1.
Emperor
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An emperor is a monarch, usually the sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the equivalent, may indicate an emperors wife, mother. Emperors are generally recognized to be of an honour and rank than kings. The Emperor of Japan is the currently reigning monarch whose title is translated into English as Emperor. Both kings and emperors are monarchs, but emperor and empress are considered the higher monarchical titles. In as much as there is a definition of emperor, it is that an emperor has no relations implying the superiority of any other ruler. Thus a king might be obliged to pay tribute to another ruler, or be restrained in his actions in some unequal fashion, although initially ruling much of Central Europe and northern Italy, by the 19th century the Emperor exercised little power beyond the German speaking states. In Eastern Europe the rulers of the Russian Empire also used translatio imperii to wield authority as successors to the Eastern Roman Empire. Their title of Emperor was officially recognised by the Holy Roman Emperor in 1514, in practice the Russian Emperors are often known by their Russian-language title Tsar, which may also used to refer to rulers equivalent to a king. Historians have liberally used emperor and empire anachronistically and out of its Roman and European context to any large state from the past or the present. Such pre-Roman titles as Great King or King of Kings, used by the Kings of Persia, however such empires did not need to be headed by an emperor. Empire became identified instead with vast territorial holdings rather than the title of its ruler by the mid-18th century, outside the European context, emperor was the translation given to holders of titles who were accorded the same precedence as European emperors in diplomatic terms. In reciprocity, these rulers might accredit equal titles in their languages to their European peers. Through centuries of international convention, this has become the dominant rule to identifying an emperor in the modern era, also the name of the position split in several branches of Western tradition, see below. Later new symbols of worldly and/or spiritual power, like the orb, rules for indicating successors also varied, there was a tendency towards male inheritance of the supreme office, but as well election by noblemen, as ruling empresses are known. Ruling monarchs could additionally steer the succession by adoption, as occurred in the two first centuries of Imperial Rome. Of course, intrigue, murder and military force could also mingle in for appointing successors, probably the epoch best known for this part of the imperial tradition is Romes third century rule. When Republican Rome turned into a de facto monarchy in the half of the 1st century BC
2.
Queen regnant
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An empress regnant is a female monarch who reigns in her own right over an empire. A queen regnant possesses and exercises sovereign powers, a queen consort shares her husbands rank and titles, but does not share the sovereignty of her husband. The husband of a queen regnant traditionally does not share his wifes rank, however, the concept of a king consort is not unheard of in contemporary or classical periods. A queen dowager is the widow of a king, a queen mother is a queen dowager who is also the mother of a reigning sovereign. The Byzantine Empress Irene sometimes called herself basileus, emperor, rather than basilissa, empress and Jadwiga of Poland was crowned as Rex Poloniae, King of Poland. Among the Davidic Monarchs of the Kingdom of Judah, there is mentioned a queen regnant, Athaliah. The much later Hasmonean Queen Salome Alexandra was highly popular, accession of a regnant occurs as a nations order of succession permits. The scope of succession may be matrilineal, patrilineal, or both, or, rarely, open to general election when necessary, the right of succession may be open to men and women, or limited to men only or women only. Historically, many realms forbade succession by women or through a line in obedience to the Salic law. No queen regnant ever ruled France, for example, only one woman, Maria Theresa, ruled Austria. As noted in the list below of widely known ruling queens, in the waning days of the 20th century and early days of the 21st, Sweden, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Luxembourg and the UK amended their acts of succession to absolute primogeniture. In some cases the change does not take effect during the lifetimes of people already in the line of succession at the time the law was passed, in 2011, the 16 Realms of the Commonwealth agreed to remove the rule of male-preference primogeniture. Once the necessary legislation was passed, this means that had Prince William had a daughter first, in China, Wu Zetian became the Chinese empress regnant and established the Zhou Dynasty after dismissing her sons. It should be noted, however, that Empress Wu used the title huangdi and in many European sources, although the Chrysanthemum Throne of Japan is currently barred to women, this has not always been the case, throughout Japanese history there have been eight empresses regnant. Again, the Japanese language uses the term josei tennō for the position which would be empress regnant in English, monarch Order of succession Queen consort Rani Regent Salic law Sultana Monter, William. The Rise of Female Kings in Europe, 1300-1800, studies 30 women who exercised full sovereign authority in Europe
3.
