- For the NZ champion racehorse, see: Lordship
Lord is a title with various meanings. It can
denote a
prince or a
feudal superior (especially a
feudal tenant who holds directly from the king, i.e., a
baron). The title today is mostly used in connection
with the
peerage of the
United Kingdom or its predecessor countries, although some
users of the title do not themselves hold peerages, and use it
'
by courtesy'.
The title may also be used in conjunction with others to denote a
superior holder of an otherwise generic title, in such combinations
as "
Lord Mayor" or "
Lord Chief Justice". The title is
primarily taken by men, while women will usually take the title
'
lady'. However, this is not universal, as the
Lord of Mann and female Lord Mayors are
examples of women who are styled 'lord'.
In religious contexts
Lord can also refer to
various different gods or deities.
The earliest uses of Lord in the English language in a religious context
were by English
Bible
translators such as Bede. This reflected
the
Jewish practice of substituting the
spoken Hebrew word '
Adonai' (which means 'My
Lord') for
YHWH when read
aloud.
According to the
Oxford
Dictionary of English, the
etymology
of the word can be traced back to the
Old English word 'hlāford' which
originated from 'hlāfweard' meaning 'bread keeper' or 'loaf-ward',
reflecting the
Germanic tribal
custom of a
chieftain providing
food for his followers. Lady, the female equivalent, originates
from a similar structure, believed to have originally meant
'loaf-kneader'.
Title
Peerage
Five ranks
of peer exist in the United Kingdom
, in descending order, these are: duke, marquess, earl, viscount, and baron. The title 'Lord' is used most often by
barons who are rarely addressed with any other. The style of this
address is 'Lord (X)', for example,
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, is
commonly known as 'Lord Tennyson'. The ranks of marquess, earl and
viscounts commonly use lord as well, with viscounts using the same
style as used for baron. However, marquesses and earls have a
slightly different form of address where they can be called either
the 'Marquess/Earl of (X)' or 'Lord (X)'. Dukes also use the style,
'Duke of (X)', but it is not acceptable to refer to them as 'Lord
(X)'. Dukes are formally addressed as 'Your Grace', rather than 'My
Lord'. In the
Peerage of
Scotland, the members of the lowest level of the peerage have
the title '
Lord of Parliament'
rather than baron.
For senior members of the peerage, the title lord also applies by
courtesy to some or all of their
children; for example the younger sons of dukes and marquesses can
use the style 'Lord (first name) (surname)'. The titles are
courtesy titles in that the holder
does not hold a peerage, and is, according to
British law, a
commoner.
House of Lords
In the UK,
the House of
Lords
(known commonly as 'the Lords') forms the upper house of Parliament. Here all peers are treated as
lords but there are three different classifications:
- Most lords who hold peerages created before the passage of the
Life Peerages Act 1958 (and a
handful who hold peerages created after then) are hereditary peers, who until 1999
constituted the most numerous category of lords sitting in the
House. There are in excess of 700 lords whose titles may be
inherited, however since the House of Lords Act 1999, they are no
longer guaranteed a seat in the Lords and instead must take part in
an election for a total of ninety-two seats. All male peers of
England, Great Britain and the United Kingdom were before
1999 entitled to sit in the House of Lords by virtue of their
title. Peeresses were granted the right
to sit in 1963. Peers of Scotland and Ireland, however,
historically had limitations on their right to sit at Westminster.
Between 1707 and 1963, Scottish
peers participated in elections to determine which of them
would take the sixteen seats allocated to them. Elections were
abolished in 1963, and from that
time until 1999 all Scottish peers and peeresses were entitled to
sit. Irish peers participated in
similar elections between 1801 and 1922, when the Irish Free State was established. Elections
of Irish peers ceased in 1922, however already-elected Irish
representative peers remained entitled to sit until their death.
The last Irish representative peer to die was Francis Charles
Adelbert Needham, 4th Earl of Kilmorey, who died in 1961. Many
Irish peers also hold peerages of Great Britain and the United
Kingdom, which entitled them to sit in the House (without the
necessity of being elected a representative peer) until 1999.
- The importance of hereditary lords has declined steadily
following the increase in the appointment of life peers. These peers are entitled to
sit in the House of Lords for the duration of their life, but
cannot transfer their titles to their heirs. They are rarely above
the rank of baron. The first life peers were appointed to assist
the House of Lords in exercising its judicial functions
under the Appellate
Jurisdiction Act 1876. Widespread appointment of life peers was
enabled by the passage of the Life Peerages Act 1958. Since that
Act was passed, some 1,086 life peers have been created. The only
hereditary privilege associated with life peerages is that children
of life peers are entitled to style themselves 'The Honourable (firstname) (surname)'.
- These first two groups are collectively termed Lords Temporal as opposed to the third type
of lord sitting in the House known as Lords Spiritual (or spiritual
peers). This group consists of twenty-six Church of England bishops who are
appointed in order of superiority. Unlike Lords Temporal, who can
be appointed from any of the four nations of the UK, only bishops
with English Sees are eligible to sit in the Chamber. Bishops of the
Church of
Scotland
traditionally sat in the Parliament of Scotland but were
excluded in 1638 following the Scottish Reformation. There are
no longer bishops in
the Church of Scotland in the traditional sense of the word,
and that Church has never sent members to sit in the Westminster
House of Lords. The Church of
Ireland ceased to send bishops to sit after disestablishment
in 1871. The Church in Wales ceased
to be a part of the Church of England in 1920 and was
simultaneously disestablished in
Wales. Accordingly, bishops of the Church in Wales were no longer
eligible to be appointed to the House as bishops of the Church of
England.
