What's in a Title?

A hat worn by princes of the Holy
Roman Empire as well as princes of
Belgium.

In fantasy worlds, there is prone to be a specific form of government. In this government there is prone to be nobility. Said nobles are either going to have regular titles or special titles. These are the regular titles, with the feminine in parentheses. Not all of these are required.

• Emperor (empress)
• King (queen)
• A king's widow is known either as the queen dowager or the queen mother.
• Grand Duke (grand duchess)
• Grand Prince (grand princess)
• Basically the same as a grand duke; the heir to the throne.
• Archduke (archduchess)
• Infante (infanta)
• Basically the archduke of Spain and Portugal, this is any child of the king that is not the heir to the throne.
• Duke (duchess)
• Prince (princess)
• Marquesse (marquise)
• Margrave (margravine)
• Count/Earl (countess)
• Viscount (viscountess)
• Baron (baroness)
• Freiherr (freifrau)
• A German baron or baroness.
• Baronet (baronetess)
• Hereditary knight
• Ritter
• Equal to baronet and hereditary knight.
• Knight (dame)
• Nobile
• Edler von
• Austria-Hungarian and German.

If you make up your own titles, you will have a more difficult time. Remember good old Gramir of the Wicked Death? If your titles sound anything as ridiculous as that, you need to change it immediately. You may laugh, but your readers will upon seeing your ridiculous titles. Hierarchies among the titles are important; I suggest creating names of titles that correspond to the titles given for real life feudalism above to keep it a little more realistic. If you deviate too much, it may seem either barbaric or overly complicated.

Feel free to post the names of your titles and what they correspond to here so that I can adequately judge.