Royalty and nobility in the Golden Empire

There were two types of royalty and nobility in the Golden Empire: preexisting upper castes on worlds incorporated into the Empire's fold, both hereditary and elected, and the royalty and, to a lesser extent, nobility of the Empire as a whole.

Local monarchies
Many worlds in the Golden Empire had monarchical governments, including such titles for leaders as King, Queen, Prince, Lord, and Baron. In general, Rin Sakaros left these preexisting structures intact so long as they were not to the detriment of the world's citizens. The nature of these titles was eclectic based on systemary tradition and defied a single summary, but they carried weight only on their home systems, not through the Empire as a whole, although those with noble titles also sometimes had diplomatic rank that would be recognized on other systems.

All royal houses on individual worlds were effectively mediatized to prevent any local sovereign from being considered equal to the Sovereign of the Empire.

The Royal Family
The Empire itself had a much smaller elite. It was headed by the Sovereign, who alone had the power to grant and revoke royal and noble titles. The Sovereign herself carried the title "Queen"; a theoretical male monarch would have been "King", while an equally hypothetical husband of a reigning Queen would have been "Prince Consort". The Sovereign was the head of the Royal Family.

In practice, Rin Sakaros rarely issued royal titles. For the first half century of the Empire, she created only one Prince of the Golden Empire (her brother Tariun). Upon reconnecting with her family in the known galaxy after 137 ABY, Rin slowly began to expand the Empire's "Royal family". Her Royal Guard used the title for Rin's baby brother, Nagarian, before Rin herself actually granted it in early 142 ABY. When Rin's cousin Andromeda Keane came to live in the Empire, Rin created her as the first Princess of the Golden Empire. This created the precedent that no one, regardless of blood relation to the Sovereign, was automatically considered royalty; the status had to be given. By law, however, the Phoenix Prince, heir apparent to the throne, was to be created a Prince of the Empire if he was not one already. In 151 ABY, Rin revised the rules to clearly differentiate between the Royal Household and more distant family members, creating the rank of Mirza below Prince.

Because all royal status was conferred as a gift from the Sovereign, there was no morganatic marriage among the Empire's royalty. Breek Zagrev was made a Princess upon her marriage to Tariun Sakaros in 145 ABY.

Royal titles of the Empire carried no special authority, but commanded a degree of respect, as all who carried them were considered part of the Sovereign's family, whether or not they were biologically related. Assaulting a member of the Royal family merited an automatic death sentence, and Royal Guards would execute anyone who attacked their charges without any attempt at apprehension.

Royalty in the Empire were allowed to wear silver coronets or circlets; direct blood relatives of the Sovereign (as opposed to more distant relations or those who married into royalty) could wear silver inlaid with gold. Andromeda Keane wore a very simple silver circlet at her cousin Rin's request, but Tariun Sakaros flatly refused to wear his coronet for anything other than state occasions or when ruling as Prince Regent. The act of "crowning" a new royal was performed only by the Sovereign.

Nobility
The rank of Viscount was the Empire's noble title, awarded for "unparalleled contributions to the defense or society of the Golden Empire". All Viscounties were life peerages, but came with estates granted by the Sovereign and certain diplomatic privileges.

Recipients of the various Royal orders received the styles "Sir" and "Lady", but were not considered nobility. Though the Prefect of the Order of Keltrayu was styled "Lord" or "Lady", this was considered an honorific, not a title in itself, and was attached to the office, not the person who held it.