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The Website of Dynasties and Nobility out of Europe

How is the information presented?
For most of the dynasties, you will find the following information:

Brief story of the country or sub-country
Sources
Dynasty
Religion
Qualifications and titles
* Head of the Family,
* Heir,
* Other members of the Family
Laws and decrees (including Family House Rules) governing the qualifications and titles
Succession
Orders and decorations
Glossary
Head of the Family
Children
Brothers and sisters
Other members of the Family
Predecessors

Orthograph:
The language used is English: surnames and first names recorded in French, Italian, Spanish, etc. in official records however are mentioned as such.

Difficulties may arise for names translated from languages using different alphabets such as Arabic and Chinese: is the correct name Abdulaziz, Abdul Aziz or Abd al Aziz ?

We have adopted as much as possible the most recent orthograph used by the family and rejected any standardization of the spelling of surnames and first names.

Contents:
All the information is derived from sources mentioned in each section or from information contributed by our Committee Members and by numerous visitors of our website.

The following rules have been adopted:
- grass letters have been used for the given name and surname of all living dynasts, and in the Predecessors section, for the main name of the ruler;
- no address has been provided for privacy or security reasons, except for the palaces of ruling dynasties: when found, the cities and countries of individual entries have been indicated;
- if an individual is indicated without being married while father or mother of children, it does not mean that the children are illegitimate, it means that the name of the mother of of the father is not available: same observation for missing death dates, education references, etc.

Titles and Style:
Styles are today very much in use: most of the government ministers of the 190+ countries of the world are qualified HE (His Excellency).

For members of the dynasties, the Editor follows closely the Almanach de Gotha, as the reference of all these modern styles.

The translation of titles faces the following difficulties:

- heredity may be a different concept from today's hereditary rules in Western countries: how is it possible to translate precisely a Manchu Fng ng Chiang Chun (the 12th degree of declining nobility in the Chinese Imperial Family) ?

- an Arab Emir, if hereditary, is translated as a Prince. An Arab Shaikh is not translated.

- colonial powers did not want to translate titles at their present value: for the British Empire, a Maharajadhiraj was not a King of Kings, a Maharaja was not a Great King and a Raja was not a King. The King of Lesotho was a Paramount Chief: when gaining full independance, the Maharajas of Bhutan, of Nepal and of Sikkim became Kings. Lesotho and Swaziland became Kingdoms.

- polygamy also brings different problems. There are 5,000 members of the Saudi Royal Family: are they all entitled to the qualification of Royal Highness and to the title of Prince(ss) ?

As one distinguished member of an African royal family stated, "half the country's people are royals".

All the original titles, when not translated, are in italic letters.

The Editor did not want to align the names to the Western custom of adding a first name to a family name.

Names are therefore rendered according to public registrations and/or to national custom: for example, a member of the Chinese imperial family did not need to bear his family name (Aisin Gioro or, in Pinyin, Aixinzhueluo) before the Communist revolution.

Family names sometime precede the first names (for example, HRH P^ce Norodom Sirivudh).

Name handles (such as de, al, ibn, bin...) are rendered in small letters, except in Arabic surname equivalents (for example, Al Saud): dashes and apostrophes have been often eliminated.

African tribe and clan names: when a tribe or a clan did not settle in a place that was named after the tribe of the clan, the tribe or clan name has been kept in its plural form (for example, the Bakalaka in Botswana). For large ethnic states, the African name of the state has been preferred (for example, Buganda).