Judiciary
Charles Pepys, 1st Earl of Cottenham,
a Lord Chancellor of the United Kingdom
The judges of the House of Lords, the final appellate Court of the
United Kingdom, hold life peerages, and are addressed accordingly.
They are known collectively as the
Law
Lords. The title 'Lord' is also used to refer to some judges
who are not peers in some Commonwealth legal systems. Some such
judges, for instance judges of the Court of Appeal of England and
Wales, are called 'Lords Justices', or 'Ladies Justices', as the
case may be. Other such judges, for instance judges of Canadian
provincial supreme courts, are known only as 'Justices' but are
addressed in court as 'My Lord' or 'My Lady' or 'Your Lordship' or
'Your Ladyship'.
Examples of judges who use the title include:
Lord of the Manor
The title
of Lord of the Manor arose in the English medieval
system of Manorialism following the
Norman Conquest. The title
Lord of the Manor is a titular feudal dignity which is
still recognised today. Their holders are entitled to call
themselves "[Personal name], The Lord/Lady of the Manor of [Place
name]" but, for example, the
Identity & Passport
Service does not recognise such titles. The title is not a
title of the
nobility.
Laird
The Scottish title Laird is a shortened form of 'laverd' which is
an old Scottish word deriving from an Anglo-Saxon term meaning
'Lord' and is also derived from the middle English word 'Lard' also
meaning 'Lord'.
'Laird' is a hereditary title for the owner of a landed
estate in the United
Kingdom and is a title of Gentry. The title of Laird may carry certain local
or feudal rights, though unlike a Lordship, a Lairdship has never carried
voting rights, either in the historic Parliament of Scotland or, after
unification with the Kingdom of
England, in the British
House of Lords.
Other
Various high offices of state may carry the cachet of honorary
lords, such as the titles of
Lord
High Chancellor or
Lord Mayor.
Feudalism
Cleric, knight and workman
In
feudalism, a lord has
aristocratic rank, has control over a portion of
land and the produce and labour of the
serfs
living thereon. Knights or lesser lords would swear the
oath of
fealty to the lord, and
would then become a
vassal.
Bishops in the Middle Ages held the feudal rank of lord over their
spiritual inferiors, hence today even bishops who do not sit as
Lords Spiritual may be addressed as
"Lord Bishop". As a reflection of its feudal (and thus territorial)
nature, however, the title is generally reserved for
diocesan bishops, not
assistant or
coadjutor bishops.
As part of the heritage of feudalism, lord can generally refer to
superiors of many kinds, for example
landlord. In many cultures in Europe the equivalent
term serves as a general title of address equivalent to the
English 'Mister' (
French Monsieur,
Spanish Señor,
Portuguese Senhor,
Italian
Signore,
Dutch
Meneer/Mijnheer/De Heer (as in: to de heer Joren Jansen),
German Herr,
Hungarian Úr,
Greek Kyrie or
to the English formal "you" (
Polish
Pan). See also
gentleman.
Religion
People have often used the term 'lord' in religious contexts,
where,
The Lord refers to
God
in
Judaism or
Islam, or
to
God,
Jesus, or the
Holy Spirit in
Christianity. In the
Anglican Church there are also
Lord Bishops. In many
Christian Bibles (such as the
King James Version), the
Hebrew name
YHWH (the
Tetragrammaton) is rendered
LORD (
all caps) or (
small
caps). This usage follows the
Jewish
practice of substituting the spoken Hebrew word '
Adonai' (translated as
'Lord') for YHWH when read aloud. Following practice in Hebrew, the
Septuagint mainly used the
Greek word
Kyrios ( , meaning
'lord') to translate
YHWH. As this was the
Old Testament of the
Early Church, the Christian practice of
translating the divine name as 'Lord' derives directly from
it.
In Hindu theology,
The Lord or
Svayam Bhagavan refers to the concept of
absolute representation of the monotheistic God.
Other religious uses of the word Lord include:
- Ba'al, or Baal, is a Northwest Semitic
title meaning 'lord', used for various gods and local
spirit-deities. In some texts, the term refers to Hadad, the lord of the divine assembly whose name only
priests were allowed to speak. References to Baal in the Hebrew Bible, such as the prophet Elijah's confrontation with Baal's priests, usually
correspond to local gods rather than to Hadad.
- Bel meaning 'Lord' is a common title
of the Babylonian deity Marduk.
- En meaning 'Lord' as in Sumerian
deities Enki and Enlil.
- The name of the god Adonis may be a
cognate of the Hebrew word for 'lord'.
- In the Wiccan religion, the male god is
also referred to as 'The Lord' and the female as 'The Lady'.
See also
References
- Sources consulted
- Endnotes
, known as 'Lords Justices of Appeal'.
, known as 'Lords of Council and
Session'.
and the High Courts
of India. The Bar
Council of India however calls upon lawyers to give up this
practice of addressing judges as 'lords'.
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