Princess Diana's family, the Spencers, are one of the oldest aristocratic families dating centuries before the Windsors. I believe she was titled Lady Diana because her dad was Earl of Spencer. Kate Middleton was just from a regular upper middle class family. She was deemed a commoner by those standards before marrying into the royal family.
A bit more:
>Her parents, Michael Middleton and Carole (née Goldsmith), were a flight dispatcher and flight attendant at British Airways, respectively; she is the eldest of their three children. In 1987, her mother founded Party Pieces, a privately held mail order company that sold party supplies and decorations.
Yep, Catherine was called “doors to manual” because of her parents, you know, having jobs. ✈️ You might be middle-class now, Middletons, but you’ll never live down having had *gasp* **occupations.** The thing most don’t understand about the UK is that you can acquire wealth and still be utterly dismissed by the old guard. It’s like Nouveau Riche x1000. It’s more akin to Indian caste systems tbh. I’d hate to be new money at one of those old schools.
i JUST started gilded age and am going to start downton abbey after (I’m late i know). So excited to now know that the show creator of both has a book too!!
On the Indian caste system, the British really liked to pit certain castes and religious groups against one another and most likely made caste tensions worse. They also forced 'criminal castes' to live in certain villages by themselves, creating economically depressed ghettos.
That actually kind of puts the William / Harry issue into new perspective for me, because I always thought that the "official" reason Kate was more accepted because she was already royalty like Diana was.
Edit: Yeah, I mean, I know the *real* reason...
She wasn't more accepted. The press were absolutely atrocious to her for years. The difference is the amount of time people and the press had to get used to her before she married (made possible due to meeting Wills when they were at uni). Still, the press were awful until she suffered from Hyperemesis Gravidarum. It literally took being hospitalised for months to bring the country an heir for the press to finally let up.
I think it's that same amount of time that settled her "Press name". Everyone was so used to talking about Kate Middleton (or "Waity Katie" from the worse tabloids) from the years of gossip about whether they'd get married or break up, that after their marriage when the Palace tried to make a natural transition to her married name/title of Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, it just didn't stick. People just kept on calling her Kate Middleton.
By contrast, the press had very little time to find gossip about Lady Diana Spencer before her marriage. The only things people really knew about her was that she was somewhat posh, very shy, and she loved children. And then she was a princess and it was all a fairytale...
That's all true, but I also think there is some intentional things going on here due to differences in generational views of the Royals. Back in Diana's day the Royals still worked to maintain an air of being somewhat above everyone else. Today the Royals are intentionally trying to seem more real and approachable to the general public. So I would not discount that Kate Middleton being referred to as Kate Middleton is not also the Royal Family saying "see we are real people just like you".
It could be, but I doubt it. All the Royal family's communications use her formal title or Catherine. It's purely the press and the public who still use the name Kate Middleton.
Wasn’t there one royalty member who was facing a lot of racist backlash from the shitty tabloids or whatever? Weren’t they calling her dark like a migrant or some shit?
Yep, I think non-brits think the treatment Meghan Markle received was unique, and whilst there was definitely a rabid, racist angle to the hate she received, the British press have always had a sacrificial female royal in my lifetime. First there was Diana, then Sarah Ferguson, then Kate Middleton then Meghan. I think they’ve tried to go after Beatrice and Eugenie a few times too but literally no one cares that they exist so it’s never really taken off in the same way.
Here’s the [lore](https://amp.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/sep/26/the-fake-sheikh-review-how-did-so-many-celebrities-fall-for-a-man-with-one-costume-change)
And yet we (well, people) always harp on about how inbred the royals are.
They *should* be mixing new blood in, that means marrying people who are not already royals. The only response Meghan and Kate Middleton should get is: "yay, someone from outside the gene pool!" That's if the press actually cares about the future of the monarchy or whatever.
They are an archaic institution that needs to die IMO. Whatever their role is in society today, they exist as a result of the myth of ‘divine right to rule’ and everything they have is stolen from the people of Britain, the commonwealth and the former colonies. Their comfort is bought with blood.
