CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · General Reference

Duke of Fife

British dukedom

Cross-disciplinary reference desk with index cards, atlas, dictionary and catalogue
General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 21, 2026
Entity authorityQ1264534 ↗
Source-derived summary

Duke of Fife is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom that has been created twice, in both cases for the Earl of Fife. In 1889, Lord Fife married Princess Louise, the eldest daughter of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) and a granddaughter of Queen Victoria.

History

Alexander Duff (1849–1912) was the eldest son of the 5th Earl Fife (1814–1879). Upon his father's death on 7 August 1879, he succeeded as the 6th Earl Fife. With this, he inherited the titles Baron Braco (created in 1735), Earl Fife and Viscount Macduff (both created in 1759), all in the Peerage of Ireland (and created for Scottish nobleman William Duff, 1696–1763), and Baron Skene in the Peerage of the United Kingdom (created in 1857 for his father The 5th Earl Fife; a title which gave him a seat in the House of Lords). In 1885, Queen Victoria created for Alexander Duff the title Earl of Fife in the Peerage of the United Kingdom.

On Saturday, 27 July 1889, Alexander, 1st Earl of Fife and 6th Earl Fife, married Princess Louise, the third child and eldest daughter of the then-Prince of Wales (the future King Edward VII) and his wife Princess Alexandra, in the Private Chapel at Buckingham Palace. The couple were third cousins in descent from King George III. The wedding marked the second time a descendant of Queen Victoria married a British subject. Two days after the wedding, the Queen elevated Alexander, Lord Fife, to the dignities of Marquess of Macduff, in the County of Banff, and Duke of Fife, both in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. Queen Victoria's Letters Patent of 29 June 1889 creating these titles contained the standard remainder to "heirs male of his body".

Editorial summary

“Duke of Fife” enters the record as british dukedom. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Duke, Fife and British can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1889, 1849, 1912, 1814—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Duke, Fife and British.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Duke of Fife” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Duke, Fife and British provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1264534. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1889, 1849, 1912 and 1814.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Duke of Fife”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Duke of Fife primary sources, Duke of Fife archive and Duke research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Duke of Fife”?
  2. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
  3. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Duke of Fife” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.