If you’ve ever fancied calling yourself a ‘Lord’ then today could be your lucky day providing you can spare £5,000.

The Lordship of Newton-by-Chester is up for sale by London-based Manorial Auctioneers Ltd.

Company owner Robert Smith, who takes a commission on such sales, said: “It allows people to call themselves Lord of somewhere. Everybody loves a Lord, well most people do.”

Unlike the Labour peer, Lord Lyndon Harrison of Chester, who happens to live in Newton, the titleholder is not allowed to take their seat in the second chamber.

Mr Smith stressed: “You can’t go to the House of Lords!”

The holder of the title of Lordship of Newton-by-Chester is not allowed to take their seat in the second chamber. (Photo by Oli Scarff/Getty Images)

However, the Manorial Society of Great Britain does organise Champagne receptions for members at prestigious locations, with an event taking place at the House of Lords on June 27 at £120 per head event.

Manorial Auctioneers is selling Lordships of the Manor as well as Baronies in Scotland and Ireland and a Seignory in Guernsey.

Mr Smith is not at liberty to identify the current owner of the title ‘Lordship of Newton-by-Chester’ but says they live in London.

“I think they bought it some years ago and they have fallen out of love with it perhaps and now they are selling it,” added the company owner, who has 30 or 40 titles for sale at any one time

“Quite a few have sold but this one hasn’t,” he added.

The catalogue in which the Chester title is for sale claims it was held by Arni of Neston in 1066.

Lord Harrison of Chester speaking in the House of Lords
Lord Harrison of Chester speaking in the House of Lords

And it says Newton is mentioned in the opening entry for the Cheshire section of the Domesday Book which was compiled in 1086 for King William I (the Conqueror) as a form of inventory of the principal landowners and their holdings in England

It states: “The City of Chester paid tax on 50 hides before 1066. Three-and-a-half hides which are outside the City; that is one-and-a-half hides beyond the bridge and two hides in Newton and ‘Redcliffe’ and in the Bishop’s Borough, these paid with the City.”

Talking about modern day Newton, the catalogue states: “It lies about a mile and a half north-east of the city centre and the university has a post-graduate building here, known as Newton Hall, sadly, it appears, not the Queen Anne house that was still standing until after the Second World War.

"The post-graduates occupy a modern building here. Newton Hall Farm is now a four-star hotel.”