When should we capitalise ranks and titles?

Do we write the king or the King, professor or Professor, detective inspector or Detective Inspector? 

When I copy-edit books, Capital Letters jump out at me as if they’re bold and underlined. Straightaway, I ask, ​Is the capitalisation essential here? Often in the case of ranks and titles, the answer is, No.

Spotting unnecessary capitals

Take a look at the following passage:

Captain Henglebing threw down his sword. The Soldier must be mistaken! The Lieutenant had said that the King was dead, and his Queen with him; that one of the Night Watchmen – that idiot Sergeant Bongalong – had caved in their skulls with a battleaxe stolen from Lord Lunderwig. The Captain sank to his knees in horror. That blasted Sergeant. And that stupid Lord for having a battleaxe on his person in the first place in the middle of King Rupert’s birthday ball. Now the King and Queen were dead. Dead! And he would never have his wicked way with the Queen, which was a shame, because he was rather tiring of Princess Gertrude. The Princess was pretty, right enough, but that wart on the end of her nose was rather off-putting…​

Setting aside for a moment the dubious quality of the tale itself, consider the capitalisation in the passage. We have:

• Captain (x 2)
• Soldier
• Lieutenant
• King (x 3)
• Queen (x 3)
• Night Watchmen
• Sergeant (x 2)
• Lord (x 2)
• Princess (x 2)

… all crammed into one 130-word paragraph. That’s a lot of words with initial caps. Imagine a whole book styled in this way; it would be a pretty laborious read.

Now take a look at this version:

Captain Henglebing threw down his sword. The soldier must be mistaken! The lieutenant had said that the king was dead, and his queen with him; that one of the night watchmen – that idiot Sergeant Bongalong – had caved in their skulls with a battleaxe stolen from Lord Lunderwig. The captain sank to his knees in horror. That blasted sergeant. And that stupid lord for having a battleaxe on his person in the first place in the middle of King Rupert’s birthday ball. Now the king and queen were dead. Dead! And he would never have his wicked way with the queen, which was a shame, because he was rather tiring of Princess Gertrude. The princess was pretty, right enough, but that wart on the end of her nose was rather off-putting…

The passage is exactly the same, but with those words that don’t need to be capitalised taken down to lower case. Do you see the difference? It’s an easier, smoother read.

The simple rule for capitalisation

Capitalisation is, to a certain degree, a style choice. But most editors opt for this style rule:

Captitalise a title or rank only when it’s used before a name, as a name or in a form of address.

So, for example, we have:

• Prime Minister Keir Starmer made a speech. But: The prime minister, Keir Starmer, made a speech.
• Professor Lewis looked out of the window. But: The professor looked out of the window.
• Captain Clarke gave the order. But: The captain gave the order.
• ‘Stop, General!’ But: She told the general to stop.

Once you get the hang of it, it's a pretty simple rule to apply. But of course, this being the English language, ​there can be...

... exceptions to the rule

Perhaps the idea of not capitalising a particular rank or title just doesn't sit right with you. Perhaps referring to Charles III as the king, for example, seems... well, disrespectful.

In that case, go ahead and break the rule! If you're writing about an important figure, you can choose to capitalise their rank or title in all references as a mark of respect. The BBC News style guide, for example, capitalises the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Pope and the King (with reference to our current monarch), and the Oxford University style guide capitalises university job titles, as does the Cambridge University style guide. The British government style guide capitalises specific governmental job titles (but minimises the use of capitalisation in general).​​

A final thought

​Ultimately, whatever capitalisation style you apply for ranks and titles, what matters most is consistency. If Charles is the king on page one, then we expect him to remain the king (not the King) throughout the book, and we expect Camilla to be the queen (not the Queen) to match with this style.

And if in doubt... step away from the Caps Lock / Shift keys.

​With my best wishes,