Charles and William FitzRoy, were very rich but unremarkable. Their successors in the Vane family managed toContinue reading “Dukes of Cleveland: Two FitzRoys and Several Vanes”

The woman at the centre of the historical drama The Mirror and the Light—though she doesn’t say very much—is Jane Seymour, third wife of Henry VIII of England and mother of the future king, Edward VI. Hilary Mantel’s trilogy focuses on the rise and fall of Thomas Cromwell, from a tradesman’s son to chief ministerContinue reading “Seymour of Wolf Hall: the rise and fall and rise again of the dukes of Somerset”

There’s a fairly common surname in England and America, Compton, and if you want to think it might once upon a time have been connected to the old Anglo-Norman aristocracy, as derived from an old French word connected to accounting (comptant), that’s not a bad deduction; but it just as easily could be derived, likeContinue reading “Compton—Not quite dukes, but marquesses of Northampton”

It is rare for any aristocratic family to place one of its members so high in the court hierarchy as to be known as ‘the royal favourite’, but for one family to produce two in as many generations, and both with the same name—George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham—is really extraordinary. Many aristocratic families spend decadesContinue reading “Two Royal Favourites for the Price of One: George Villiers and George Villiers, the Dukes of Buckingham”