DUKE, James Buchanan, American to bacco manufacturer: b. on farm near Durham, N. C., 1857. He was educated in the country schools; entered the tobacco business with his father and brothers at Durham under the firm name of Duke Brothers and Company. In 1884 he went to New York and in 1M organ ized the American Tobacco Company of which he was president until 1912. He is president of the Continental Tobacco Company and the Consolidated Tobacco Company and since 1912 chairman of the board of directors of the British-American Tobacco Company. He is a director of the Imperial Tobacco Company and of many other corporations.
DUKE (in French duc, in Spanish duque, in Italian duca, in Venetian doge, all derived from the Latin dux, leader, commander), a title belonging originally to a military leader. It seems to have come into use when Constantine separated the military and civil commands of the provinces; the title dux was then applied to the military governor of a province, and the ducal rank was made inferior to that of the conies (count). The Goths, Franks and other northern tribes who invaded the vast Roman territories, adopted, if they had not before borrowed, the titles of duke and count. Among those warlike peoples, however, the dukes as military chiefs soon acquired a marked pre eminence over the counts, whose functions in the eastern and western empires were more of a civil and jealous nature. Under Charlemagne, who was Jealous of the increasing power of the higher nobility, the dignity was suffered to cease, but under his weaker successors the ducal governors of the provinces attained an almost absolute independence. The concession of hereditary power and independent jurisdiction, first to the central province known as the Isle de France, and then to Aquitaine, extended itself under the Carlovingians to Burgundy, Normandy and Gascony, and on the accession of Hugh Capet to all the other subaltern ten ures. It was not long until the dukes, feeling secure in the unlimited governing power, of their provinces, proclaimed their title to be as good as that of the • They coined money, assumed the crown a, sceptre, gave law to their subjects, made war even against the king and reduced the royal jurisdiction to a few towns such as Rheims and Laon. From the time of Philip II (Philippe Auguste) to that of Louis XI, however, these duchies were grad ually reunited to the crown, and those subse quently accorded to the members of the royal family enjoyed none of the privileges of in dependent sovereignty. Prior to the Revolu tion dukes were created by letters patent of the king, and were of three kinds; those desig nated as dukes and peers held the first rank and had a seat in Parliament. The dignity of
the second class descended to their male chil dren, but that of the dukes by brevet ceased with themselves. The rank of duke in the royal family of France was superior to that of prince, and sometimes inferior to that of count. The ducal along with all other titles of nobility was abolished at the Revolution, but was restored by Napoleon in 1806.
In Germany the dukedom passed through phases similar to that exhibited in France. In 847 the Emperor Louis appointed a duke (Her zog) of Thuringia to protect the frontiers against the Wendes, or Vandals, a Slavonic tribe. The power of the dukes gradually in creased, their dignity became hereditary and they soon became powerful members of the Holy Roman Empire. An archbishop of Cologne, Bruno, was the first who bore (in 959) the title of archduke (Erzherzog), which since the time of the Emperor Frederick III (1453) has been given exclusively to the princes of the house of Austria. All the Austrian princes are arch dukes, as distinguishing title of the imperial family.
In Great Britain the title of duke ranks as a title of honor or nobility next below that of a prince or princess of the royal blood and that of archbishop of the Church of England. The first hereditary duke in England was the Black Prince, created by his father, Edward III in 1336. The duchy of Cornwall was bestowed upon him, and was thenceforward attached to the eldest son of the king, who is considered a duke by birth. The duchy of Lancaster was soon after conferred on his third son, John of Gaunt, and hence arose the special privileges which these two duchies still in part letain. Richard II was the first sovereign to make creations apart from princes of the royal Henry VIII and Edward VI made creations; but through attainders and failure of issue by the reign of Elizabeth in 1572 the ducal order became extinct, and was not revived till the creation of Villiers, Duke of Buck ingham, and Ludovic Stuart, Duke of Rich mond, by James I. Charles Ii hesiowed dukedoms on six of his illegitimate children those of Monmouth, Grafton, Northumberland, Southampton, Richmond and Saint Albans. By William, Anne and George I lower dignities were advanced to the rank of duke— of the 26 dukes of the British peerage exclusive of those of royal blood, only two, those of Nor folk and Somerset, were created prior to the Civil War. The coronet of a British duke consists of eight strawberry leaves of a con ventional type on a rim of gold. In the Bible the word dukes is used, Gen. xxxvi, 15, for the duces, of the Vulgate.