Prince
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A prince is a male ruler, monarch, or member of a monarchs or former monarchs family. Prince is also a title in the nobility of some European states. The feminine equivalent is a princess, the English word derives, via the French word prince, from the Latin noun princeps, from primus + capio, meaning the chief, most distinguished, ruler, prince. The Latin word prīnceps, became the title of the informal leader of the Roman senate some centuries before the transition to empire. Emperor Augustus established the position of monarch on the basis of principate. The term may be used of persons in various cultures. These titles were borne by courtesy and preserved by tradition, not law, in medieval and Early Modern Europe, there were as many as two hundred such territories, especially in Italy, Germany, and Gaelic Ireland. In this sense, prince is used of any and all rulers and this is the Renaissance use of the term found in Niccolò Machiavellis famous work, Il Principe. Most small territories designated as principalities during feudal eras were allodial and this is attested in some surviving styles for e. g. British earls, marquesses, and dukes are still addressed by the Crown on ceremonial occasions as high, in parts of the Holy Roman Empire in which primogeniture did not prevail, all legitimate agnates had an equal right to the familys hereditary titles. Gradual substitution of the title of Prinz for the title of Fürst occurred. Both Prinz and Fürst are translated into English as prince, but they not only different. This distinction had evolved before the 18th century for dynasties headed by a Fürst in Germany, note that the princely title was used as a prefix to his Christian name, which also became customary. Cadets of Frances other princes étrangers affected similar usage under the Bourbon kings, the post-medieval rank of gefürsteter Graf embraced but elevated the German equivalent of the intermediate French, English and Spanish nobles. By the 19th century, cadets of a Fürst would become known as Prinzen, the husband of a queen regnant is usually titled prince consort or simply prince, whereas the wives of male monarchs take the female equivalent of their husbands title. In Brazil, Portugal and Spain, however, the husband of a monarch was accorded the masculine equivalent of her title. To complicate matters, the style His/Her Highness, a prefix often accompanying the title of a dynastic prince, although the arrangement set out above is the one that is most commonly understood, there are also different systems. Depending on country, epoch, and translation, other usages of prince are possible, foreign-language titles such as Italian principe, French prince, German Fürst and Prinz, Russian knyaz, etc. are usually translated as prince in English
4.
Knight
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A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a monarch or other political leader for service to the monarch or country, especially in a military capacity. Historically, in Europe, knighthood was conferred upon mounted warriors, during the High Middle Ages, knighthood was considered a class of lower nobility. By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, often, a knight was a vassal who served as a fighter for a lord, with payment in the form of land holdings. The lords trusted the knights, who were skilled in battle on horseback, since the early modern period, the title of knight is purely honorific, usually bestowed by a monarch, as in the British honours system, often for non-military service to the country. The modern female equivalent in the United Kingdom is Dame, furthermore, Geoffroi de Charnys Book of Chivalry expounded upon the importance of Christian faith in every area of a knights life. This novel explored the ideals of knighthood and their incongruity with the reality of Cervantes world, in the late medieval period, new methods of warfare began to render classical knights in armour obsolete, but the titles remained in many nations. Some orders of knighthood, such as the Knights Templar, have become the subject of legend, each of these orders has its own criteria for eligibility, but knighthood is generally granted by a head of state or monarch to selected persons to recognise some meritorious achievement. This linkage is reflected in the etymology of chivalry, cavalier, the special prestige accorded to mounted warriors finds a parallel in the furusiyya in the Muslim world, and the Greek hippeus and Roman eques of classical antiquity. The word knight, from Old English