(Fr. Baron, It. Barone, Sp. Barón, Port. Baron, Ger. Baron, Freiherr, Russ. Барон Baron )
The rank of baron is the next below that of viscount, and forms the lowest degree of nobility. The name is of very uncertain etymology, and the whimsical derivations which have been assigned it, though numerous enough, do not present any one sufficiently plausible to be adopted with any confidence. It began to be used in England about the time of the Conquest, and was no doubt introduced from France, where it was of much more ancient date. After this period it began to supersede the Saxon term of thane, a dignity with which the newly imported title seems to have corresponded; and as the Saxon word was frequently used, in a more extended signification, to denote free-born men, so its Norman successor was employed, with equal latitude, to signify the free citizens of towns and boroughs. The remains of this custom are still observable in the Cinque-ports, the freemen of which retain their old designation of barons as an honorary title.
There was also another description of persons to whom the same title once extended. In the earlier periods of history, when the higher nobility were almost independent of their sovereign, or were rather petty sovereigns themselves, and presented in their style of living a complete copy, on a smaller scale, of the royal court, it was customary with many of the nobles to have in their train barons of their own creation; and this was principally the case in the counties-palatine. It has indeed been maintained that every earldom had under it ten barons, and every baron ten knights-fees, and that it was usual for such as had four knights fees to be promoted to the rank of baron.
Lords of manors, also, were anciently styled barons. But from the gradual alteration in the form of government and decline of the feudal system, all these minor dignities became obsolete, and the title remained only to those who were created immediately by the king. They were considered peers of the realm and entitled to sit in the upper house of parliament. There were three methods by which the king conferred the rank of baron on such of his subjects as he thought deserving of the reward for their services in war, or calculated, by their wisdom and knowledge of the laws, to promote the deliberations of the great council of his nobles. These methods were by tenure, by writ and by patent.
The very name of barons by tenure shows the time and manner of their origin. Portions of land or castles, to be possessed as property, or to be governed by a delegated authority, were the means by which feudal monarchs were accustomed to reward their followers. To some of these was attached the title of baron, that is, they were held per barioniam, or by grand serjeanty. It is most probable that some of these were given as a possession for ever, while others were only intended for a temporary honour, and to be always at the disposal of the king. But whatever was the original intention, whether the king, in claiming such a power, did, as the barons accused him of doing, invade their rights, or whether in some cases custom had grown into prescription, and the barons unjustly opposed what began to appear a despotic exercise of prerogative, the triumph of the barons at Runnymede decided the question in their favour, and though no encroachment was made on the power of the king to create barons by whichever method he chose, when created they were no longer dependent on his favour for the continuance of their honour.
But although, in the case of barons by tenure, the castle, manor, etc. was the means of conveying the title, they were not so essentially united that the property, into whatever hands it might pass, carried the title with it; for yet were they so distinct that the owner could retain his dignity, and yet make over his tenure in whatever manner and to whomsoever he chose. If, without license from his sovereign, he conveyed it away, the property became forfeit to the crown, and the title returned with it, and became extinct. Nor will such a consequence appear, upon examination, unjust. In making the grant to the first possessor, the king, of course, did so after a full conviction of his worthiness to enjoy the honour it conferred, and consequently of that of his descendants, at least in the most important particular, that of birth. But as the distribution of honours always has been, and ought to be, the peculiar privilege of the monarch, and is the most valuable that he enjoyed, as forming the highest rewards which the services of his subjects can obtain, it was necessary to their retaining their value and influence, that he should have such control over them, as to prevent their passing into ignoble hands.
Yet this must have been the case with the title now under discussion, if it had been in the power of the holder, for the sake of gain, or even less unworthy motives, to convey it away with the property which brought it to himself. Since then the king was the sole judge of the fitness of the persons who were to enjoy the honour he conferred, if the individuals so distinguished thought proper to resign it, they virtually made a voluntary restoration of it into the hands of him from whom they received it. It was a gift which the giver could not claim again, so long as the conditions upon which it was granted were observed; but these conditions did not allow any interference with the privilege of the sovereign in extending nobility only to those who received it immediately from his favour.
