Auncienty is a term used to describe a system of precedence, for instance through years and continuance in the Houses of the Inns of Court, or among the ranks or degrees of the Officers of Arms. In many ways equivalent to Eldership, deriving from the Norman French noun "ancien" (meaning an Elder) preserved in the French concept of Ancienneté, it has a meaning of ceremonial seniority. This is slightly distinct from the obsolete usage of the word simply to mean "Antiquity".