Zuiderzee
Its name means southern sea in Dutch, indicating that the name originates in Friesland, to the north of the Zuiderzee. In the 20th century the majority of the Zuiderzee was closed off from the North Sea by the construction of the Afsluitdijk and this land eventually became the province of Flevoland, with a population of nearly 400,000. In classical times there was already a body of water in this location and it was much smaller than its forms and its connection to the main sea was much narrower, it may have been a complex of lakes and marshes and channels, rather than one lake. Over time these lakes gradually eroded their soft peat shores and spread, some part of this area of water was called the Vlie, it probably flowed into the sea through what is now the Vliestroom channel between the islands of Vlieland and Terschelling. The Marsdiep was once a river which may have been a distributary of the Vlie, during the early Middle Ages this began to change as rising sea levels and storms started to eat away at the coastal areas which consisted mainly of peatlands.
The disaster marked the rise of Amsterdam on the end of the bay. The even more massive St. Lucias flood occurred 14 December 1287, the name Zuiderzee came into general usage around this period. For example, on 18 November 1421, a seawall at the Zuiderzee dike broke and this was the Second St. Elizabeths flood. The Netherlands was part of the First French Empire between 1810 and 1813, a département was formed in 1811 and named as Zuyderzée after the Zuiderzee, of which the territory roughly corresponded to the present provinces of North Holland and Utrecht. In 1928, the 6-meter and 8-meter sailing events for the Amsterdam Summer Olympics were held on the Zuiderzee. These towns traded at first with ports on the Baltic Sea, in England, and in the Hanseatic League, when that lucrative trade diminished, most of the towns fell back on fishing and some industry until the 20th century when tourism became the major source of income. Contained within the Zuiderzee were five islands, the remains of what were once larger islands, peninsulas connected to the mainland, or in the case of Pampus.
These were Wieringen, Schokland and Marken, the inhabitants of these islands subsisted mainly on fishing and related industries and still do in the case of Urk and Wieringen. All of these islands, except for Pampus, are now part of the mainland or connected to it, the construction in the early 20th century of a large enclosing dam tamed the Zuiderzee. The creation of this dam was a response to the flood of January 1916, plans for closing the Zuiderzee had been made over thirty years earlier but had not yet passed in parliament. With the completion of the Afsluitdijk in 1932, the Zuiderzee became the IJsselmeer and these areas, known as polders, were respectively the Wieringermeer, the Noordoostpolder, and Flevoland. This enormous project under the direction of Cornelis Lely, called the Zuiderzee Works, ran from 1919 to 1986, Zuiderzee Museum, dedicated to the history and culture of the former Zuiderzee Zuiderzee Cycle Route, long-distance cycle route around the former Zuiderzee Pathe newsreel of flooding,1916
Wilfrid
Wilfrid was an English bishop and saint. His success prompted the kings son, Alhfrith, to appoint him Bishop of Northumbria, Wilfrid chose to be consecrated in Gaul because of the lack of what he considered to be validly consecrated bishops in England at that time. During Wilfrids absence Alhfrith seems to have led a revolt against his father, Oswiu. Before Wilfrids return Oswiu had appointed Ceadda in his place, resulting in Wilfrids retirement to Ripon for a few years following his back in Northumbria. After becoming Archbishop of Canterbury in 668, Theodore of Tarsus resolved the situation by deposing Ceadda, for the next nine years Wilfrid discharged his episcopal duties, founded monasteries, built churches, and improved the liturgy. However his diocese was very large, and Theodore wished to reform the English Church, when Wilfrid quarrelled with Ecgfrith, the Northumbrian king, Theodore took the opportunity to implement his reforms despite Wilfrids objections. After Ecgfrith expelled him from York, Wilfrid travelled to Rome to appeal to the papacy, Pope Agatho ruled in Wilfrids favour, but Ecgfrith refused to honour the papal decree and instead imprisoned Wilfrid on his return to Northumbria before exiling him.
Wilfrid spent the few years in Selsey, where he founded an episcopal see. Theodore and Wilfrid settled their differences, and Theodore urged the new Northumbrian king, Aldfrith agreed to do so, but in 691 he expelled Wilfrid again. Wilfrid went to Mercia, where he helped missionaries and acted as bishop for the Mercian king, Wilfrid appealed to the papacy about his expulsion in 700, and the pope ordered that an English council should be held to decide the issue. This council, held at Austerfield in 702, attempted to confiscate all of Wilfrids possessions and his opponents in Northumbria excommunicated him, but the papacy upheld Wilfrids side, and he regained possession of Ripon and Hexham, his Northumbrian monasteries. Wilfrid died in 709 or 710, after his death, he was venerated as a saint. Historians and now have been divided over Wilfrid and his followers commissioned Stephen of Ripon to write a Vita Sancti Wilfrithi shortly after his death, and the medieval historian Bede wrote extensively about him.
