Talk:Marquess

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[edit] Marquis?

I'm not sure about this article. "Marquess" is usually only used of British peers, with others being called "Marquis" (no one would ever speak of the "Marquess de Sade"). I think Marquis should probably be split off into a separate article. Proteus (Talk) 10:10, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

For all that, "Marquis" is occasionally used with British peers. I've seen "Marquis of Salisbury" as often as "Marquess of Salisbury." Mackensen 15:02, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)
I think Marquis is the standard British usage, actually - I've hardly ever seen Marquess used here.
'Marquess' is the most common form in the United Kingdom, though it is the rarest of peerage titles, and many of those that do exist are either subsidiary titles of Dukes, and hence often hidden, or else written as Lord X. I have added a section on forms of address. LordDextershire 22:26, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

I, too, find ‘marquess’ rather archaic as a generic and international term. The Guardian Style Guide, incidentally has ‘marquis not marquess, except where it is the correct formal title, eg Marquess of Blandford’[1]. The Times has ‘marquess (not marquis, except in foreign contexts and occasional Scottish titles)’[2]. The BBC’s advice is delightful, but not entirely not helpful:

It simplifies things considerably if we call all peers lord and all peeresses lady. This means we do not have to worry if they are a viscount, a marquess, a baroness or a countess.

Ian Spackman 22:38, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Marquis (also correctly spelt Marquess) is not the rarest of peerage titles. There are fewer dukes. Viewfinder 00:10, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

It's the rarest in the sense that fewer Marquessates have been created than Dukedoms. Proteus (Talk) 08:29, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to second the importance of distinguishing between marquesses and marquises. As long as the two titles exist as seperate entities we should learn them to be as such, despite their similarities. Quite simply, the most important thing to remember is that "Marquess" is exclusively British, "Marquis" is predominantly Continental European. It's like "Earl" and "Count". JJ


The thing about British/American spelling is a nonsense. The title is what the title is. The Marquess of Reading is still the Marquess of Reading, even if he's in America; the Marquis de Sade is always called the Marquis de Sade, even by Brits. Simhedges 21:11, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
It depends on the title whether the spelling Marquess or Marquis is preferred. All pronounced "Mar'kess" ("Marcus"), I believe, not "mar-kwess"--Wetman 23:31, 29 July 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Pronounciation

Is the Scottish title of 'marquis' pronounced as the English 'marquess' (mar-kwess) or as the French 'marquis' (mar-khee)? Walton monarchist89 13:53, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

As the English. Jameswilson 21:43, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] China and Japan?

Does anyone know why China and Japan are included as countries with Marquesses? I assume there was some equivalent title in their peerages but unless we can explain why those titles are equivalent in their systems (and whether they are in use today - I would assume not for both of these), I think oriental marquessates should simply be omitted.

  • Well, it's a tricky matter, but while on the one hand the word marquess is clearly independent from oriental styles as such, so we must clearly label that these are equivalents, not nominal marquessates, there are also considerations, which as a whole I find quite convincing, to do so, rather then ignore them in our articles on western peerages:
  1. when one reads western authors, they often fail to give the original title, so it's quite handy to have a reference under the western word - and thus unsuspecting readers can find out about thise very equivalency in the bargain
  2. it makes sense to grasp the relative ranking of titles be equating them with a well-known system in English
  3. for various reasons, such as diplomatic contacts bothering with questions of protocol, precisely such equation has also been attempted from the oriental point of view
  4. in the case of Japan, its XIXth century constitution was deliberately inspired on admired western models, including the German (Prussian/ Holy Empire) and British, leading to lots of willing parallelisms with western institutions (e.g. Imeprial Diet, generally thus rendered in English) and generally established equation of titles.

However we must caution against other practices of loose western (mis)use of other oriental titles outside of a peerage-type ranking order Fastifex 17:12, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

The section on Chinese and Japanese titles needs to be trimmed and clarified that the titles are not equivalent but are used to translate the imperial titles. [[User:leatherbear[leatherbear]] 21:57 12 may 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Coronets

It's worth adding information on a marquess's coronet to the article - I'd edit it myself, but I can't remember how many silver balls and how many strawberry leaves are used exactly. Walton monarchist89 16:37, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Remember, coronets vary by nation, even for the same approximate title or rank. Coronets for nobles holding the rank of or equivalent to Marquis are:
Belgian coronets
Italian coronets
Danish coronets
French coronets
Polish coronets
All other coronets Lethiere 22:58, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The four-syllable "marchioness"

...is a shibboleth. Like the four-syllable Giovanni, it separates you from us. No problem with that. --Wetman 04:36, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Baron/ Baroness

A Baron's / Baroness' title is Lord X / Lady X, and not "the Right Honourable the..."