cniht, is a cognate of the German word Knecht and this meaning, of unknown origin, is common among West Germanic languages. Middle High German had the phrase guoter kneht, which also meant knight, the Anglo-Saxon cniht had no connection to horsemanship, the word referred to any servant. A rādcniht, riding-servant, was a servant delivering messages or patrolling coastlines on horseback, a narrowing of the generic meaning servant to military follower of a king or other superior is visible by 1100. The specific military sense of a knight as a warrior in the heavy cavalry emerges only in the Hundred Years War. The verb to knight appears around 1300, and, from the same time, an Equestrian was a member of the second highest social class in the Roman Republic and early Roman Empire. This class is often translated as knight, the medieval knight, both Greek ἳππος and Latin equus are derived from the Proto-Indo-European word root ekwo-, horse. In the later Roman Empire, the classical Latin word for horse, equus, was replaced in common parlance by the vulgar Latin caballus, sometimes thought to derive from Gaulish caballos. From caballus arose terms in the various Romance languages cognate with the English cavalier, Italian cavaliere, Spanish caballero, French chevalier, Portuguese cavaleiro, the Germanic languages have terms cognate with the English rider, German Ritter, and Dutch and Scandinavian ridder. These words are derived from Germanic rīdan, to ride, in turn derived from the Proto-Indo-European root reidh-, in ancient Rome there was a knightly class Ordo Equestris from which European knighthood may have been derived. Some portions of the armies of Germanic peoples who occupied Europe from the 3rd century AD onward had been mounted, in the Early Medieval period any well-equipped horseman could be described as a knight, or miles in Latin
5.
Regensburg
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Regensburg is a city in south-east Germany, situated at the confluence of the Danube, Naab and Regen rivers. With over 140,000 inhabitants, Regensburg is the fourth-largest city in the State of Bavaria after Munich, the city is the political, economic and cultural centre of Eastern Bavaria and the capital of the Bavarian administrative region Upper Palatinate. The medieval centre of the city is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, in 2014, Regensburg was among the top sights and travel attractions in Germany. Generally known in English as Ratisbon until well into the twentieth century, the first settlements in Regensburg date from the Stone Age. The Celtic name Radasbona was the oldest given to a settlement near the present city, around AD90, the Romans built a fort there. In 179, a new Roman fort Castra Regina was built for Legio III Italica during the reign of Emperor Marcus Aurelius. It is believed that as early as in late Roman times the city was the seat of a bishop, from the early 6th century, Regensburg was the seat of a ruling family known as the Agilolfings. From about 530 to the first half of the 13th century, Regensburg remained an important city during the reign of Charlemagne. After the partition of the Carolingian Empire in 843, the city became the seat of the Eastern Frankish ruler, two years later, fourteen Bohemian princes came to Regensburg to receive baptism there. This was the point of Christianization of the Czechs. These events had a impact on the cultural history of the Czech lands, as they were consequently part of the Roman Catholic. A memorial plate at St Johns Church was unveiled a few years ago, commemorating the incident in the Czech, on 8 December 899 Arnulf of Carinthia, descendant of Charlemagne, died at Regensburg, Bavaria, Germany. In 800 AD the city had 23,000 inhabitants and by 1000 AD this had almost doubled to 40,000 people. In 1096, on the way to the First Crusade, Peter the Hermit led a mob of Crusaders that attempted to force the conversion of the Jews of Regensburg. Between 1135 and 1146, the Stone Bridge across the Danube was built at Regensburg and this bridge opened major international trade routes between northern Europe and Venice, and this began Regensburgs golden age as a residence of wealthy trading families. Regensburg became the centre of southern Germany and was celebrated for its gold work. In 1245 Regensburg became a Free Imperial City and was a centre before the shifting of trade routes in the late Middle Ages. At the end of the 15th century in 1486, Regensburg became part of the Duchy of Bavaria, the city adopted the Protestant Reformation in 1542 and its Town Council remained entirely Lutheran
6.