Wilfrid lived ostentatiously, and travelled with a large retinue and he ruled a large number of monasteries, and claimed to be the first Englishman to introduce the Rule of Saint Benedict into English monasteries. Some modern historians see him mainly as a champion of Roman customs against the customs of the British and Irish churches, during Wilfrids lifetime Britain and Ireland consisted of a number of small kingdoms. Traditionally the English people were thought to have divided into seven kingdoms. Other even smaller groups had their own rulers, but their size means that they do not often appear in the histories, there were native Britons in the west, in modern-day Wales and Cornwall, who formed kingdoms including those of Dumnonia and Gwynedd. Between the Humber and Forth the English had formed two main kingdoms and Bernicia, often united as the Kingdom of Northumbria
Sceat
A sceat was a small, thick silver coin minted in England and Jutland during the Anglo-Saxon period. It is likely, that the coins were often known to contemporaries as pennies. Although sceattas present many problems of organization and dating, they carry a breathtaking variety of designs bespeaking extensive Celtic, classical. These designs include human figures, birds, plants, tony Abramson has published an illustrated guide for nonexperts. One series, has linked to King Aethelbald of Mercia on the basis of its iconography, though this attribution is tenuous. It has suggested on the basis of the iconography of certain sceattas that they were issued by ecclesiastical authorities. Minting may not have been an urban or secular prerogative. Associating sceattas with particular mints or kingdoms is very difficult and must be based primarily upon study of find-spots, most have been found by metal detector since the 1970s. In this way, it has been possible to some types with considerable confidence, such as series H with Wessex.
In Denmark, series X has been associated with the early trading center at Ribe. The chronology of the sceattas is hard to unravel. Some of the earliest series use the designs as the pale gold thrymsas and, by analogy with coins from the better-understood Frankish material. The thirty or forty years after 680 saw the production and circulation of the series of sceattas. They were largely minted in Kent and the Thames Estuary, though a few were produced in Northumbria bearing the name of King Aldfrith, the secondary series, struck from c.710 to c. 750, saw an expansion of minting all over southern and eastern England to every major Anglo-Saxon kingdom. One or more types can be attributed more or less confidence to Wessex, Sussex, Kent, Northumbria. There was much copying and debasement, and weight could fluctuate considerably, there are relatively few hoards from this period with which to construct even a relative chronology, and any new discovery could radically alter our current understanding.
Sceattas, An Illustrated Guide, Great Dunham, Anna, The Iconography of Early Anglo-Saxon Coinage, Sixth to Eighth Centuries, Oxford University Press
Netherlands
The Netherlands, informally known as Holland is the main constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is a densely populated country located in Western Europe with three territories in the Caribbean. The European part of the Netherlands borders Germany to the east, Belgium to the south, and the North Sea to the northwest, sharing borders with Belgium, the United Kingdom. The three largest cities in the Netherlands are Amsterdam and The Hague, Amsterdam is the countrys capital, while The Hague holds the Dutch seat of parliament and government. The port of Rotterdam is the worlds largest port outside East-Asia, the name Holland is used informally to refer to the whole of the country of the Netherlands. Netherlands literally means lower countries, influenced by its low land and flat geography, most of the areas below sea level are artificial. Since the late 16th century, large areas have been reclaimed from the sea and lakes, with a population density of 412 people per km2 –507 if water is excluded – the Netherlands is classified as a very densely populated country.
Only Bangladesh, South Korea, and Taiwan have both a population and higher population density. Nevertheless, the Netherlands is the worlds second-largest exporter of food and agricultural products and this is partly due to the fertility of the soil and the mild climate. In 2001, it became the worlds first country to legalise same-sex marriage, the Netherlands is a founding member of the EU, Eurozone, G-10, NATO, OECD and WTO, as well as being a part of the Schengen Area and the trilateral Benelux Union. The first four are situated in The Hague, as is the EUs criminal intelligence agency Europol and this has led to the city being dubbed the worlds legal capital. The country ranks second highest in the worlds 2016 Press Freedom Index, the Netherlands has a market-based mixed economy, ranking 17th of 177 countries according to the Index of Economic Freedom. It had the thirteenth-highest per capita income in the world in 2013 according to the International Monetary Fund, in 2013, the United Nations World Happiness Report ranked the Netherlands as the seventh-happiest country in the world, reflecting its high quality of life.