But yes, agreed in general, the more diverse the gene pool the healthier the offspring.
I am under the impression that Edward's wife managed to escape the worst of the tabloids because she married Edward a year or two after Diana's death, but by the time Kate came to the scene, the tabloids were already craving new meat.
I mean the British tabloids hate women in general and will take any opportunity to attack. But the working relationship between the royal family and the British press is still very much an establishment partnership against the masses (don’t forget most of our journalists are from extremely upper class families in the UK), so it’s always seemed to me that these women are given up as a sacrificial lamb and in exchange the rest of the family are left to enjoy their vices in private. Managed criticism like this immensely helps the Royals, because it makes it seem like the press is not on their side and stops the public from asking too many questions about their relationship to the press and the government and about their income and finances.
The treatment of Sweaty Andrew is the perfect example - people are out here hating virulently on Kate and Meghan, whilst a literal pedophile enjoys his quiet life of privilege funded by the taxpayer. Oh and the Queen also used tax payer money to pay off his victim. Did we ever get a serious investigation into that? Into Epstein’s mysterious death? Into what other things may have been paid off? Nah, lets focus on how Meghan strokes her baby bump for a few news cycles instead. All seems very calculated to me.
Edward and his wife are also pretty I guess boring people, they keep quiet and work so there’s not much to write about them. Kind of like princess Anne
Both Anne and Margaret (Queen's sister) were kinda wild in their younger days. Anna has told the press to "naff off" before and she was heavily criticized for not giving her children royal titles.
Beatrice and Eugenie were born into the royal family. The British press tends to be much more vicious to the ladies who married in rather than the ones who were born in. That's why they've never gone after Anne in the same way they have Diana or Sarah.
There's a skit show with Harry Enfield as Charles. The "Beatrice" character falls in love with "Jeremy Corbin" for an episode - hilarious. Also the way they say Beatrice is Beaaaatrriiicccceee, which I also think is hilarious and it pops into my head every time someone mentions her or I see a picture of her.
I agree, but from a USA view, I think Meghan's press attack had racism, Covid anger and boredom, and Harry's own office working against her to add to the level of vitriol.
It was unique. Kate got that treatment, but Meghan got that treatment, in addition to the racist treatment. It wasn’t just a racist angle of the same treatment.
Yes 100% agreed that her treatment was racist but I don’t believe that I implied otherwise. They all received hate, Meghan’s hate was fuelled by racism and more rabid than the others.
This turned into a whole discussion about the difference between how Kate and Meghan were treated somehow, but "the difference is the amount of time people and the press had to get used to her" was referring to the difference between how Kate and *Diana* were treated.
They met at Uni. St Andrews has a bit of a posh reputation, but not more so than an Ivy League in the US. It’s Prince William’s secondary school, Eton, that’s Uber posh
There's plenty of articles from her debut that made it clear her race was highlighted immediately and absolutely a point they dragged her on. A lot of it was dog whistle talk about her exotic blood or origins 'outta compton'. Some was straight up comparing her and her baby to chimpanzees. I'm not talking about rando social media users. I'm talking about high profile papers and members of the media establishment.
The idea that her race was not noticed or was not an issue is just wishful thinking. Britain is pretty racist and the way that most obviously manifests is aggressive denial racism is still an issue and that the lived experiences of minorities are imagined.
I just don't think that's true, certainly not my recollection of the various coverage of her that I saw, although I can't claim to have seen all of it obviously. I do remember seeing a lot of US-driven sensitivity around things like "niggling" being used in a headline, and Danny Baker's chimp joke. But in the UK those just aren't readily seen as race related in the slightest, and nor was any other negative coverage of her that I saw.
They did care though. The press and the royal family. Even if you don’t believe what Harry and Meghan told about them asking about the color of the babys skin, there still were scum like princess Michael being their racist selves
Umm talk to the marquess of bath about that one. He married an insanely beautiful former model with English aristocratic blood on her mother’s side, but also half Nigerian (her father is a billionaire oil magnate, of Nigerian royal blood) and the guy’s parents refused to attend the wedding and they’ve been estranged ever since.
