VISCOUNT, the name of a dignity which funks fourth in the peerage, immediately above that of baron. It is the most recent English title, having, it is said, its origin in the time of Henry VI., who, in 1440, created by letters patent John, Lord Beaumont, Viscount Beaumont. In Scotland the title of Viscount was first granted by James VI.
Camden observes that, although this is a new title of dignity, yet it is an ancient one of office : viscount, viceromes, the deputy of the count or earl, is the Latin name for the sheriff of a county [Slimires), an office in ancient times held by persons of the highest rank. Whether the title of viscount was suggested by that office it is difficult to say; but Spelman mentions that William the Conqueror made Baldwin hereditary Viscount (riee-comitern) of Devon and Baron of Okehampton; and "he made Unto; or Um Abtot viscount of Worcester, but Roger his son was deprived of the title by Henry I., because lie had killed a
certain servant of the king ; the office, however, was transferred through his sister to the Beaurnonts." Spelman seems in these passages to consider this title as one of dignity before Henry \'I.'s time, and as having been distinct from that of sheriff: in the first instance he joins it to the title of baron and gives it precedence; in the second, lie treats the Bcaumonts, who are usually deemed the first viscounts, as only restored to a title which had been in abeyance or forfeited for three centuries. In the British peerage, in 1861. there were 22 viscounts ; and there were 41 Irish viscounts, of whom 10 held British peerages also, with 5 Scotch viscounts, of whom 3 held British peerages.
(Spelman, tido rice.ecunes, 510rnrn dignitatis ; Camden's Britannia (Gough's), h., cxciv.; 2, 2i99; 4, 24.)