Feudal Baronies – Origins and Nature

Feudal baronies in Ireland and Scotland emerged from the broader Norman feudal system, introduced after the Norman Conquest (1066 in England, later extended to Ireland and Scotland).

• A baron originally meant any tenant-in-chief—a landholder holding directly in capite from the Crown.

• These barons were obligated to provide military service (usually forty days’ knight service) and attend the king’s great council, which later evolved into Parliament.

• Over time, “baron” came to signify lords of Parliament or peers rather than all tenants-in-chief.

Creation and Descent of Baronies

English law recognized three ways to create an honour or dignity:

1. By tenure (holding lands directly of the Crown).

2. By writ of summons to Parliament.

3. By letters patent (formal royal grant).

In Ireland:

• Feudal baronies originated with grants held in capite from King John onward.

• These early Irish baronies descended to heirs general (both male and female), not to heirs male exclusively.

• The first Irish dignity restricted to heirs male appeared only in 1316 with the Earldom of Kildare, followed by Louth (1320) and Carlisle (1322).

• The first English barony by patent was in 1387; Ireland followed with such creations in 1462 (Sir Robert Barnwall).

Feudal Barons in Ireland

• Early Irish barons, such as the Barons of Delvin (Nugent family), held large tracts in Westmeath and Longford and were summoned to Parliament as barons by tenure.

• Their holdings often originated in royal grants confirming palatine or seignorial rights — quasi-sovereign jurisdictions over their manors.

• These barons often descended from Gaelic and Norman nobility, e.g., Connor, King of Meath, ancestor of the Nugents, who became Earls of Westmeath.

Feudal Baronies in Scotland

• In Scotland, all freeholders holding land directly of the Crown were called barons until 1587, when an Act of Parliament (by Lord Menmuir) restructured parliamentary representation.

• After that date, only barons of Parliament (a peerage dignity) retained political status, while other barons became hereditary feudal landowners.

• A Scottish feudal barony remained a real property right—transferable with the caput (baronial lands)—until 2004, when the Abolition of Feudal Tenure Act ended the system. The dignity, however, survives as an incorporeal heritable honor.

Legal and Historical Legacy

• Feudal baronies were once governance units, combining landholding with judicial and military obligations.

• Over centuries, baronial status shifted from functional to honorific.

• Today, both Irish and Scottish baronies are recognized historically or socially but not as modern peerage titles—except where confirmed by letters patent or recognized jurisdiction (e.g., Scottish feudal dignities still traded as heritable honors).

⚜️ Prince of Annaly Teffia - Summary of the Feudal Rights and Dignities

Feudal Principality and Seignory of Annaly (Longford), Ireland (Ancient Teffia )

I. Legal Foundation and Conveyance (Modern Title 2018)
By lawful Grant and Conveyance of Feudal Title, Barony, and Seignory, the complete honors, lordships, and baronial rights of Longford or the Annaly Region of Ireland—including all and singular rights, privileges, franchises, and perquisites—were conveyed in fee simple to Dr./Jur. George Mentz, Seigneur of Fief Blondel, in August 2018.
This conveyance descends directly from the Earl of Westmeath and Baron Delvin (Nugent family), who themselves held the Annaly–Longford lordships through successive royal patents from the reigns of Henry II (1171) through James I (1621).
Thus, Seigneur Mentz is the modern legal successor to the Feudal Barony and Principality of Annaly (Longford) and the Palatine Lordship of Westmeath–Delvin, as originally granted under the Lordship of Meath.

II. Nature of the Rights Conveyed

III. Historical Seats and Principal Grants Forming the Principality

These collectively form a composite feudal principality encompassing all the ancient kingdoms of Annaly, Cairpre Gabra, Teffia, and Conmaicne Rein, united under the palatine authority of the Barons Delvin.

IV. Dynastic Continuity

• Gaelic Lineage: O’Farrell (Ó Fearghail) Princes of Annaly – the original native sovereigns, divided into the O’Farrell Buidhe (south) and O’Farrell Bán (north).

• Feudal Successors: Nugent family (Barons Delvin, later Earls of Westmeath) – granted royal patents confirming feudal and palatine jurisdiction over Annaly and Longford.

• Modern Holder: Dr./Jur. George Mentz, Seigneur of Fief Blondel – recipient of the 2018 conveyance, successor in law and dignity to the Nugent–Delvin feudal rights.

V. Prerogatives and Interpretations under Law

1. Title in Fee Simple – Absolute and perpetual ownership, transferable and heritable.

2. Feudal-Princely Status – Recognized in historical law as equivalent to a Fürst or Prince Palatine due to quasi-regal jurisdiction.

3. Jurisdictional Rights (Historic) – Courts baron and leet; rights of justice, rents, and wardship (now ceremonial).

4. Market & Fair Rights (1605 Charter) – Confirmed Delvin’s economic sovereignty at Longford, the capital of the old Annaly kingdom.

5. Ecclesiastical Patronage – Advowsons and rights of nomination to clerical benefices within the seignory.

6. Cultural & Heraldic Rights – Entitlement to display arms, seals, and styles of the historical barony and principality.

VI. Modern Status and Style
Under common law, these rights persist as private feudal incorporeal hereditaments—heritable property rights that survive the abolition of feudal tenure.
Accordingly, Commissioner Dr./Jur. George S. Mentz is entitled to use the historical and descriptive style:

“Lord and Feudal Prince of Annaly (Longford)”
Princeps Annaliae et Longfordiae
Seigneur de Blondel, Seigneur de l’Annaly et de Longfordie
Count Palatine of Meath (by succession of right)

VII. Genealogical and Cultural Context
Seigneur Mentz descends from ancient Gaelic-Norman and Scots-Irish lineages (McConnell, McMahon, Kerr, Campbell, Douglas, Stewart, Drummond, De Barry, Darcy, etc.), with ancestral DNA origins in Dublin, Galway, Kerry, Mayo, Cork, Clare, and Donegal—representing a full circle of historical and hereditary continuity from Ireland’s ancient nobility to modern stewardship.

