INTRODUCTION.

v

Selden remarks, that “ The name of Knight (which is mostcommonly with us restrained to an honorary title), together withMiles and Chivaler, being but the same with Eques, have beenand are, as all or most of other words that make the titles ofhonour, of divers significations. Knight, or Cniht, or Cnyht(as it was written in the Saxon), signified as, puer, servus, oran attendant. 1 ”

Lord Chief Justice Coke also states, that “ Chevalier, i. e.Eques, Knight, is a Saxon word, and by them written Cnite.Chevalier taketh his name from the horse, because they alwaysserved in wars on horseback. The Latins called them Equites,the Spaniards Cavalleroes, the Frenchmen Chevaliers, the Ita-lians Cavallieri, and the Germans Reiters, all from the horse .” 2“ The degree of Knighthood is of so great splendour andfame,” says a writer quoted by Ashmole , 3 “ that it bestowsgentility, not only upon a man meanly born, but also upon hisdescendants, and very much increaseth the honour of thosewho are well descendedand he adds, that “ it is a maximlaid down by a learned Civilian , 4 that Knighthood ennobles,inasmuch that whosoever is a Knight, it necessarily followsthat he is also a gentleman; for where a King gives thedignity to an ignoble person, whose merit he would therebyrecompense, he is understood to have conferred whatsoever isrequisite for the completing of that which he bestows . 5 By theCommon Law, if a villain were made a Knight, he was thereby

1 Titles of Honour, ed. 1672, p. 636. 2 First Institute, 74 b .

3 P. 43, namely, “ Flandria illustrata,” by Anthony Sanders, 2 vols. folio, 1631.

4 Andreas Tiraquel (de Nobilitate et jure Primigenitorum, fol. 1573, vol. I. c. vm. p. 60),

“ Militia nobilitat, ut quisquis est Miles, is quoque continuo sit nobilis.”

5 Florentin de Therriat, de la Noblesse Civile, p. 188.