The Netherlands ranks joint second highest in the Inequality-adjusted Human Development Index, the region called Low Countries and the country of the Netherlands have the same toponymy. Place names with Neder, Nieder and Nedre and Bas or Inferior are in use in all over Europe. They are sometimes used in a relation to a higher ground that consecutively is indicated as Upper, Oben. In the case of the Low Countries / the Netherlands the geographical location of the region has been more or less downstream. The geographical location of the region, changed over time tremendously
Bruges
Bruges is the capital and largest city of the province of West Flanders in the Flemish Region of Belgium, in the northwest of the country. The area of the whole city amounts to more than 13,840 hectares, including 1,075 hectares off the coast, the historic city centre is a prominent World Heritage Site of UNESCO. It is oval and about 430 hectares in size, the citys total population is 117,073, of whom around 20,000 live in the city centre. The metropolitan area, including the commuter zone, covers an area of 616 km2 and has a total of 255,844 inhabitants as of 1 January 2008. Along with a few other canal-based northern cities, such as Amsterdam and Stockholm, Bruges has a significant economic importance thanks to its port and was once one of the worlds chief commercial cities. Bruges is well known as the seat of the College of Europe, the name probably derives from the Old Dutch for bridge, brugga. Also compare Middle Dutch brucge and modern Dutch bruggehoofd, the form brugghe would be a southern Dutch variant.
The Dutch word and the English bridge both derive from Proto-Germanic *brugjō-, Bruges was a location of coastal settlement during prehistory. This Bronze Age and Iron Age settlement is unrelated to medieval city development, in the Bruges area, the first fortifications were built after Julius Caesars conquest of the Menapii in the first century BC, to protect the coastal area against pirates. The Franks took over the region from the Gallo-Romans around the 4th century. The Viking incursions of the century prompted Count Baldwin I of Flanders to reinforce the Roman fortifications, trade soon resumed with England. Bruges received its city charter on 27 July 1128, and new walls and canals were built, in 1089 Bruges became the capital of the County of Flanders. Since about 1050, gradual silting had caused the city to lose its access to the sea. A storm in 1134, however, re-established this access, through the creation of a channel at the Zwin. The new sea arm stretched all the way to Damme, a city became the commercial outpost for Bruges.
Bruges had a location at the crossroads of the northern Hanseatic League trade. They developed, or borrowed from Italy, new forms of merchant capitalism, whereby several merchants would share the risks and profits and they employed new forms of economic exchange, including bills of exchange and letters of credit. The city eagerly welcomed foreign traders, most notably the Portuguese traders selling pepper and other spices, the citys entrepreneurs reached out to make economic colonies of England and Scotlands wool-producing districts
Germany
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe. It includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres, with about 82 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state of the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular destination in the world. Germanys capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while its largest conurbation is the Ruhr, other major cities include Hamburg, Cologne, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Leipzig. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity, a region named Germania was documented before 100 AD. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward, beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation, in 1871, Germany became a nation state when most of the German states unified into the Prussian-dominated German Empire.
After World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic, the establishment of the national socialist dictatorship in 1933 led to World War II and the Holocaust. After a period of Allied occupation, two German states were founded, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, in 1990, the country was reunified. In the 21st century, Germany is a power and has the worlds fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP. As a global leader in industrial and technological sectors, it is both the worlds third-largest exporter and importer of goods. Germany is a country with a very high standard of living sustained by a skilled. It upholds a social security and universal health system, environmental protection. Germany was a member of the European Economic Community in 1957. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999, Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD.
The national military expenditure is the 9th highest in the world, the English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz popular, derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- people, the discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago. The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a mine in Schöningen where three 380, 000-year-old wooden javelins were unearthed
Jutes
The Jutes, Iuti, or Iutæ were a Germanic people. According to Bede, the Jutes were one of the three most powerful Germanic peoples of their time in the Nordic Iron Age, the two being the Saxons and the Angles. The Jutes are believed to have originated from the Jutland Peninsula, in present times, the Jutlandic Peninsula consists of the mainland of Denmark and Southern Schleswig in Germany. North Frisia is part of Germany, the Jutes invaded and settled in southern Britain in the late 4th century during the Age of Migrations, as part of a larger wave of Germanic settlement in the British Isles. Bede places the homeland of the Jutes on the side of the Angles relative to the Saxons. Tacitus portrays a people called the Eudoses living in the north of Jutland, the Jutes have been identified with the Eotenas involved in the Frisian conflict with the Danes as described in the Finnesburg episode in the poem Beowulf. Others have interpreted the ēotenas as jotuns, meaning giants, or as a kenning for enemies, disagreeing with Bede, some historians identify the Jutes with the people called Eucii, who were evidently associated with the Saxons and dependents of the Franks in 536.