The title "The Right Honourable" only comes from being a member of the Privy Council.

[edit] Realm

What is the name of the realm a Marquess rules? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 217.198.211.203 (talk) 13:42, August 21, 2007 (UTC)

Realm always connoting "independently ruled", in English-language usage it is Marquisate, as in the once-independent Marquisate of Montferrato, in Italian Marchesato del Montferrato. Never Marquessate as you might be led to believe here. The uniquely English form Marquess is applied only to some, but not all English and UK marquisates or marquessates and never to Continental ones, where the local forms are most commonly applied: no one would refer to "the marchese" as "the marquess". In spite of what you've read above, the convention applies quite arbitrarily and individually to each title: one form is preferred— watch your step addressing those Christmas cards. In English-language usage the title is not applied to the estate: the Duke of Devonshire's holdings are traditionally centered in Derbyshire, the dukedom lying in the title only. If you've heard of the "Dukeries" of Nottinghamshire, that was intended as a joke, simply comparing the propinquity of half-a-dozen dukes in great houses in Notts. to a rookery, as the U pronunciation of "duke" was "jook", rhyming with "rook".--Wetman 00:01, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] suo jure Marchionesses

The article presently says that Anne Boleyn was the only person to have been created a Marchioness in her own right, but Ehrengard Melusina von der Schulenburg was created Marchioness of Dungannon (among other titles) on 18 July 1716. 195.92.40.49 12:20, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Original French?

Saying the "original French" is not completely right. First, the much of the French that influenced English was Norman French which isn't necessarily the same. Moreover, the word is originally German, so it's not the ORIGINAL.

Therefore I took the word, original, out.

Arthurian Legend 00:37, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Marquis vs. Marquess

The article states that "marquis" and "marquise" are used in North American English, but given that most peers with whom Canadians are familiar, including past governors general, military personnel, and politicians, held British peerages, I think this is questionable to say the least. To be on the safe side, I've altered this to [[American English]; and added Commonwealth English to "marquess". fishhead64 17:55, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

It's an absurd distinction anyway. Which spelling you use depends on where the title you're talking about comes from, not which variety of English you're speaking. Proteus (Talk) 20:31, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
The American Heritage Dictionarygives marquess as a variant of marquis, which is given a full entry. I don't have access to the OED at the moment. For what it's worth, in searches specifying English-language web pages,
  • Google yields 3.2 million hits for marquess (strangely, 1.6 million if you don't specify language) and 2.3 million for marquis (16.7 million if you don't specify language);
  • Ask.com yields 300,000 for marquess, 3.4 million for marquis.
From poking around on the web, but being otherwise ignorant of the term, marquess looks to me to be a uniquely British term for the rank of marquis. That makes me think Marquess should redirect to Marquis. -Eric talk 12:50, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
It's a distinction between titles from different countries rather than different varieties of English (the Marquess of Lansdowne is a marquess wherever he is, as that's how his title is spelt, and the Marquis de Sade similarly is always so called), and so it's a difficult article to title, as there isn't really a generic term for the holder of a title of this rank - granted, "marquess" and "marquis" are the most commonly used, as British and French titles are the most commonly encountered, and both are sometimes used to translate other varieties, but they're not universal - a German markgraf is pretty much always called a "margrave", for instance. On the whole, though, I'd say that, as we have to choose a title, "marquis" would be the best, as it's more likely to be used (even by those in Britain) to translate a title of this rank (the spelling "marquess" being much more restricted to those whose title is actually spelt that way). Proteus (Talk) 16:48, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] POV?

Isn't it a bit of a NPOV problem to have the marchioness and marquise simply described in the Marquess article? As if women are somehow subordinate to the men of the same rank? Can we consider something else?--Eva bd 01:36, 1 March 2008 (UTC)


That is an interesting observation. I noticed that it is also the same for baron/baroness and count/countess. However, Lord and Lady are seperate, as well as Prince and Princess. With that being said, I think we need to discuss if there is 1- enough to create seperate articles for all, 2- if the articles should be renamed to include both male & female titles, and/or 3- if the female counterparts should be expanded within the existing articles??? Krushdiva (talk) 19:59, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Coronet

The coronet is wrong on two counts. The jewels or strawberry leaves are not real and should be coloured gold. The cloth or stuff should be red and not purple. - Kittybrewster ☎ 21:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

    What's more, should it read "viscount" or "marquess"?