VIII. Summary of Legal Effect

• Ownership: Fee-simple title to the feudal seignory and honors of Annaly–Longford.

• Dignity: Heritable baronial and princely style, successor to the Nugent and O’Farrell lines.

• Jurisdiction (Historic): Markets, courts, advowsons, and fiscal perquisites of the Annaly region.

• Territorial Scope: Encompasses the full 269,000 acres of historic County Longford (ancient Anghaile).

• Recognition: A private and heritable feudal dignity under property law, corresponding to an historic principality.

In Essence:

The Seigneur of Fief Blondel holds by conveyance and succession the Feudal Seignory and Principality of Annaly (Longford)—a title whose roots lie in the ancient Irish kingdom of Anghaile, ennobled through Norman, Tudor, and Stuart royal grants, and today preserved as a lawful incorporeal hereditament conferring the dignities of a Feudal Prince and Lord of Annaly and Longford.

Feudal Barons of Ireland or Scotland

For a primer on Feudal Irish Baronies, see House of Lords

According to the principles of the English law, Honours can only have been created in three ways, by tenure, by writ, or by patent. An attempt may be made here to show that there is an analogy between the ancient feudal baronies and the baronies that have since been created in Ireland, and that all feudal baronies went to the heirs male, and therefore, although the feudal principle has ceased, still all those baronies are confined in their descent to the heirs male. We assert that no feudal baronies of Ireland have ever been confined in their descent to heirs male.

There exist, from the reign of John, grants of land, held in capite of the Crown, and iu every case the grant has [48] been to the grantee and his heirs. There can be no dcubt that at the time of the signing of Magna C arta, Baron Fitz-Walter and Baron Say, and some others, were barons by tenure; but when claims have been made to those baronies, this House has uniformly treated them as the first writs of summons, and heirs general of those barons have frequently succeeded to them; all the earldoms in Ireland before the year 1316 were granted to the heirs of the parties, so that there is not till that year, before which period the Barony of Slane was created by writ of summons, a single dignity in Ireland which descended to heirs male only. All the early patents of the English peerage have been printed, and the result is that the first time heirs male were ever mentioned in the creation of any dignity, was in the instance of the Earldom of Kildare in 1316. The next was that of Louth in the 12th Edw. 2d, and the third that of the Earldom of Carlisle, in the 15th Edw. 2d.

The first creation of a baron by patent in England was in 1387, which was also the first instance in England of a barony being created to a man and the heirs of his body. No second instance occurred till 1443. No creation of a baron in Ireland by patent is on record limiting the dignity to the heirs male of the body, until the 2d of Edw. 4th, in 1462, when Sir Robert Barnwall was created. From the Crown downwards, every dignity, from an early period, was granted to the heirs of the persons created, or the heirs of the body.

The Barons of Delvin of Westmeath-Longford) were summoned to Parliament on various occasions.

Connor, who was King of Meath, and the ancestor of Cuniffe. According to O'Dugan, this Connor was the ancestor of Nugent, Earls of Westmeath.

The original and antiquity of baronies has occasioned great inquiries among our English antiquaries. The most probable opinion seems to be, that they were the same with our present lords of manors, to which the name of court baron (which is the lord's court, and incident to every manor) gives some countenance. (11) It may be collected from king John's magna carta, (k) that originally all lords of manors, or barons, that held of the king in capite, had seats in the great council or parliament; till about the reign of that prince the conflux of them became so large and troublesome, that the king was obliged to divide them, and summon only the greater barons in person, leaving the small ones to be summoned by the sheriff, and, as it is said, to sit by representation in another house, which gave rise to the separation of the two houses of parliament. (/) By degrees the title came to be confined to the greater barons, or lords of parliament only; and there were no other barons among the peerage but such as were summoned by writ, in respect of the tenure of their lands or baronies, till Richard the Second first made it a mere title of honor, by conferring it on divers persons by his letters-patent, (tn) Cite

In the 13th Century in England the barons ceased to be peers, unless so created, but in Scotland, up to the year 1587,—in which year, various acts, drawn up by Lord Menmuir [see article BALCARREs, ante, p. 199] were passed for regulating the form and order of parliament and the vote of the barons,—the title of baron was common to all the landed proprietors or lairds, holding their lands directly of the Crown.

https://books.google.com/books?pg=PA254&dq=grants+created+capite+%22feudal+baron%22&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&id=L3NEAQAAMAAJ&output=text

The feudal system was introduced into England by the Norman Conquest. Its pressure on the common people was aggravated by the completeness of the subjection of the Saxon race. All the land was held by feudal tenure, and there was no allodium. The few Saxons who were permitted to retain their lands were brought under the feudal system; and the thanes were reduced to the condition of franklins, or simple freeholders. The Normans, who held most of the manors from the king, were called tenants-in-chief (in capite); and they were bound to knight service—that is, to maintain in the field, for forty days at a time, a certain force of their subtenants. This service extended to religious foundations and monasteries. Exclusive of these, 1400 tenants-in-chief and about 8000 mesne lords (holding fiefs not directly from the crown) are enumerated in Domesday Book.

https://books.google.com/books?pg=PA51&dq=lords+holding+%22directly+from+the+crown%22&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&id=gfpq97p6U5oC&output=text