Ellis Wasson offers one of the first comprehensive studies of the European ruling class during the 19th and 20th centuries. Distilling a wealth of recent resear

The Times (UK) book of the year! Meritocracy: the idea that people should be advanced according to their talents rather than their birth. While this initially s

This stunning book presents the intriguing stories and celebrated histories of some of the leading families of Great Britain and Ireland and the opulent residen

Doyle describes how the French revolutionaries tried to abolish the nobility, analysing the intellectual roots of hostility to nobles, the steps by which revolu

He reconstructs the extraordinary financial history of the dukes of Devonshire, narrates the story of the Cozens-Hardys, a Norfolk family who played a remarkabl