Middle Ages
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In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or Medieval Period lasted from the 5th to the 15th century. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and merged into the Renaissance, the Middle Ages is the middle period of the three traditional divisions of Western history, classical antiquity, the medieval period, and the modern period. The medieval period is subdivided into the Early, High. Population decline, counterurbanisation, invasion, and movement of peoples, the large-scale movements of the Migration Period, including various Germanic peoples, formed new kingdoms in what remained of the Western Roman Empire. In the seventh century, North Africa and the Middle East—once part of the Byzantine Empire—came under the rule of the Umayyad Caliphate, although there were substantial changes in society and political structures, the break with classical antiquity was not complete. The still-sizeable Byzantine Empire survived in the east and remained a major power, the empires law code, the Corpus Juris Civilis or Code of Justinian, was rediscovered in Northern Italy in 1070 and became widely admired later in the Middle Ages. In the West, most kingdoms incorporated the few extant Roman institutions, monasteries were founded as campaigns to Christianise pagan Europe continued. The Franks, under the Carolingian dynasty, briefly established the Carolingian Empire during the later 8th, the Crusades, first preached in 1095, were military attempts by Western European Christians to regain control of the Holy Land from Muslims. Kings became the heads of centralised nation states, reducing crime and violence, intellectual life was marked by scholasticism, a philosophy that emphasised joining faith to reason, and by the founding of universities. Controversy, heresy, and the Western Schism within the Catholic Church paralleled the conflict, civil strife. Cultural and technological developments transformed European society, concluding the Late Middle Ages, the Middle Ages is one of the three major periods in the most enduring scheme for analysing European history, classical civilisation, or Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Modern Period. Medieval writers divided history into periods such as the Six Ages or the Four Empires, when referring to their own times, they spoke of them as being modern. In the 1330s, the humanist and poet Petrarch referred to pre-Christian times as antiqua, leonardo Bruni was the first historian to use tripartite periodisation in his History of the Florentine People. Bruni and later argued that Italy had recovered since Petrarchs time. The Middle Ages first appears in Latin in 1469 as media tempestas or middle season, in early usage, there were many variants, including medium aevum, or middle age, first recorded in 1604, and media saecula, or middle ages, first recorded in 1625. The alternative term medieval derives from medium aevum, tripartite periodisation became standard after the German 17th-century historian Christoph Cellarius divided history into three periods, Ancient, Medieval, and Modern. The most commonly given starting point for the Middle Ages is 476, for Europe as a whole,1500 is often considered to be the end of the Middle Ages, but there is no universally agreed upon end date. English historians often use the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485 to mark the end of the period
7.
Castle
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A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble. Usage of the term has varied over time and has applied to structures as diverse as hill forts. Over the approximately 900 years that castles were built, they took on a great many forms with different features, although some, such as curtain walls. A European innovation, castles originated in the 9th and 10th centuries, after the fall of the Carolingian Empire resulted in its territory being divided among individual lords and princes. Although their military origins are often emphasised in castle studies, the structures served as centres of administration. Many castles were built from earth and timber, but had their defences replaced later by stone. Early castles often exploited natural defences, lacking features such as towers and arrowslits, in the late 12th and early 13th centuries, a scientific approach to castle defence emerged. This led to the proliferation of towers, with an emphasis on flanking fire, many new castles were polygonal or relied on concentric defence – several stages of defence within each other that could all function at the same time to maximise the castles firepower. These changes in defence have been attributed to a mixture of castle technology from the Crusades, such as concentric fortification, not all the elements of castle architecture were military in nature, so that devices such as moats evolved from their original purpose of defence into symbols of power. Some grand castles had long winding approaches intended to impress and dominate their landscape, while castles continued to be built well into the 16th century, new techniques to deal with improved cannon fire made them uncomfortable and undesirable places to live. As a result, true castles went into decline and were replaced by artillery forts with no role in civil administration, and country houses that were indefensible. From the 18th century onwards, there was a renewed interest in castles with the construction of castles, part of a romantic revival of Gothic architecture. The word castle is derived from the Latin word castellum, which is a diminutive of the word castrum, meaning fortified place. The Old English castel, Old French castel or chastel, French château, Spanish castillo, Italian castello, the word castle was introduced into English shortly before the Norman Conquest to denote this type of building, which was then new to England. In its simplest terms, the definition of a castle accepted amongst academics is a fortified residence. Feudalism was the link between a lord and his vassal where, in return for service and the expectation of loyalty. Castles served a range of purposes, the most important of which were military, administrative, as well as defensive structures, castles were also offensive tools which could be used as a base of operations in enemy territory
8.
