SCA Errata Sheet: Precedence

In the SCA, the members of the Order of Chivalry, of the Laurel, and of the Pelican are members of the peerage. In some kingdoms they outrank barons.

This is quite ahistorical. In medieval England the lay peerage was composed of barons and higher titles, and knights without a higher title were not peers. The French peerage was even more exclusive.

Knights had high status, but there were many ways to achieve status outside the  hierarchy of nobility and the crown as the fount of honor.

In John Russelll's mid 15th c. Boke of Nurture, the following were all ranked equal in estate to a knight: unmitered prior or abbot, dean, archdeacon, Master of the Rolls, under justices and Barons of the Exchequer,  Clerk of the Crown,  Mayor of the Staple of Calais, Doctor of Divinity or Both Laws (i.e, civil and canon), provincial, prothonotary, or Pope's collector.