VISCOUNT, the title of the fourth rank of the European nobility. In the British peerage it intervenes between the dignities of earl and baron. The title is now purely one of honour, having long been dissociated from any special office or functions.
In the Carolingian epoch the or missi comitis, were the deputies or vicars of the counts, whose official powers they exercised by delegation, and from these the viscounts of the feudal period were undoubtedly derived. Soon after the counts became hereditary the same happened in the case of their lieu tenants; e.g., in Narbonne, Nimes and Alby the viscounts had, according to A. Molinier, acquired hereditary rights as early as the beginning of the roth century. Viscountcies thus developed into actual fiefs. Viscounts, however, continued for some time to have no more than the status of lieutenants, either calling themselves simply vice-comites, or adding to this title the name of the count ship from which they derived their powers. It was not till the i 2th century that the universal tendency to territorialize the feudal dominions affected the viscountcies with the rest, and that the viscounts began to take the name of the most important of their domains. Thus the viscounts of Poitiers called themselves vis counts of Thouars, and those of Toulouse viscounts of Bruniquel and Montelar. From this time the significance of the title was extremely various. Some viscounts, notably in the duchy of Aquitaine and the county of Toulouse, of which the size made an effective centralized Government impossible, were great barons, whose authority extended over whole provinces, and who dis puted for power with counts and dukes. Elsewhere, on the other hand, e.g., in the Ile de France, Champagne, and a great part of Burgundy, the vicomtes continued to be half feudatories, half officials of the counts, with the same functions and rank in the feudal hierarchy as the chatelains ; their powers were jealously limited and, with the organization of the system of prevots and baillis in the 12th century, practically disappeared. In the royal
domains especially, these petty feudatories could not maintain themselves against the growing power of the Crown, and they were early assimilated to the prevots.
In Normandy vicomtes appeared at a very early date as deputies of the counts (afterwards dukes) of the Normans. When local Norman counts began in the I 1 th century, some of them had vicomtes under them, but the normal vicomte was still a deputy of the duke, and Henry I. largely replaced the hereditary holders of the vicomtes by officials. "By the time of the Conqueror the judicial functions of the viscount were fully recognized, and ex tended over the greater part of Normandy." Eventually almost the whole of Normandy was divided into administrative vis countcies or bailiwicks by the end of the i2th century. When the Normans conquered England, they applied the term viscounts or vicecomes to the sheriffs of the English system, whose office, how ever, was quite distinct and was hardly affected by the Conquest.
Nearly four centuries later "viscount" was introduced as a peerage style into England, when its king was once more lord of Normandy. John, Lord Beaumont, K.G., who had been created count of Boulogne in 1436, was made Viscount Beaumont, Feb. 12, 144o, and granted precedence over all barons, which was doubtless the reason for his creation. The oldest viscountcy now on the roll is that of Hereford, created in 155o; but the Irish viscountcy of Gormanston is as old as 1478. See FORMS OF ADDRESS.