Page:The Complete Peerage Ed 2 Vol 1.djvu/36

 PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION^) This work is intended as an alphabetical " Synopsis " of the entire Hereditary Peerage, extant, extinct, or dormant, ot England, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, as also of Scotland and Ireland (including such Peerages as have been created for life only by charter or patent), con- taining a short account of each Peer, and stating also (where it can be ascertained) the date and place of birth, baptism, marriage, death and burial, not only of all the Peers themselves, but of their respective wives, together with other particulars, including the name and description of the father and mother of each Peer and Peeress. The succession to the title is shown, and the plan generally adopted is almost the same as in the " Synopsis of the Peerage of England " (a work of infinite labour and merit), edited by that well-known antiquarian genealogist, Sir Nicholas Harris Nicolas, g.c.m.g., in 1825. Of this work (after his death), a new edition, under the name of the " Historic Peerage of England," was issued in 1857, with many very valuable additions, by one who was thoroughly competent for such a work, viz., William Courthope, late (1854-66) Somerset Herald. Both these works, however (besides that upwards of a quarter of a century has now [1887] elapsed since the publication of the latter), take no notice of the Peerage of Scotland or Ireland, and (though most useful, and indeed indispensable, to all genealogists) contain, even as to the English Peers, a somewhat meagre (though generally accurate) account ; while no notice whatever is taken of their alliances. This work includes such eldest sons or grandsons of Dukes, Mar- quesses, or Earls, who, having been styled by a courtesy title as heirs apparent to such Peerages, have died in the lifetime of their respective fathers or grandfathers. Of these the account is placed immediately after the notice of such their ancestors. With respect to Baronies by tenure (of which a fuller and more (') The Preface to volume i of the first edition is here reprinted with the additions made by G.E.C. in later volumes.