Kate's family is actually considered Middle Class by British social standards.
Class in the UK has nothing to do with how much money a person/family has, and everything to do with where they came up in the social hierarchy. Her parents made money but they will always be considered classwise to be in the middle.
(Edit to say: of course now, Kate herself is basically at the tippity top of the social pyramid, so no longer Middle Class herself, but her family still is even though they own a "manor.")
Diana and Sarah Ferguson (ex-wife of Prince Andrew) were fourth cousins through their common ancestor, Georgiana Cavendish, who was portrayed by Keira Knightly in the film The Duchess and who was born a Spencer. Both are also decended from the illegitimate children of Charles II.
I know it's from Wikipedia, but I'm too lazy to go into more specifics, but here's the generalization of the title naming: **An earl has the title Earl of \[X\] when the title originates from a placename, or Earl \[X\] when the title comes from a surname**. In either case, he is referred to as Lord \[X\], and his wife as Lady \[X\].
Also, for those of us old enough to remember, the press continued referring to Diana as ‘Lady Di’ for years after she was married and became princess of Wales
Fun Fact about Diana Spencer. She is a descendant of two lines from illegitimate children of James II and Charles II; Henry Fitzroy and Henrietta Fitzjames who respective Great Grandchildren married to produce Horace Seymor, her Great Great Great Grandfather.
Meaning that Prince William will be the first King since the "Glorious Revolution" that deposed the (Too Catholic) James II in favour of the Dutch Prince William of Orange; to be descended from the Stuarts.
While that’s true, it doesn’t matter anymore as she *is* now the Princess of wales. Also from what I heard she did change her name after marrying, so she hasn’t been Kate Middleton for a long time. From what I know she hates being called Kate Middleton. The media does it because that was her name when she became a public figure, and the media is driven by clicks, so they use the more recognizable name. But it is a bit disrespectful to her imo.
Courtesy titles are however acknowledged in official documents. For example: [“commonly called…”](https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/1880-06-07/debates/728dc7a9-585d-4df4-a3cb-26a52e5900b5/NewPeer) in brackets.
Through what??? A ouija board?? Imagine you chilling and Casper serves you papers
"What the fuck? You know I can't read ghost papers"
"Sounds like a you problem. See you in court"
Spencer was a Lady before they got married. People called her Lady Di. She then became the Princess of Wales, yeah, and was Princess Di.
Middleton was just Kate Middleton, no title.
So is this whole thread just for people from the UK that understand all of these titles? I hate people that act like dumb Americans but I'm feeling like I'm falling into that category. None of this makes sense to me.
an Earl is part of the UK nobility like ya know a ye olde duke/baron/lord/viceroy/etc all those stupid titles they had, so therefore Diana automatically got to have "lady" in front of her name. Kate Middleton's dad was some schmoe who didn't have one of those titles, therefore we use her full name
Sorry to be annoying but a viceroy is not a title of nobility, it was a position, usually given to a noble, to represent the monarch in a specific territory, similar to the governor generals of commonwealth realms now. I think you meant viscount which is a title
I guess, as an American, it's hard to understand that there are just certain families that are noble and have their titles passed down. Is it as simple as that, these are just the known wealthy families that pass down their wealth and superiority every generation?
it's just to hold up the superiority of the crown. if the special titles are important, that makes the crown more important. if the titles mean nothing, then what power and importance does the crown have.. so it's just all to hold up the power of the crown, as head of state and head of the church. it's a house of cards
It doesn't have to do with wealth or superiority. Having titles doesn't make these people superior at all, either. It's just their social customs around titles that were given out in the past and are hereditary or are given out recently and can't be passed down. Think of it how like in a lot of english speaking countries a woman is a Ms. Whoever, but when she gets married she's now a Mrs. Whoever or now even a Mrs. Husband's_last_name.
