In Selden’s “Titles of Honour,” iii., 890, he says, “Of feminine titles some are immediately created in women, some are communicated by their husbands, others are transmitted to them from their ancestors, and some also are given them as consequents only of the dignity of their husbands and parents.” Of “immediate creation” he gives the example of Margaret, Countess of Norfolk, created by Richard II. Duchess of Norfolk, wherein the investiture is mentioned by the patent to be by putting on her the cap of honour “recompensatio meritorum.” Henry VIII. created Anne Boleyn Marchioness of Pembroke. James I. created Lady Mary Compton the Countess of Buckingham in her husband’s lifetime, without permitting him to share the honour. He also created Lady Finch, first Viscountess of Maidstone, and afterwards Countess of Winchilsea, limiting inheritance to heirs of her body.
Anne Bayning, wife of James Murray, was created Viscountess Bayning of Foxley in 1674. Several titles have been granted for discreditable causes, too few for “recompensatio meritorum.” Men that were merely rich have been made peers. Women that have been truly noble have not been made Noble by Letters Patent. The Baroness Burdett Coutts is the only modern example I can recal.
The titles that women received from their husbands were doubtless intended more as an honour to their husbands than to themselves, though they carried, at times, considerable privileges along with them. They bore them as widows until their death, sometimes with the full honours and powers their husbands had borne.
There are some curious cases of titles being assigned. Randol, Earl of Chester and Lincoln, granted the Earldom of Lincoln to his sister, the Lady Hawise de Quency. She afterwards granted the title to John de Lacy, who had married her daughter Margaret, a grant confirmed by the King in a charter, limiting the inheritance to the heirs of Margaret.
I have already noted the two limitations of a daughter’s inheritance of property. The same affected titles. But having inherited, she became endowed with every privilege to the full; and every duty was exacted of her to the utmost.
Women paid Homage.—In spite of many careless remarks to the contrary, women paid homage. “John, heir of the Devereux, died under age; his sister Joane, making proof of her age, and doing her homage, had Livery of the Lands of her Inheritance” (2 Ric. II., Dugdale, 117).
The summons to Ladies as well as to Lords for aids to the King was “de fide et homagio.”
It is true that at some periods widows did not pay Homage for the lands of their deceased husbands; but neither then did men pay Homage for the lands of their deceased wives, holding only by “the Courtesy of England.” “Because if Homage be given, it might never return to the lawful heir” (“Statutes of the Realm, Lands held by Courtesy,” vol. i., p. 220).
Received Homage.—Many examples are given in the “Rotuli Hundredorum,” “Testa de Nevil” and “Kirkby’s Inquest.” Isabella and Idonea de Veteripont insisted on Fealty and Homage from the inhabitants of Appleby. 4 Edward I., as did Anne Clifford later (Nicholson’s “History of Westmoreland,” v. 2). One curious distinction comes in here between the sexes, as a result of the system of coparceny among sisters. A brother might pay Homage to his brother, but not a sister to her sister. The statute of 20 Henry III. (1236) enacted that “the law regarding sisters, co-heirs, be used for Ireland as in England, that the eldest sister only pay Homage to the Overlord or to the King in her own name and that of her sisters, but that the sisters do not pay Homage to the sister for that would be to make her Seigneuress over the other sisters” (Rot. Parl., 20 Henry III.).
They could hold Courts Baron.—A petition, 16 Richard II., appears, praying that no Liegeman should be compelled to appear at the Courts and Councils of the Lord or of the Lady to reply for his freehold.