Why does Scotland have earls while England has dukes? It is partly because Scotland was never conquered by the Normans.
The word earl is derived from the Anglo-Saxon, a branch of the Germanic languages. The Scandinavian cognate is jarl. Scotland never had to cope with all these Norman nobles - dukes and counts - whose titles were of Latin origin (dux and comes) and who - after1066 - displaced the Anglo-Saxon earls in England.
But there was no feminine equivalent to an earl; so nowadays the term Countess is used.
Most of the words associated with royalty are also of Latinate descent: royal, majesty, prince. Curiously, though, king and queen are of solid Germanic stock.
I thought you might want to know ...
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