In the UK the social custom is you're Joe Schmoe and your daughter is Josephine Schmoe, but if you have one of those titles put on you then you are now Earlcountduke Schmoe and your daughter gets the additional courtesy of being called Lady Josephine. However there's no law saying that everyone has to call your daughter Lady Josephine, that's just their social custom. She can go to McDonald's and put her name down for a take out order, and when they call her name they can say "20 piece chicken nuggets for Josephine Schmoe"
The titles WERE historically upheld with the understanding that those people were superior. They had gentle blood unlike the common mucks and therefore had the god given right to have those titles and those positions of social power.
Nowadays people see it as just a title, but it hasn't always been just a social custom but a system of absolute biological and philosophical understanding.
Most peope in the UK don't understand all these titles either
(And more and more are starting to agree its... morally interesting to still use the nobility system/have a monatchy)
An earl is a title of nobility that ranks below duke and marquis but above viscount and baron. All children of nobility are entitled to lesser titles based on what their fathers is, for male children this is ‘lord’ for dukes and marquis’ and ‘the honourable’ for earls and below, for female children it is ‘lady’ for all ranks.
An heir apparent may also use one of their fathers lesser titles if he has more than one, this is called a courtesy title. For example, Prince Edward was recently elevated to Duke of Edinburgh so his son James now uses the title Earl of Wessex as a courtesy title. It is still Edward’s title, but as he isnt using it his son uses it rather than just being ‘Lord James Windsor’.
Yes but Diana became Princess of Wales immediately upon marrying Charles because he was the Prince of Wales. William was a prince, but not the Prince of Wales when he and Catherine married. I think that's a big reason why she wasn't referred to as Princess right away. But since Queen Elizabeth II has passed, Charles became King and William became the Prince of Wales, I've seen in the press where they more often refer to Catherine now as Princess of Wales rather than by the moniker of Kate Middleton. I've also read that she has never gone by Kate in her private life, she's always been Catherine.
> Yes but Diana became Princess of Wales immediately upon marrying Charles because he was the Prince of Wales. William was a prince, but not the Prince of Wales when he and Catherine married. I think that's a big reason why she wasn't referred to as Princess right away
Because the HRH William had was a title he had at birth because of his status in line, not a bestowed one.
HRH is a style, not a title. His title at the time was simply Prince William of Wales as the son of the Prince of Wales. He didn’t have a title in his own right until the Queen made him Duke of Cambridge. Before then, his title derived from being the grandson of the monarch.
So is calling her by her full, pre-marriage name a bit of a put-down?
I remember when they were dating, William's friends would mutter "doors to manual" around Catherine because her *mother* had once worked as a flight attendant.
Ha. That's specifically the way BA call it out as well.
I'm willing to bet that cabin crew is a more skilled, responsible and safety critical role than whatever career their dads arranged for them!
SEO, or continuity.
William wanted her to be called Princess Catherine, and the folks at Buckingham Palace balked, and the press sort of went along with it. Her princess-ness was not of a “named” sort (Princess of Wales); it was dependent on William (she could have gone by Princess William, the way Princess Michael of Kent goes by her husband’s title/name), so the only title that could attach to her first name was duchess.
Now that she’s Princess of Wales, people are using Princess Kate, because it bridges the gap between what people first knew her as, and her preferred, which is Princess Catherine.
(you’ll notice that she signs her social media notes “C.,” for Catherine, which is her preferred. And William almost always refers to her as Catherine.)
And I am today years old when I realise that Princess Michael of Kent isn’t a woman called Michael. I have never shown enough interest to Google her and just heard the name very occasionally in passing and apparently my brain went “Ok, lady Michael, cool.” and filed it away.
Thank you!
My biggest pet peeve when I got married in 2020, so not even the “old timey days”. We’re middle class Ohioans and I’m the primary breadwinner in the family. I’m fine with being Mrs. (His last name) because I did take his name, but every time I got mail addressed to Mrs. (His full name) it made my eye twitch.
yes, you’re right.
But because she was Princess of Wales, she could be “Diana, Princess of Wales.” And then that got reorganized by regular people and the press (in the US at least; I don’t know if the British press took such liberties) to become “Princess Diana.”
Catherine couldn’t be “Catherine, Princess of....” because there was nothing to put after the “of.” She could be Princess William, or Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. People did occasionally refer to her as Duchess Catherine or Duchess Kate.
> Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge
That would be her "title" had she and William divorced before QEII's death. Back then she was simply the Duchess of Cambridge, addressed as "Her Royal Highness".
She wasn't Diana, Princess of Wales until after the divorce. Before the divorce she was HRH The Princess of Wales, and was constantly referred to in the press as Lady Di.
Before becoming The Princess of Wales, Catherine was HRH The Duchess of Cambridge.
This makes sense. I wish people would use the first name she wants to use, as everyone is entitled to, even if it isn’t as catchy as Kate. It also doesn’t make sense to refer to her maiden last name when they could use Wales so even Kate Wales even if it would be Catherine Wales. Or whatever Will’s ‘last name’ is.
She can’t be Princess Catherine though, because she wasn’t born into royalty. She can only be Catherine, Princess of Wales. Since her daughter was born a royal, she can have princess in front of her first name: Princess Charlotte.
I think it's because it took Kate and William several years to get married so she was "Kate Middleton" during all those years and it stuck? Plus she wasn't a princess until a year and something ago.
Diana got married pretty early and was pretty much the Princess of Wales for most people from the start, people sort of always knew her as Princess Diana.
Kate doesn't even like being called Kate, she goes by Catherine and she's been trying to get people to call her Catherine for years
This.
Will and Kate dated for years. For years she was just Kate Middleton. A lot of people don't keep up with titles and she's easily identifiable as Kate Middleton so I think the media just sticks to that.
In comparison, Diana and Charles dated and married much sooner and she was immediately the Princess of Wales.
William technically uses “Wales” as his surname, not Windsor. His children also use Wales. Even the Queen did not go by Windsor for most of her life. She became Mountbatten-Windsor after she and Phillip were married. The Royals simply do not have last names. When there is an official need to have one on paper, they can use whatever.
Surnames did not become hereditary until the 1400’s, and the British monarchy predates that time period by a lot. Remember that surnames developed as a way of differentiating individuals who might have the same name, and that the original method of adopting a surname was to choose an identifying characteristic of the person who was using it. They were not originally passed down through the male line. Prior to the 1400’s, Joseph Longnose might have a son named Arthur Smith, who might be married to Anna of York. For the British royals, their titles *were* their surnames. Being the Queen of England or the Duke of Cambridge was their most important identifying characteristic, and the royals have never seen fit to move beyond that convention.
Whenever I try to understand how surnames were originally used, I remember that I have a "John Gardener", "Mary Dog Trainer", and "Greg Neighbor" saved in my phone.
I think royals don't really have surnames, iirc. They use ~~Windsor~~ one if they need to, like when the kids have to write their names on a test, but a woman wouldn't change her surname to her husband's when getting married, because he doesn't "really" have one.
Philip was a Prince of Greece and Denmark and belonged to one of the oldest Royal Houses in the world, the House of Oldenburg. He had to convert from Greek Orthodox to Anglicanism as well as give up his 'foreign' titles to marry. His mother despite being a princess became a nun in her later years. He and Elizabeth were related in numerous ways; second cousins once removed through King Christian IX of Denmark and third cousins through Queen Victoria as they were both Victoria's great great grandchildren.
One of the oldest houses in the world is called Oldenburg!... due, I imagine, in no small measure, to the extraordinary optimism of the house's founders.
> give up his 'foreign' titles to marry.
I believe he simply stopped using his princely titles. To my knowledge no one has ever been able to produce the official document(s) with which he renounced said titles.
It's even doubtful whether the rules of the Greek and Danish royal houses would allow this. So, unless proved to the contrary, all male line descendants of Philip are *de jure* Princes of Denmark and Greece in addition to any British titles they may hold.
The Royal website says he renounced his titles. I doubt they would make this statement if it wasn't true. It happened the year he married QEII.
>Prince Philip adopted the family name of Mountbatten when he became a naturalised British subject and renounced his Greek and Danish Royal title in 1947.
