The Reform Act 1832 did its work; the middle classes came into their own, and the word gentleman came in common use to signify not a distinction of blood, but a distinction of position, education and manners.

citation needed] Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind states "You're no gentleman" on occasions when a lack of manners and respect toward her causes her to feel insulted.

Sir George Sitwell, however, has suggested that this opinion is based on a wrong conception of the conditions of medieval society and that it is wholly opposed to the documentary evidence. Structured like a multipart TV series, “A Gentleman of France” serves up thrilling cliffhanger after cliffhanger. He attended King Edward VI Grammar School, Shrewsbury School (after age 16) and obtained a second class degree in Modern History at Christ Church, Oxford in 1877.

The House of the Wolf was serialized in the English Illustrated Magazine in 1888/89 and was published in 1890 after Weyman contacted literary agent, A.Portrait of Marie de Medicis (1573-1642), queen of France, in a widow's habit, surrounded by a lady of the court and a gentleman, circa 1620. If there are any inconsistencies or peculiarities in the configuration, we will immediately contact you. The Nobility of the British Gentry or the Political Ranks and Dignities of the British Empire Compared with those on the Continent (2nd ed. Similar use (notably between quotation marks or in an appropriate tone) may also be deliberate irony.

These men, under the old system, had no definite status; but they were generosi, men of birth, and, being now forced to describe themselves, they disdained to be classed with franklins (now sinking in the social scale), still more with yeomen or husbandmen; they chose, therefore, to be described as "gentlemen".

Selden said "that no Charter can make a Gentleman, which is cited as out of the mouth of some great Princes [who] have said it," because "they, without question, understood Gentleman for Generosus in the antient sense, or as if it came from Genii/[Geni] in that sense. Oh, the stiff upper lip of the man - Gaston de Marsac is really a Victorian English Gentleman, in spite of the historical and geographical setting. Even as late as 1400, the word gentleman still only had the descriptive sense of generosus and could not be used as denoting the title of a class.