France
In France, for example, many titles are not substantive titles but courtesy titles. A common practice is descending title when cadet males of noble families, especially landed aristocracy, may assume a lower courtesy title such as count even though lacking a titled seigneury themselves. For example the eldest son of the Duke of Paris (substantive title) may be called Marquess of Paris (courtesy title) and younger sons Count N. of Paris, where N. stands for the first name.
Read more about this topic: Courtesy Title
Famous quotes containing the word france:
“I shall not bring an automobile with me. These inventions infest France almost as much as Bloomer cycling costumes, but they make a horrid racket, and are particularly objectionable. So are the Bloomers. Nothing more abominable has ever been invented. Perhaps the automobile tricycles may succeed better, but I abjure all these works of the devil.”
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)
“The bugle-call to arms again sounded in my war-trained ear, the bayonets gleamed, the sabres clashed, and the Prussian helmets and the eagles of France stood face to face on the borders of the Rhine.... I remembered our own armies, my own war-stricken country and its dead, its widows and orphans, and it nerved me to action for which the physical strength had long ceased to exist, and on the borrowed force of love and memory, I strove with might and main.”
—Clara Barton (1821–1912)