<Tr> <Td> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> </Td> </Tr> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> <P> Landed gentry or gentry is a largely historical British social class consisting in theory of landowners who could live entirely from rental income, or at least had a country estate . It was distinct from, and socially "below", the aristocracy or peerage, although in fact some of the landed gentry were wealthier than some peers, and many gentry were related to peers . They often worked as administrators of their own lands, while others became public, political, religious, and armed forces figures . The decline of this privileged class largely stemmed from the 1870s agricultural depression; however, there are still a large number of hereditary gentry in the UK to this day, many of whom transferred their landlord style management skills after the agricultural depression into the business of land agency, the act of buying and selling land . </P> <P> The designation "landed gentry" originally referred exclusively to members of the upper class who were landlords and also commoners in the British sense--that is, they did not hold peerages--but usage became more fluid over time . Similar or analogous social systems of landed gentry also sprang up in countries that maintained a colonial system; the term is employed in many British colonies such as the Colony of Virginia and some parts of India . By the late 19th century, the term was also applied to peers such as the Duke of Westminster who lived on landed estates . The book series Burke's Landed Gentry recorded the members of this class . Successful burghers often used their accumulated wealth to buy country estates, with the aim of establishing themselves as landed gentry . </P>

Traditionally a person of low status who worked on the land