n.
European title of nobility, ranking immediately below a count , or earl.
The wife of a viscount is a viscountess. In the Carolingian period, the vicecomes were deputies or lieutenants of the counts ( comes ), whose official powers they exercised by delegation. In the 11th century most of Normandy was divided into vicomtés , but the viscountcy was not introduced into the English peerage until nearly 400 years after the Norman conquest.