Were nobles also lords

Answer 1

The nobles and the lords were not precisely the same.

The nobles had titles, dukes, earls or counts, barons, and so on.

The lords might or might not have titles, and this depended on how the word was used. There is a House of Lords, and all them members are nobles. But then the House of Lords does not include people whose highest rank is baronet or knight, who are nobles.

The word lord can mean just the owner of a property on which people live who are not in his or her family. Thus, the word became combined with the word land into the word landlord. The lord of a manor was not necessarily a knight or baron, but could be a commoner. And in fact, the younger sons of a nobleman were of the nobility, but they were also commoners.

There were different levels of nobility, and to some extent the people of different ranks had different functions. They were as follows (there were examples of women who had title in their own right at all levels, including women who were monarchs; also titles here are in English):

• Emperor or empress, who was head of an empire consisting of different states, each of which could be ruled by a lesser monarch or count, or as a republic or commune.
• King or queen, who was a monarch of a kingdom but might be subject to an emperor
• Prince or princess, who might be a monarch of a principality, might be subject to a king or emperor, or might simply be a son of a king or emperor.
• (Archduke and archduchess are post medieval)
• Duke and duchess, who had the highest level of peerage, and whose duchies could, in theory, contain multiple counties. Also, in theory, a duke could maintain an army. Some duchesses were called dukes rather than duchess. For example, Queen Elizabeth II is the Duke of Normandy (in the Channel Islands) and Duke of Lancaster.
• Marquess and marchioness, who were counts of marches, or border counties, and expected to have their own armies to oppose invasions.
• Earl and countess, who were the chief lords of counties. They did not have armies, though they did have men under arms, who were the equivalent of militias.
• (Viscount and viscountess are post medieval)
• Baron and baroness, who were peers, meaning they were, for example, able to sit in parliament as lords, in many ways on a footing equal with all up to the level of duke. The were at the lowest rank that could sit in parliament. They theoretically had large estates with other untitled manorial lords below them.
• (Baronet and baronetess were post medieval)
• Knights and dames, whose titles were not hereditary. There were hereditary knights on the continent.
• Untitled members of the nobility, who were the younger sons and daughters of the people with titles.
• Gentlemen and gentlewomen, people with no title, but who lived in and managed manors. This group is not explicitly defined under the law, as far as I know.

A person with one rank could also have another. So, a duke of a duchy could also be an earl of a county and also a knight. So, for example, Lionel of Antwerp was the Duke of Clarence, but he was also the Earl of Ulster. And many members of the higher ranks of nobility are also knights; the Prince of Wales has always been also a Knight of the Garter.