Knight Fever: Difference between revisions

Honorable mention among titles goes to "squire". Once meaning an apprentice knight(sort of like a [[Star Wars|Padawan]]) it became a colloquial term for minor nobility specifically those with a respectable but not gigantic landhold and a few renters. As a rule of thumb you can say there would have been one squire to a village in the heyday of squirearchy though after all those centuries customs were always a mishmash even in one country. In some ways this was one of the more democratic positions of the aristocracy. A highly talented person could gather enough money, or influence, or whatever in the course of successful career to retire and found a landholding dynasty. This was not unrelated to the fact that squiredom was also a function of primogeniture; you have to be pretty rich to convince a grandee to marry a commoner, but a younger son or even a bastard had enough clout in his pedigree to attract, while money would make him or her(or his family) forgo pride as it would not for someone who was established. In a way their position was ambiguous. While certainly part of the nobility in a sense they did not get a seat in the Lords with their holding. This was made up for by the fact that they could run in the Commons and more and more, as history went on, it was the Commons that were calling the tune until the Lords was reduced almost to a [[Kicked Upstairs|retirement home.]] Squires at one time formed an important place in British history, playing some of the biggest roles in providing officers for the armed services, and taking part in the judiciary, legislature and(Anglican)clergy. Many famous British literary characters are from the families of squires.