<P> Chinese sovereignty and peerage, the nobility of China, was an important feature of the traditional social and political organization of Imperial China . </P> <P> While the concepts of hereditary sovereign and peerage titles and noble families were featured as early as the semi-mythical, early historical period, a settled system of nobility was established from the Zhou dynasty . In the subsequent millennia, this system was largely maintained in form, with some changes and additions, although the content constantly evolved . The last, well - developed system of noble titles was established under the Qing dynasty . The AD - 1911 republican Xinhai Revolution saw the dissolution of the official imperial system although the new Republic of China government maintained noble titles like the Duke Yansheng . Though some noble families maintained their titles and dignity for a time, new political and economic circumstances forced their decline . Today, the nobility as a class is almost entirely dissipated in China, and only a very few maintain any pretense or claim to noble titles, which are almost universally unrecognized . Elevation and degradation of rank might occur posthumously, and posthumous elevation was sometimes a consideration; Guan Yu, was styled, during his lifetime, Marquis of Han Shou (漢 壽 亭 侯) in the Han dynasty then posthumously in the later Song dynasty elevated to Duke Zhonghui (忠 惠 公) then in the Yuan dynasty Prince of Xianling Yiyong Wu'an Yingji (顯靈 義勇 武安 英 濟 王) then in the Ming dynasty both beatified and royalized as Saintly Emperor Guan the Great God Who Subdues Demons of the Three Worlds and Whose Awe Spreads Far and Moves Heaven (三界 伏 魔 大 神威 遠 震 天尊 關 聖帝 君) and in popular culture deified as a God of Prosperity, Commerce, War, and Police . </P> <P> The apex of the nobility is the sovereign . The title of the sovereign has changed over time, together with the connotations of the respective titles . In Chinese history are generally 3 levels of supreme and fully independent sovereignty or high, significantly autonomous sovereignty above the next lower category of ranks, the aristocracy who usually recognized the overlordship of a higher sovereign or ruled a semi-independent, tributary, or independent realm of self - recognized insufficient importance in size, power, or influence to claim a sovereign title, such as a Duchy which in Western terms would be called a Duchy, Principality, or some level of Chiefdom . </P> <P> The broadest sovereign is what gets translated as the single term emperor in English . An emperor might appoint or confirm or tolerate subsovereigns or tributary rulers styled kings . </P>

Who was considered the head of the house in ancient china