Commoner

Commoner is a class term used to describe people who are not of royal blood. It is sometimes mistaken as referring to those not of noble blood, but this is incorrect; Lady Diana Spencer, though the daughter of Earl Spencer, was described as a commoner at the time of her wedding to Charles, Prince of Wales, as was Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon (later Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother) at the time of her marriage to Albert, Duke of York, later King George VI.

The most famous continued usage of the reference is found in the term House of Commons (literally House of Commoners), through ironically its sister chamber, the House of Lords, was also largely made up of commoners, ie, members of the peerage who were not of royal birth. In practice those holding peerages are not called commoners but nobles, ie, those of had been ennobled, that is had been made a peer by the monarch or by birth.

In some British universities (notably Oxford and Cambridge), a commoner is an undergraduate student who does not hold either a scholarship or an exhibition.