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ANYONE with ambition to to join the aristocracy could get their chance because a family will auction off the lordships of two manors, near Chipping Campden, which it has owned since the 17th century.

The new lords and ladies of the manor will be able to use the titles on their passports, cheque books and credit cards and will be eligible for membership of the Manorial Society of Great Britain.

Memorial Auctioneers will auction the Lordships of Broad Campden and Berrington at Stationers' Hall, Ave Maria Lane, London on Tuesday, May 20 at 2pm.

Expected to fetch between £5,000 and £6,000 each, they will be auctioned on behalf of the Earl of Gainsborough who is descended from the Hicks family, the Viscounts Campden, who acquired them in the 17th century with the Lordship of Chipping Campden, which was sold last November.

They were included under Chipping Campden, in the Domesday Book, in 1086.

Overlord at the time was Hugh Lupus who was the Norman Earl of Chester, a title now held by the Prince of Wales.

The Ludloes, Molyneux and the Earls of Gloucester were among several families who held them, together with Tewkesbury Abbey, at different times in the Middle Ages.

They were joined with Campden early in the 17th century by rich silk merchant and money lender, Sir Baptist Hicks, who became Baron Hicks of Ilmington and Viscount Campden in 1628 after giving kings James I and Charles I £33,000-worth of loans.

7:50am Thursday 15th May 2008

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