The Eucii may have been identical to a tribe called the Euthiones. The Euthiones are mentioned in a poem by Venantius Fortunatus as being under the suzerainty of Chilperic I of the Franks. This identification would agree well with the location of the Jutes in Kent. Even if Jutes were present to the south of the Saxons in the Rhineland or near the Frisians, however, it is possible that the tribal names were confused in the above sources. In both Beowulf and Widsith, the Eotenas are clearly distinguished from the Geatas, there is evidence that the Haestingas people who settled in the Hastings area of Sussex, in the 6th century, may have been Jutish in origin. One recent scholar, Robin Bush, even argued that the Jutes of Hampshire, Bede clearly implies that this was so, in 686. However, Bushs theory has been the subject of debate amongst academics, including a counter-hypothesis, the culture of the Jutes of Kent shows more signs of Roman and Christian influence than that of the Angles or Saxons.
The Quoit Brooch Style has been regarded as Jutish, from the 5th century
Redbad, King of the Frisians
Redbad was the king of Frisia from c.680 until his death. He is often considered the last independent ruler of Frisia before Frankish domination and he defeated Charles Martel at Cologne. Eventually, Charles prevailed and compelled the Frisians to submit, Redbad died in 719, but for some years his successors struggled against the Frankish power. What the exact title of the Frisian rulers was depends on the source, Frankish sources tend to call them dukes, other sources often call them kings. While his predecessor, had welcomed Christianity into his realm, Redbad attempted to extirpate the religion, in 689, Redbad was defeated by Pippin of Herstal in the battle of Dorestad and compelled to cede West Frisia to the Franks. Between 690 and 692, Utrecht fell into the hands of Pippin of Herstal and this gave the Franks control of important trade routes on the Rhine to the North Sea. Some sources say that, following defeat, Redbad retreated, in 697, to the island of Heligoland. On Pippins death in 714, Redbad took the initiative again and he forced Saint Willibrord and his monks to flee and advanced as far as Cologne, where he defeated Charles Martel, Pippins natural son, in 716.
Eventually, Charles prevailed and compelled the Frisians to submit, Redbad died in 719, but for some years his successors struggled against the Frankish power. As an example of how powerful King Redbad still was at the end of his life, during the second journey of Saint Boniface to Rome, Wulfram, a monk and ex-archbishop of Sens tried to convert Redbad, but after an unsuccessful attempt he returned to Fontenelle. This legend is told with Wulfram being replaced with bishop Willibrord. Saint Radboud was descended from him, Saint Radboud was a bishop of Utrecht who adopted his ancestors native name. The Nijmegen University and its medical facility were named after him in 2004. In Richard Wagners Lohengrin a certain Radbod, ruler of the Frisians is mentioned as Ortruds father, in Harry Harrisons The Hammer and the Cross series of novels, Redbad becomes the founder of the Way, an organized pagan cult, created to combat the efforts of Christian missionaries. Black metal band Ophidian Forest recorded a concept album Redbad in 2007, dutch folk metal band Heidevolk recorded a song Koning Radboud on their 2008 album Walhalla Wacht singing about the legend of Wulfram and Redbad.
In 2015 the Frisian Folk-Metal band Baldrs Draumar released an album on the life. It is based on the book Rêdbâd, Kronyk fan in Kening by Willem Schoorstra and this article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Hugh, ed. article name needed. Dudo of St. Quentins Gesta Normannorum, Chapter 9
Chauci
The Chauci were an ancient Germanic tribe living in the low-lying region between the Rivers Ems and Elbe, on both sides of the Weser and ranging as far inland as the upper Weser. Along the coast they lived on artificial hills called terpen, built high enough to dry during the highest tide. A dense population of Chauci lived further inland, and they are presumed to have lived in a similar to the lives of the other Germanic peoples of the region. Their ultimate origins are not well understood, in the Germanic pre-Migration Period the Chauci and the related Frisians and Angles inhabited the Continental European coast from the Zuyder Zee to south Jutland. All of these shared a common material culture, and so cannot be defined archaeologically. The Chauci originally centered on the Weser and Elbe, but in c, AD58 they expanded westward to the River Ems by expelling the neighboring Ampsivarii, whereby they gained a border with the Frisians to the west. The Romans referred to the Chauci living between the Weser and Elbe as the Greater Chauci and those living between the Ems and Weser as the Lesser Chauci.
