A commoner, also known as the common man, commoners, the common people or the masses, was in earlier use an ordinary person in a community or nation who did not have any significant social status, especially a member of neither royalty, nobility, nor any part of the aristocracy. Depending on culture and period, other elevated persons may have had higher social status in their own right, or were regarded as commoners if lacking an aristocratic background.
A Medieval French manuscript illustration depicting the three estates: clergy (oratores), nobles (bellatores), and commoners (laboratores).
US Vice President Henry A. Wallace proclaimed the "arrival of the century of the common man" in a 1942 speech broadcast nationwide in the United States.
Nobility is a social class found in many societies that have an aristocracy. It is normally ranked immediately below royalty. Nobility has often been an estate of the realm with many exclusive functions and characteristics. The characteristics associated with nobility may constitute substantial advantages over or relative to non-nobles or simply formal functions, and vary by country and by era. Membership in the nobility, including rights and responsibilities, is typically hereditary and patrilineal.
The House of Lords is the upper legislature of the Parliament of the United Kingdom and is filled with members that are selected from the royalty (both hereditary titleholders and those ennobled only for their individual lives).
French aristocrats, c. 1774
A French political cartoon of the three orders of feudal society (1789). The rural third estate carries the clergy and the nobility.
Opening of the Hungarian Diet (Országgyűlés) with the members of hungarian nobility in the Royal Palace, 1865
