Peerage of Scotland

The Peerage of Scotland (Scottish Gaelic: Moraireachd na h-Alba; Scots: Peerage o Scotland) is one of the five divisions of peerages in the United Kingdom and for those peers created by the King of Scotland before 1707. Following that year's Treaty of Union, the Kingdom of Scotland and the Kingdom of England were combined under the name of Great Britain, and a new Peerage of Great Britain was introduced in which subsequent titles were created.

As of November 2025, there are 74 peers of Scotland: 8 dukes (including one royal duke: the Duke of Rothesay), 4 marquesses, 39 earls, 3 viscounts and 20 lords of Parliament (counting peers known by a higher-ranking title in one of the other peerages).

Scottish peers were entitled to sit in the ancient Parliament of Scotland. After the Union, the peers of the old Parliament of Scotland elected 16 Scottish representative peers to sit in the House of Lords at Westminster. The Peerage Act 1963 granted all Scottish peers the right to sit in the House of Lords. However, thirty six years later, this automatic right was revoked, as for all hereditary peerages (except those of the incumbent Earl Marshal and Lord Great Chamberlain), when the House of Lords Act 1999 received royal assent.

Unlike English and Welsh peerages, many Scottish titles have been granted with remainder to pass via female offspring (thus an Italian family has succeeded to and presently holds the earldom of Newburgh^[1]), and in the case of daughters only, these titles devolve to the eldest daughter rather than falling into abeyance (as is the case with ancient English baronies by writ of summons). Unlike other British peerage titles, Scots law permits peerages to be inherited by or through a person who was not legitimate at birth, but was subsequently legitimised by their parents marrying later.^[2][3]

The ranks of the Scottish peerage are, in ascending order: Lord of Parliament, Viscount, Earl, Marquess and Duke. Scottish viscounts differ from those of the other divisions of peerage (of England, Great Britain, Ireland and the United Kingdom) by using the style of in their title, as in Viscount of Oxfuird. Though this is the theoretical form, most viscounts drop the "of". The Viscount of Arbuthnott and to a lesser extent the Viscount of Oxfuird still use "of".

The Scottish peerage differs from those of England and Ireland in that its lowest rank is not that of baron. In Scotland, "baron" is a rank within the Baronage of Scotland, considered noble but not a peer, equivalent to a baron in some continental countries. The Scottish equivalent to the English or Irish baron is a lord of Parliament. Barons in Scotland were historically feudal barons until 2004, when a change in Scottish law abolished the feudal system.^[4] This reform "expressly preserves the dignity of baron... and any other dignity or office, whether or not of feudal origin," converting feudal titles into non-territorial dignities - personal titles no longer attached to the land, including the quality, precedence, and heraldic rights pertaining.