Holy Roman Emperor
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The Holy Roman Emperor was the ruler of the Holy Roman Empire. From an autocracy in Carolingian times the title evolved into an elected monarchy chosen by the Prince-electors, until the Reformation the Emperor elect was required to be crowned by the Pope before assuming the imperial title. The title was held in conjunction with the rule of the Kingdom of Germany, in theory, the Holy Roman Emperor was primus inter pares among the other Catholic monarchs, in practice, a Holy Roman Emperor was only as strong as his army and alliances made him. Various royal houses of Europe, at different times, effectively became hereditary holders of the title, after the Reformation many of the subject states and most of those in Germany were Protestant while the Emperor continued to be Catholic. The Holy Roman Empire was dissolved by the last Emperor as a result of the collapse of the polity during the Napoleonic wars, from the time of Constantine I the Roman emperors had, with very few exceptions, taken on a role as promoters and defenders of Christianity. In the west, the title of Emperor was revived in 800, as the power of the papacy grew during the Middle Ages, popes and emperors came into conflict over church administration. The best-known and most bitter conflict was known as the Investiture Controversy. After Charlemagne was crowned Emperor of the Romans by Pope Leo III, no pope appointed an emperor again until the coronation of Otto the Great in 962. Under Otto and his successors, much of the former Carolingian kingdom of Eastern Francia fell within the boundaries of the Holy Roman Empire, the various German princes elected one of their peers as King of the Germans, after which he would be crowned as emperor by the Pope. After Charles Vs coronation, all succeeding emperors were called elected Emperor due to the lack of papal coronation, the term sacrum in connection with the medieval Roman Empire was first used in 1157 under Frederick I Barbarossa. Charles V was the last Holy Roman Emperor to be crowned by the Pope, the final Holy Roman Emperor-elect, Francis II, abdicated in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars that saw the Empires final dissolution. The standard designation of the Holy Roman Emperor was August Emperor of the Romans, the word Holy had never been used as part of that title in official documents. In German-language historiography, the term Römisch-deutscher Kaiser is used to distinguish the title from that of Roman Emperor on one hand, the English term Holy Roman Emperor is a modern shorthand for emperor of the Holy Roman Empire not corresponding to the historical style or title. Successions to the kingship were controlled by a variety of complicated factors, elections meant the kingship of Germany was only partially hereditary, unlike the kingship of France, although sovereignty frequently remained in a dynasty until there were no more male successors. The Electoral council was set at seven princes by the Golden Bull of 1356, another elector was added in 1690, and the whole college was reshuffled in 1803, a mere three years before the dissolution of the Empire. After 1438, the Kings remained in the house of Habsburg and Habsburg-Lorraine, with the exception of Charles VII. Maximilian I and his successors no longer travelled to Rome to be crowned as Emperor by the Pope, Maximilian therefore named himself Elected Roman Emperor in 1508 with papal approval. This title was in use by all his uncrowned successors, of his successors only Charles V, the immediate one, received a papal coronation
9.
