The Arundel title was inherited in 1580, when the Howards became the genealogical successors to the paternally extinct FitzAlans, ancient kin to the House of Stuart, dating back to when the family first arrived in Great Britain from Brittany (see Alan fitz Flaad).

Claiming descent from Hereward the Wake, the resister of the Norman conquest who has been much celebrated in folklore, John Howard fought to the death at the Battle of Bosworth Field in defence of the cause for the House of York.

Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham, served as Lord High Admiral of the English fleet which defeated the invading Spanish Armada.

Osbert, Dugdale wrote, had been given lands in Rochdale in return for his service as Master of King Henry I's Buckhounds.

If Dugdale was correct a young William Howard left Lancashire to settle in Norfolk and practise as a lawyer perhaps at the behest of his father-in-law.

Richard James separately wrote the Iter Lancastrense, a poem on the history of Lancashire in which he mentions "Robin Howorrth, from whose familie Great Noble peers derive their progenie".

Sir William's son, Sir John Howard I, became Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk and married Joan de Cornwall, an illegitimate granddaughter of Richard, 1st Earl of Cornwall and King of the Romans,[5] the second son of King John.

Four members of the family in a row fell from grace or were convicted and imprisoned because of their Catholic beliefs: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk and his son Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey were imprisoned in late 1546. , accused of being involved in a plot to usurp the crown from Henry VIII's son, Prince Edward (future Edward VI) and thus reverse the Reformation and return the English Church to papal jurisdiction.

[7] Norfolk's son, Philip Howard, 13th Earl of Arundel was imprisoned in the Tower of London for his Catholicism in 1585, remaining there for over ten years until he fell ill with dysentery and he died in October 1595.

Starting with the 2nd Duke of Norfolk, the Howards added in the 3rd quarter the checkered blue and gold of the Warren Earls of Surrey, whom they became heirs of.

The office is hereditary in the Howard Family in their position as Dukes of Norfolk, the senior dukedom in the United Kingdom.