Could a vassal also be a noble?

Answer 1

A king chose the highest order of vassals. They were the peers, and they had titles. The peers, who could be dukes, counts or earls, barons, and so forth, chose their own vassals at least part of the time, perhaps their overlords chose for them. In this way, a feudal pyramid was constructed from the highest person in authority to the lowest.

Vassals were required to give allegiance and support to their lords. The lords gave them land in exchange. And this also was operated in the same feudal pyramid.

In theory the king could elevate anyone to any station outside the church, and often inside the church.

Answer 2

Certainly a knight could be -and normally he was- a vassal. Almost all noblemen were vassals, except the two extremes of the social scale of nobility that I will mention later. People in the lower part of the social scale -without nobility- were not vassals but serfs.

Categories as "Seigneur" and "vassal" were not fixed for a particular degree in the social and political scale: they were relatives to other person, so most of the nobility was "seigneur" of somebody below him and vassal to somebody up to him. The Duke was a vassal of the King but he was a "seigneur" of a marquis. And the marquis could be the vassal of a Duke but the "seigneur" of a Count. The only ones who should be exclusively "seigneurs" or exclusively vassals were the two extremes of the social chain of nobility: the King in the upper side (seigneur of seigneurs) and. in the bottom of the chain, those knights who had no vassal below them, being themselves vassals of a "seigneur".

Two things are important to know about this subject: (a) each person can not only have several vassals but also can be linked as vassal to several an different "Seigneurs"; (b) when an order is given from the upside to the downside, no link of such chain of vassalage could be put aside in order to get efficiency. That means that each level is subjected to his direct upper level but not to the level to whom such upper level authority is linked as a vassal. An example -that has happened several times in the Middle Ages- can clear the situation. The King (for example, the King of France) call his Dukes for a war. They should come to fight as vassals and bring their vassals. But it happens that one of such Dukes is also vassal to another king (for example, the Emperor of Germany to which the King of France wants to fight). Then such Duke has the right to say that he can not go to war for none of the two parties. In that situation, the King of France calls the vassals of such Duke to the war. And the Marquis or Counts answer that they have no legal link with the King because they are vassals of the Duke; not of the King. So the King cannot give orders to them to fight because such obligation is derived of the contract of vassalage and they are not vassals of the King.

As you can see, the medieval States are organized in a very different way that are our modern States, respecting a lot of autonomy to each local Seigneur.

In modern times (XVII and XVIII Centuries) the term vassals has chages is meaning and, due to the centralization of the political power in the hands of the King, all the people belonging to a Kingdom was considered as vassals of the king. The present Monarchies avoid the term "vassal" and they use the more light word "subject" ("súbdito", in Spanish), that it is equivalent to the democratic "citizen".

I hope that this explanation could help to answer the question.

TORREBERMEJA

Answer 3

A vassal is a holder of land who owes homage to the king. He may be a Knight, but not necessarily.

Answer 4

yes it can not

Answer 5

He had to kill him first

Answer 6

yes