Nobility
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The privileges associated with nobility may constitute substantial advantages over or relative to non-nobles, or may be largely honorary, and vary from country to country and era to era. There is often a variety of ranks within the noble class. g, san Marino and the Vatican City in Europe. Hereditary titles often distinguish nobles from non-nobles, although in many nations most of the nobility have been un-titled, some countries have had non-hereditary nobility, such as the Empire of Brazil. The term derives from Latin nobilitas, the noun of the adjective nobilis. In modern usage, nobility is applied to the highest social class in pre-modern societies and it rapidly came to be seen as a hereditary caste, sometimes associated with a right to bear a hereditary title and, for example in pre-revolutionary France, enjoying fiscal and other privileges. Nobility is a historical, social and often legal notion, differing from high socio-economic status in that the latter is based on income. Being wealthy or influential cannot, ipso facto, make one noble, various republics, including former Iron Curtain countries, Greece, Mexico, and Austria have expressly abolished the conferral and use of titles of nobility for their citizens. Not all of the benefits of nobility derived from noble status per se, usually privileges were granted or recognised by the monarch in association with possession of a specific title, office or estate. Most nobles wealth derived from one or more estates, large or small and it also included infrastructure such as castle, well and mill to which local peasants were allowed some access, although often at a price. Nobles were expected to live nobly, that is, from the proceeds of these possessions, work involving manual labour or subordination to those of lower rank was either forbidden or frowned upon socially. In some countries, the lord could impose restrictions on such a commoners movements. Nobles exclusively enjoyed the privilege of hunting, in France, nobles were exempt from paying the taille, the major direct tax. In some parts of Europe the right of war long remained the privilege of every noble. During the early Renaissance, duelling established the status of a respectable gentleman, Nobility came to be associated with social rather than legal privilege, expressed in a general expectation of deference from those of lower rank. By the 21st century even that deference had become increasingly minimised, in France, a seigneurie might include one or more manors surrounded by land and villages subject to a nobles prerogatives and disposition. Seigneuries could be bought, sold or mortgaged, if erected by the crown into, e. g. a barony or countship, it became legally entailed for a specific family, which could use it as their title. Yet most French nobles were untitled, in other parts of Europe, sovereign rulers arrogated to themselves the exclusive prerogative to act as fons honorum within their realms. Nobility might be inherited or conferred by a fons honorum
10.
Medieval fortification
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During this millennium, fortifications changed warfare, and in turn were modified to suit new tactics, weapons and siege techniques. Towers of medieval castles were usually made of stone or sometimes wood, often toward the later part of the era they included battlements and arrow loops. The tower had a staircase to make it hard for the attackers to fight upward. An exact nature of the walls of a town or city would depend on the resources available for building them, the nature of the terrain. In northern Europe, early in the period, walls were likely to have constructed of wood. Especially where stone was available for building, the wood will have been replaced by stone to a higher or lower standard of security. This would have been the pattern of events in the Five Boroughs of the Danelaw in England, in many cases, the wall would have had an internal and an external pomoerium. This was a strip of ground immediately adjacent the wall. The word is from the medieval, derived from the classical Latin post murum. An external pomoerium, stripped of bushes and building, gave defenders a clear view of what was happening outside, an internal pomoerium gave ready access to the rear of the curtain wall to facilitate movement of the garrison to a point of need. By the end of the century, the word had developed further in common use. By that time too, the walls were no longer secure against a serious threat from an army as they were not designed for resisting cannon shot. They were sometimes rebuilt, as at Berwick on Tweed, or retained for use against thieves, very elaborate and complex schemes for town defences were developed in the Netherlands and France but these belong mainly to the post-medieval periods. However, a few, such as those of Carcassonne and Dubrovnik, Medieval walls that were no longer adequate for defending were succeeded by the star fort. After the invention of the shell, star forts became obsolete as well. Harbours or some sort of access was often essential to the construction of medieval fortification. It was a route for trading and fortification. The concept of rivers or harbours coming directly up to the walls of fortifications was used by the English as they constructed castles throughout Wales
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Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Burgrave". Encyclopædia Britannica. 4 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 820.
Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "