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Italian Titles of Nobility 11/8/2020 Italian Titles of Nobility - A Concise, Accurate Guide to Nobiliary History, Tradition and Law in Italy until 1946 - Facts, no… Italian Titles of Nobility See also: Sicilian Heraldry & Nobility • Sicilian Genealogy • Books • Interview ©1997 – 2015 Louis Mendola Author's Note An article of this length can be little more than a precis. Apart from the presentation of the simplest facts, the author's intent is to provide accurate information, avoiding the bizarre ideas that color the study of the aristocracy. At best, this web page is a ready reference that offers a quick overview and a very concise bibliography; it is intended as nothing more. This page is published for the benefit of the historian, genealogist, heraldist, researcher or journalist – and all scientific freethinkers – in search of an objective, unbiased summary that does not seek (or presume) to insult their knowledge, intelligence or integrity. The study of the nobility and heraldry simply cannot exist without a sound basis in genealogical science. Genealogy is the only means of demonstrating familial lineage (ancestry), be it proven through documentation or DNA, be it aristocratic or humble. At 300 pages, the book Sicilian Genealogy and Heraldry considers the subject in far greater detail over several chapters, and while its chief focus is the Kingdom of Sicily, it takes into account the Kingdom of Italy (1861-1946) as well. That book includes chapters dedicated to, among other things, historiography, feudal law and proof standards. Like this web page, the book (you can peruse the table of contents, index and a few pages on Amazon's site) is the kind of reference and guide the author wishes were available when he began to study these fields seriously over thirty years ago. In response to numerous queries over the years – including some from the news media – the author has often explained that Italy has no "college of arms" or other government agency empowered to recognize titles of nobility or personal coats of arms. Furthermore, it should be remembered that historical fact is ascertained through scientific reasoning and solid evidence, not via "approval" from a self-appointed "authority" or by somebody who happens to be descended from royalty. The text that follows is concerned with reality, not fantasy. In passing, as there are various Byzantine, Aragonese and Swabian "pretenders" in Europe and even in the United States, it should be noted that the medieval dynasties (Hautevilles, Hohenstaufens, et al.) that ruled Sicily are long-extinct, and that Italy has four royal families: Savoy, Bourbon-Sicilies, Bourbon-Parma, Hapsburg-Tuscany. The other soi-disant "pretenders" are – for lack of a better term – fabulists. That they gain acceptance on the internet or edit entries in Wikipedia does not make them real. Recent decades have witnessed an increasingly widespread interest in coats of arms and titles of nobility, especially among Italian descendants abroad, many of whom have been deceived by heraldic or genealogical research firms (some, ironically, operated by noble families) into believing themselves to be armigerous or even titled. The typical American who boasts of a "noble" lineage in Italy dating from the Middle Ages based on genealogical research "by experts in Italy" is the victim of such deception. Still others have paid vendors thousands for supposed "titles of nobility" which, in reality, cannot be sold or transferred in law; those purchasing such "titles" have fallen prey to wishful thinking – a title of nobility is not a piece of paper. Please note that the author does not, in any way, represent – or speak on behalf of – the governments, institutions, publishers or persons mentioned on this page, although he has occasionally been consulted by some of them, such as the Sovereign Military Order of Malta and the editors of the Almanach de Gotha. Nor has the author ever been paid by any of the institutions, organisations or publishers mentioned here. Queries regarding specific cases and policies should be addressed to the relevant party, not to the author. The author does not render opinions as to the legitimacy of specific titles of nobility claimed by this or that person. (Scientifically, we can prove that such a claim is valid, but we cannot "debunk" one that isn't.) It often happens that one publisher or fount of honour "recognises" a certain person's title while another does not. The following text is based on fact rather than fiction, so – in stark contrast to most sites concerning this topic – expect the blunt and the pragmatic rather than the timid or the whimsical. www.regalis.com/nobletitles.htm 1/10 11/8/2020 Italian Titles of Nobility - A Concise, Accurate Guide to Nobiliary History, Tradition and Law in Italy until 1946 - Facts, no… Introduction Until 1948, the Consulta Araldica (Italy's college of arms) governed heraldic matters in the Kingdom of Italy. Based first at Turin and later at Rome, this agency was part of the Ministry of the Interior. Italian heraldic law was rather complex, full of regulations and other provisions attempting to preserve certain heraldic practices of the realms which had existed in Italy before 1860. Indeed, various regional heraldic commissions had spent decades to ensure that the entrenched nobilities of the Kingdom of Sardinia, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, the Papal State, and the grand duchies of Tuscany, Parma and Modena, as well as certain formerly Austrian territories (parts of Lombardy and Venetia), would not be unduly offended by the body of heraldic law of the newly-unified Italy. Camillo Benso di Cavour infamously observed that, "a Sicilian prince is about equal to a Piedmontese count." In general, heretofore unrecognized noble families, whether titled or not, were required by law to petition for recognition of their ranks or titles by the Crown if such was desired. The names of the heads of these families were inscribed in the Libro d'Oro del Regno d'Italia, a series of large, handwritten registers maintained at the offices of the Consulta Araldica and now consultable at Italy's Archivio Centrale dello Stato at EUR outside Rome. An extract is presented in SAGI's Annuario della Nobiltà Italiana, described below. This official registry of the Kingdom of Italy should not be confused with the similarly-named Libro d'Oro published until 2010 by the Collegio Araldico. Defunct since 2014, Collegio Araldico was a family-operated publishing house that accepted members in an affiliated heraldic club; it was not a governmental agency. (In passing, it should be mentioned that Italy has numerous nobiliary directories of varying levels of quality; the first publication of this kind in the united Italy, published today in a current, new series, is the red Annuario, of which an early edition is shown here. Such directories are listed under Further Reading at the end of this article.) Although the terms of decrees of creation issued prior to 1860 were respected in the new Kingdom, general regulations were instituted to establish national norms based loosely on the Sardinian (Savoyard) model. While a few titles devolved to heirs male general, titles the subject of new creations were stipulated to be transmitted by legitimate male primogeniture. In certain realms, such as the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, female succession ("Sicilian Succession") had been permitted in cases where male heirs were lacking, and this policy was abrogated. Transmission of titles to adopted children required royal rescript. The decree of 1926 is the most recent legislation regarding succession and recognition; it is not part of current law. The last Italian monarch, King Umberto II (1904-1983), was deposed by popular referendum in 1946. Though its results have been disputed, at least in certain quarters (particularly by fanatical monarchists), this referendum – remarkably, the first occasion for Italian women to vote – was held under American auspices during the Allied occupation and established the Italian Republic as a legitimate state recognized internationally and, eventually, by all of the former ruling dynasties, the Vatican, the Republic of San Marino and the Sovereign Military Order of Malta. Article 139 of the Constitution of the Italian Republic codified the exile of the King of Italy and his male heirs, a provision abrogated some fifty years later. It also abolishes the Consulta Araldica and official recognition of predicati (territorial designations or "seats") if recognized during the Fascist era (i.e. after 28 October 1922). Subsequently, these designations could be suffixed to surnames as a result of particular petitions to provincial courts having jurisdiction in such matters. Eventually, in 1967, Italian high courts would issue still more rulings to attenuate the status even of those titles recognized until 1922 (expressly abrogating most of the corpus of Italian nobiliary and heraldic law), but local courts would uphold the rights to identity of titled aristocrats in www.regalis.com/nobletitles.htm 2/10 11/8/2020 Italian Titles of Nobility - A Concise, Accurate Guide to Nobiliary History, Tradition and Law in Italy until 1946 - Facts, no… cases where impostors claimed the titles and territorial designations of living persons whose immediate forebears had been recognized by the Consulta Araldica before 1922. Among the aristocracy, the Italian Republic's quasi-diplomatic recognition (for cultural purposes) of royal dynasties other than the House of Savoy served to bolster a return of adherence to nobiliary laws and traditions as these had existed before 1860, arcane as this matter may be. The dynasties of the Two Sicilies and Tuscany naturally recognize their own heraldic norms, rather than those of the House of Savoy. Two orders of knighthood, the Order of Malta and the Constantinian Order of St. George of the Two Sicilies, that recognize ancestral nobility for certain knights employ their own nobiliary standards, which in a few respects differ from those employed in the Savoy dominions in recent centuries, and certainly in the Kingdom of Italy.
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