But as it was observed before, the title and the property were not essentially united, yet only royal authority could separate them. This was sometimes exercised for that purpose, and barons occasionally received the king’s licence to make alienation of their baronial tenements to strangers, and at the same time were permitted to enjoy the dignity. The method of continuing this to them was generally by summoning them to the next assembly of nobles by the name of their former baronies. It may be, that this licence to retain their dignity existed only in the king’s promise, or in the understood custom of issuing writs to those who had enjoyed the honour for a length of time, as a matter of right, so long as their baronial tenements remained, and that, properly speaking, from that time forth they are to be considered as only barons by writ.
It is very probable that these gave rise to the term of barons by prescription, a distinction which some writers have made, but for which there does not seem any authority. Barons spiritual by tenure (archbishops and bishops) will be treated under another head; but it may be remarked here, that in Saxon times they partook more of the nature of barons by writ, as they were summoned to the assembly of wise men, or Wittenagemote, not by right of office, but from their character for superior probity, learning, and prudence, and the authority which the sanction of their sacred profession would give to its decrees.
The second kind of barons to be treated are barons by writ. When the king wished to assemble his nobles to deliberate on the affairs of the nation, they were summoned by writs in his name, appointing the time and place of meeting. These were addressed to all who had hereditary right to nobility; and besides these to such as the king thought fit to add to their number, for their ability to assist the business in hand. Their being thus once summoned constituted a claim to nobility for themselves; but it is a disputed point whether it secured the same rank to their descendants.
In the twenty-seventh year of Henry VI, a writ was issued to Sir Henry Bromfleet, in which it was declared to be the royal pleasure, that his title of Lord Veysey should continue to his heirs lawfully born. This seems to argue that, without this special provision, the title did not necessarily descend; and that, if we find writs generally issued to the heirs of such as owed their nobility to the same kind of summons, this honour flowed entirely from the sovereign bounty, and was an act of favour, and not of justice. Yet there is every reason to believe, that if the second generation experienced the same distinction, it was considered that a hereditary title had been established.
The style of the writs varied: sometimes the name of baron was employed, and sometimes that of lord; sometimes the person was named with the addition of his estate or place of residence, and sometimes the bare name of the party was used. There is no mention of barons by writ before the time of Henry III who, after the battle of Evesham, in which he finally subdued the rebellious barons, found their numbers so thinned by the unfortunate struggle, and the necessity he was under of attainting many whom the war had spared, that he was induced to replenish their ranks by the summary method of issuing writs to the most worthy commoners for a parliament, which was intended to be held at Winchester. It appears from the records of Chancery, that many abbots and priors who were summoned during the same times were, by petitioning, relieved from what they considered as a burden.
Of barons by patent, the first creation was by Richard II in the eleventh year of his reign, who gave the title of Baron of Kidderminster to John Beauchamp of Holt.
Parliaments have sometimes exercised the privilege of creating barons, but the privileges of the king and the parliament are now better defined, and that of conferring nobility has long since been justly considered to belong exclusively to the king. The title, when so conferred, is always hereditary, but the course of descent is marked out in the letters patent. In ancient times the sum of £265 per annum in land was fixed as the lowest revenue by which the dignity of a baron could be maintained.
Of the three sorts of barons here mentioned, the very name of the first, barons by tenure, shows that it had its origin in feudal times, and with the feudal system the use of it expired. Barons by writ, also, are now never created, and letters patent are the only means by which men are now raised to the dignity of barons. Thus this honour is placed on the same footing as all other titles of hereditary distinction.
The sovereign as fons honorum also has the gift to create life peerages and a small number of life barons were created from the reign of James I onward. These were mostly women who did not have the right then to sit in the House of Lords. The legitimate children of a life peer could not inherit the title but took the privilege of children of hereditary barons, being entitled to style themselves with the prefix "the Honourable". The Life Peerages Act 1958 was enacted to enable the creation of life peers, always of baronial rank, to take seats in the House of Lords. With the removal of most of the hereditary peers from the Upper House, life peers now form the great majority of its membership and well over 1000 life barons and baronesses have been created since 1958.
Life baronies under the Life Peerages Act are theoretically created by the Sovereign, but in practice, none is granted except upon the proposition of the Prime Minister. Normally, the Prime Minister chooses only peers for his own party, but permits the leaders of opposition parties to recommend peers from those parties. The Prime Minister may determine the number of peers each party may propose; he may also choose to amend these recommendations, but by convention does not do so.
WILLIAM BERRY (Edited)
See Nobility.
