A correspondent writes: “In the Russian table of ranks you linked to, is Actual in eg. Actual privy councillor a mistranslation? It seems very odd.” I’ve wondered about that oddness myself — it’s not a mistranslation, in the sense that Russian Действительный and German Wirklicher both mean ‘actual,’ but how did that term arise? Anybody know the history of these titles? The OED entry for actual (updated November 2010) is no help; it gives no senses that are obviously appropriate here.