4 min read · Feb 28, 2013
The Downton Abbey TV series begins with a predicament for the Earl of Grantham. Lord Robert has no sons, and an “entail” keeps any of his daughters from inheriting his great estate and mansion: Downton Abbey. Robert’s heir is Matthew Crawley, a distant cousin. Matthew will someday inherit both the earl’s title and his real estate, thanks to the entail. What is this “entail”?
The Downton story begins in 1912, but the family’s problem comes from centuries earlier. During the High Middle Ages, most European monarchies and noble families operated under the primogeniture system, where the eldest son inherits the title, even if he has an older sister. In some versions of primogeniture, a daughter only inherits if she has no brothers. In others, girls can’t inherit at all. And in one version (the Salic Law), not even a daughter’s sons or grandsons can inherit. The title has to pass to and through men. (Another primogeniture wrinkle: everyone in the line of descent must be legitimate — with married parents. No bastards!)
France’s King Charles IV, for example, died in 1328, leaving only daughters. French primogeniture denied them the throne. The king’s closest male relative was his sister’s son, Edward. But nephew Edward was disqualified too, since his descent ran through his mother: a woman. So the throne went to the king’s cousin, the son of his father’s younger brother, who became King Philip VI. (Actually, the French nobility hastily adopted the rule against men claiming through their mothers, to make sure the king’s nephew couldn’t inherit — because he happened to be King Edward III of England. Edward didn’t agree, and the result was the Hundred Years’ War.)
In Downton Abbey, a strict male-only version of primogeniture keeps Robert from leaving the earldom to one of his daughters. If Robert had a younger brother, he’d be next in line, and his sons would follow. But no such luck. Who then? Somewhere back in history, a long-dead earl — Robert’s ancestor — had a younger son who did not inherit the title. If that younger son has a living descendant through an all-male line, he becomes the earl after Robert. That’s Matthew Crawley.
But what about Robert’s real estate, as opposed to his title? What about Downton Abbey and the surrounding farmland? That’s where the entail comes in. An entail (a.k.a. “fee tail”) is basically a will that sets up a primogeniture system for real estate. A lord or other landholder leaves his house and land to his son “and the male heirs of his body.” It ensures that a single male descendant gets all the family’s real estate. Where the family has a noble title, the entail follows the title, so the same man gets the real estate and the lordship. Robert’s family has an entail, so Matthew gets the earldom, the farmland, and Downton Abbey.
[Spoiler Alert: This paragraph reveals details of Downton Abbey Season 3, through the last episode.] What if there’s no one left with the necessary all-male descent? If we’re talking about a kingdom, the parliament or nobles will pick someone — they’ll bend the rules — because you’ve got to have a king or queen. A noble title, on the other hand, will often die out without an heir. At the end of Downton Abbey Season 3, Matthew dies, and if he’d left no son, the Earldom of Grantham could go extinct. We don’t know if the Downton family has some more distant male-descended cousin. Happily, the family faces no such trouble. Matthew married Robert’s eldest daughter, Mary, and fathered a son. The baby is the heir.
Unlike titles, real estate never dies. So in most cases the entail will just end if there is no male-descended heir, and the owner can decide who inherits his land and house.
Great Britain outlawed the entail in 1925. But that only applies to real estate. The law still allows male-only primogeniture for aristocratic titles. Royal primogeniture, on the other hand, became gender-neutral in 2015. In other words, the monarch’s eldest child inherits the British throne, even if female: a newfangled system often called “absolute primogeniture.”
By the way, Downton’s creator, Julian Fellowes, is married to the niece of an English earl. If not for primogeniture, his wife would have inherited the title when the old earl died childless in 2011. Instead, the title died because there was no male-descended heir. So Fellowes is intimately familiar with primogeniture — and he’s argued for applying the gender-neutral version to the British aristocracy.
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If you enjoy interesting blends of history and fiction, you’ll love my multiple award-winner, The Jericho River: A Novel About the History of Western Civilization.
Image Sources & Credits:
- Highclere Castle (April 2011), by Richard Munckton from Windsor, Melbourne, Australia — provided through Wikimedia Commons
- King Edward III of England in robes of the Order of the Garter, drawn 1430–1440
© 2013, 2016 by David W. Tollen
