290
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. vn. APRIL is, iwi.
honour of the bishop (Dugdale, vol. vi.
p. 1001). Are these conditions to be frtlmd
in similar charters ? W. M. P.
"NOBLE."
(9 th S. vii. 208.)
MY friend M. Jean Grellet, the learned President of the Swiss Heraldic Society, has favoured me with an answer to the above question. His note is forwarded in original. Your correspondent is probably aware of the system generally in force abroad, by which all the sons of a count, or a man with the title of de or von, take the title of count or de, their sons and sons' sons carrying on the title from generation to generation, so that those with titles are fairly numerous. The eldest son is styled the Count de X. ; the younger sons add the Christian name, Count Alexander de X., and so on. Foreigners find it sometimes difficult to understand the sys- tem of our country by which the eldest son succeeds to the title, the younger sons bear- ing a courtesy title only, and their sons becoming merged in the untitled mass. Ac- cording to the foreign system the younger sons of the Duke of Marlborough, and all their male descendants from generation to generation, would be Prince A. or B. de Marlborough, instead of plain Mr. A. or B. Churchill. J. H. RIVETT-CARNAC.
Schloss Wildeck.
As to its origin, the Swiss nobility may be divided into five classes :
1. The counts and barons of feudal ages who were the sovereign lords of the different parts of the country. They only owed alle- giance to the emperor. To these belonged the Counts of Kyburg, Habsburg, Neuchatel, Gruyere, &c. ; the Barons of Falkenstein, Grandson, &c. Their sovereign rights passed in the course of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries into the hands of the republican authorities as the counties, &c., were absorbed by the cantons. All these families have long since become extinct.
2. The ministerial^ who held feudal offices or fiefs under the counts and barons. They were lords of their tenements, in German Herr, in French seigneurs. Their tenement was called Herrschaft, seigneurie (lorddom if we may say so). A few, like the Hall wy Is, the Blonays, the Gingins, &c., still own the castles from which they derive their name, but they have of course lost the judicial rights which they once possessed.
3. The patrician families which were alone
eligible for the councils of some of the
towns, like Berne, Friburg, Lucerne, Zurich,
<fcc. These towns were not, as they are now,
merely the capitals of the canton ; they were
the sovereign of the country, which had no
voice whatever in the government, being the
subject. Most of these families had acquired
some of the fiefs once possessed by the
original feudal families.
4. The military nobility. Officers of the Swiss regiments in foreign service who had distinguished themselves were often raised to the rank of nobility by the sovereign whom they served (kings of France, emperors of Germany, &c.). On their return home they were usually admitted into the ranks of the patrician families ; but if they had received from the foreign sovereign a title of count or baron, as was sometimes the case, these titles, though occasionally given by courtesy, were never officially recognized.
5. A fifth category may be made for the nobility of Neuchatel. This canton was a monarchy till 1848. The prince gave the privileges and rights of nobility to persons he wanted particularly to honour, usually without, but sometimes with titles ; but these concessions became perfect only when ap- proved of and registered by the Council of State of the principality. These titles were here officially recognized as late as 1848, but since that year, as in the rest of Switzerland, they are no longer officially admitted.
All the members of families belonging to the above-mentioned categories had in former times the right to be knighted. Since the formality of knighting fell into disuse with the disappearance of the feudal system, they were considered to be knights by hereditary right. Nearly all these families used, and still use, the prefix von or de, and were styled edel or noble. Though the modern constitu- tions do not recognize any rank of nobility or distinction of persons, still the prefix is officially used, it being admitted, by a some- what liberal interpretation, that it has be- come part of the name.
JEAN GRELLET, President of the Swiss Heraldic Society.
FANTASTIC FICTION (9 th S. vii. 161). In reading MR. YARDLEY'S interesting note on this subject it has occurred to me that some distinction should be made between the genuine folk-story and the modern imitations which are due entirely to the inventiveness of their authors. Except in form, there is no resemblance between ' Zadig ' or * Vathek ' and the contes of Straparola and Perrault.