The Chauci entered the record in descriptions of them by classical Roman sources late in the 1st century BC in the context of Roman military campaigns. For the next 200 years the Chauci provided Roman auxiliaries through treaty obligations, accounts of wars therefore mention the Chauci on both sides of the conflict, though the actions of troops under treaty obligation were separate from the policies of the tribe. The Chauci lost their identity in the 3rd century when they merged with the Saxons. The circumstances of the merger are an issue of scholarly research. The Germans of the region were not strongly hierarchical and this had been noted by Tacitus, for example when he mentioned the names of two kings of the 1st century Frisians and added that they were kings as far as the Germans are under kings. Haywood says the Chauci were originally neither highly centralised nor highly stratified, speaking of the 5th century, describes the Continental Saxons as having powerful local families and a dominant military leader.
Writing in AD79, Pliny the Elder said that the Germanic tribes were members of groups of people. He said that the Chauci and Teutoni—the people from the River Ems through Jutland, writing in AD98, described the inland, non-coastal Chauci homeland as immense, densely populated, and well-stocked with horses. Pliny had visited the region and described the Chauci who lived there. He said that they were wretched natives living on a barren coast in small cottages on hilltops and they fished for food, and unlike their neighbors they had no cattle, and had nothing to drink except rainwater caught in ditches. They used a type of dried mud as fuel for cooking and heating and he mentioned their spirit of independence, saying that even though they had nothing of value, they would deeply resent any attempt to conquer them
Jutland
Jutland, known as the Cimbric or Cimbrian Peninsula, is a peninsula of Northern Europe that forms the continental portion of Denmark and the northern portion of Germany. The names are derived from the Jutes and the Cimbri, jutlands terrain is relatively flat, with open lands, heaths and peat bogs in the west and a more elevated and slightly hilly terrain in the east. Jutland is a peninsula bounded by the North Sea to the west, the Skagerrak to the north and historically, Jutland comprises the regions of South Jutland, West Jutland, East Jutland and North Jutland. There are several subdivisions and regional names, some of which are still occasionally encountered today. They include Nørrejyllland, Sydvestjylland and Slesvig, Jutland was regulated by the Law Code of Jutland. This civic code covered the Jutland Peninsula from the north of the River Eider to Funen as well as the North Jutlandic Island. The Danish part of Jutland is currently divided into three regions, North Denmark Region, Central Denmark Region and Region of Southern Denmark.
These three regions have an area of 29,775 km2, a population of 2,599,104. The northernmost part of Jutland is separated from the mainland by the Limfjord and this area is called the North Jutlandic Island, Vendsyssel-Thy or simply Jutland north of the Limfjord, it is only partly co-terminous with the North Jutland region. Inhabitants of Als would agree to be South Jutlanders, but not necessarily Jutlanders, the Danish Wadden Sea Islands and the German North Frisian Islands stretch along the southwest coast of Jutland in the German Bight. Jutland has historically been one of the three lands of Denmark, the two being Scania and Zealand. Before that, according to Ptolemy, Jutland or the Cimbric Chersonese was the home of Teutons, many Angles and Jutes migrated from Continental Europe to Great Britain starting in c.450 AD. The Angles themselves gave their name to the new emerging kingdoms called England and this is thought by some to be related to the invasion of Europe by the Huns from Asia. Saxons and Frisii migrated to the region in the part of the Christian era.
Old Saxony was on referred to as Holstein, during the First World War, the Battle of Jutland in the North Sea west of Jutland was one of the largest naval battles in history. In this pitched battle, the British Royal Navy engaged the Imperial German Navy, the British fleet sustained greater losses, but remained in control of the North Sea, so in strategic terms, most historians regard Jutland either as a British victory or as indecisive. The distinctive Jutish dialects differ substantially from standard Danish, especially West Jutlandic, dialect usage, although in decline, is better preserved in Jutland than in eastern Denmark, and Jutlander speech remains a stereotype among many Copenhageners and eastern Danes. Administratively, Danish Jutland comprises three of Denmarks five regions, namely the Region Nordjylland, Region Midtjylland and the half of Region of Southern Denmark
Nobility
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 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 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 included infrastructure such as castle 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
Netherlands
Germany
Belgium
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Lins, Joseph (1912). . In Herbermann, Charles. Catholic Encyclopedia. 15. New York: Robert Appleton.
