Game Name, Titles, Etc.

[TinCow]

We're definitely playing ERE, and I want to get this game started in a week and a half, so I'd like to figure out what the proper names for everything should be. We need to get good names/titles for the following things:

1) Name of the Game!
2) FACTION HEIR
3) FACTION LEADER
4) GOVERNING BODY
5) CHANCELLOR
6) All Feudal Titles: Knight, Baronet (just in case we return to the linear system), Baron, Viscount, Count, Marquess, Duke, Grand Duke

Please offer suggestions for all of these.

[Privateerkev]

Name of game = Emperor of the Romans

Short, to the point, keeps with our Roman theme.

[OverKnight]

Byzantine Intrigues: The Empire Strikes Back

As for titles of the nobles, some of the ERE titles are quite. . .elaborate, particularly in the late period.

FL = Basileus, Emperor or Autokrator
FH = Caesar or Kaisar, depending if we adopt Latin or Greek transliterations.
Grand Duke = Exarch?
Duke = Dux?
Baron = Praetor?
Knight = Strategos?

I'll dig around wikipedia and John Julius Norwich's history of the Empire later on to see if I can get others.

Here's a start, some titles to think about.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_title

[AussieGiant]

Strap into that!!

Court titles
Αύγουστος (Avgustos, Augustus),
Καίσαρ (Kesar, Caesar),
πρίγκιψ (Prinkips, princeps, Prince),
κόμης (Komis, comes, 'Count' (certain type of officer)),
μάγιστρος (magistros, magister),
κοιαίστωρ (kyestor, quaestor),
σιλεντιάριος, (silentiarios, silentiarius, a certain type of court officer),
παλάτιον (palation, palatium, palace),
κουροπαλάτης (kuropalatis, from curator + palatium),
ακτουάριος (aktuarios, actuarius, a court physician)[1],
καγκελλάριος (kankellarios, cancellarius, chancellor),
σακελλάριος (sakellarios, saccellarius, treasurer),
τιτουλάριος (titularios, titularius, title-bearer),
οφφικιάλος (offikialos, officialis, an official).

I'd recommend:

FL = Augustus or Caesar
FH = Princeps
Chancellor = Cancellarius
Grand Duke = Exarch
Duke = Dux
Marquess = Magister
Count = Comes
Baron = Quaestor
Knight = Silentiarius

[Ramses II CP]

(Stealing shamelessly from AG's list without regard to their original meaning)

Knight - kyestor (Questor seems the closest to a Knight errant to me)
Baronet - kuropalatis (Curator, a for the lowest land owning title)
Baron - offikialos ('Office holder' for the second lowest landed rank)
Viscount - titularios (Title bearer, one of the first ranks of consequence)
Count - Komis (It evidently means Count, simple)
Marquess - magistros (They both start with an M?)
Duke - Dux (Reconsidered to rip off AG's edit)
Grand Duke - Strategos (Ditto)

Chancellor - kankellarios (It means chancellor)
Prince - Prinkips (It means Prince)
I'd prefer to call the Emperor, Emperor. Simplicity for simplicity's sake.

Some of these I chose because they seem slightly insulting (Curator and Office Holder) to me, which is appropriate for the bottom ranks. Others I chose because because it will be simple to keep their counterpart in mind, and so the ranks won't be confusing.

Anyway, debate, discuss, discard, etc.

[AussieGiant]

My other thoughts would be to use Strategos for Grand Duke.

It was the highest non-royal rank you could get...and seems suitably impressive.

Augustus or Caesar has to be the FL or nothing...they are a lock as one of the top royal positions in most reference material I have available...

Please note I'm NOT using Wikipedia as my first reference on any of this!!

Another question is the spelling...do we use the Latin based version or the converted English letters?

i.e. Kyestor or Quaestor; Avgustos or Augustus etc etc.

[Ferret]

tbh I'd prefer to keep the titles in English otherwise I'm going to get really confused as to who is what rank and probably end up using English anyway.

Game name: Rebirth of the Romans

[Zim]

No new names/titles to add, just wanted to say I rather like the idea of using Basileus for the emperor (or just using them both interchangably).

[_Tristan_]

I think simplicity should prevail over verisimilitude...

I simply won't stand trying to write Megas Logosthetes everytime I want to adress the Chancellor...

Something like Magister would do the trick for me...

FlyDude' s point should also help in creating a fitting hierarchy...

As for the name of the game, I must shamefully grant that I like the Star Wars theme but I would prefer if we remain in the trend set so far in the previous games...

WotS
KotR

perhaps something like RoER (Rise of Eastern Rome)

[Ignoramus]

How about using the nickname most historians give to Justinian, "Last of the Romans"? I know that there' nothing essentially "Roman" about the empire now, but they all thought of and called themselves Romans, and to be honest they had a legitimate right to do so.

As for the titles, I agree with AG's list.

[pevergreen]

Vote: Last of the Romans.


im still here

[TinCow]

I'm also a fan of Last of the Romans, which also happens to have the same acronym (LotR) as Lord of the Rings, for you fanboys.

For titles, I suggest we adopt a dual system of real Byzantine titles as well as the current generic English (language, not nobility) titles. That way people who want to roleplay properly can refer to them by their 'real' titles and people who are confused by that or who care less about roleplaying can just use the generic titles and be clearly understood.

Position - Real Title (Generic Title)

Faction Leader - Basileus (Emperor)
Faction Heir - Caesar (Prince)
Governing Body - Senate
Chancellor - Megas Logothetes (Megas)
Knight - ? (Sir)
Baronet - ? (Baronet)
Baron - ? (Baron)
Viscount - ? (Viscount)
Count - Patrikios (Count)
Marquess - Anthypatos (Marquess)
Duke - Magistros (Duke)
Grand Duke - Exarch (Grand Duke)

I'm missing titles for the mid and low ranks. The ones for the high ranks are (according to wikipedia) titles given to very few people in the Byzantine Court, so I think they fit the bill. If we're looking for some historical accuracy, we should pick titles that generally correspond to their rarity, not the level of power held by that person. Strategos should not be a formal title, it should be something we can call people who lead armies. In KOTR we often referred to people as 'General' and in the next game (LotR?) we can just use Strategos as this substitute.

[_Tristan_]

Nice acronym, this LoTR...

Who gets to be Sauron ? I volunteer for Gandalf...

Shouldn't Basileus rather be Basileos to reflect the greek origin (like the other titles...) ?