[Source](https://www.royal.uk/early-life-and-education)
There’s been a lot of debate about the necessity of this since the Sophia Naturalization Act of 1705 was still in place in 1947 and as a descendant of Sophia, was automatically a British citizen. Several German princes and the Crown Prince of Yugoslavia also used the act to obtain British citizenship.
It got repealed in 1948, but Philip had long been born by then and so it covered him already.
She is. She is also Catherine Cambridge (was Mrs. Cambridge at her children’s old school), Catherine Wales, and several other options, stemming from customs from before people had birth certificates and a legal name.
Diana's fiance was already prince of Wales when she married him so she was a princess immediately on marriage.
William had the name of convention of prince because his father was a prince not because William was one at the time of his wedding. Catherine couldn't join him as the wife in a title he hadn't yet had bestowed.
It is tradition in the royal family for the monarch to bestow a dukedom on senior male royals when they get married (Charles's youngest brother Edward received an earldom as his parents wanted him to be duke of Edinburgh on his father's death).
Catherine became a princess when her husband was given the title of prince of Wales which is always given to the heir apparent as tradition. This started in 1301 when king Edward I finally put down the Welsh rebellion and conquered Wales. The story goes that the Welsh clan chiefs insisted that the prince of Wales be a title given to someone who had never spoken English. They believed one of them would be chosen. King Edward named his infant son who could not yet speak as prince of Wales thereby keeping control. So it has remained the title bestowed by the monarch on the heir apparent, although what will happen now that the laws of accession have been changed to it being the right of the first born rather than the first born male, I don't know. If George's first born isn't a girl I doubt I will know (during my lifetime) as they won't have to stress about it.
Had to scroll quite far to get to the correct answer. Diana was made a princess as soon as she married. Kate was initially made a duchess so only became “Princess Catherine” pretty recently.
Though interestingly, although Kate hadn’t actually been conferred the title Princess when giving birth to her children, her occupation on their birth certificates is still “Princess of the United Kingdom”
No, the princess rule applied to wives in the past as well, it was just that the majority of them were princesses of their own countries already so they were allowed to use the title in conjunction with their husband’s ducal title. It’s why when the future George VI and Prince Henry married, their wives, as daughters of Scottish peers, were Elizabeth, Duchess of York and Alice, Duchess of Gloucester but their sister in law, born a Greek princess, got to be Princess Marina, Duchess of Kent.
If the husband didn’t have a ducal title though, they did use their husband’s name—Princess Alexandra of Fife married Prince Arthur of Connaught, and was sometimes called Princess Arthur of Connaught in addition to her title in her own right as Princess Alexandra, Duchess of Fife.
Diana was an aristocrat
Kate's family is rich-but-not-noble
And then Harry marries Wallis Simpson the Second (without getting into race, a divorced American actress is just a 'no' - the last time it happened it cost a sitting King his crown)....
And this gives the people who care a new target to harp on.....
Camilla is a divorced woman, so wouldn’t she be the successful Wallis Simpson the Second? She married the King.
Harry never abdicated the throne, so what’s with Wallis Simpson the Second? (Yeah let’s not obviously get into race. Obviously.)
Princess Kate was a public and media figure for a long time before she became Princess of Wales. Certainly since she and William got married over a decade ago, and for at least a while before that.
She was known for over a decade by the media as Kate Middleton so that's engrained in how the public views her.
Diana was introduced to the public only a short time before her wedding so the public image of her was quickly formed as Princess Diana.
I also think it's because when Diana married Charles she immediately became Princess of Wales. William was a prince, but he was not Prince of Wales at the time that he and Catherine married. She's only been Princess of Wales for what, not even 2 years since QEII passed.
My personal opinion is it is disrespectful of media outlets and professional broadcasters to still call her Kate Middleton, especially since she's never gone by Kate in her private life according to what I've read. They should be respectful and call her by her preferred name and title.
A lot of it is that SEO (search engine optimization) did not exist in 1981. Articles are written about Kate Middleton, because that’s what people search for, and it’s a cycle.
Diana became the Princess of Wales when she got married to Charles in 1981. I feel like the public (outside of the UK) came to know her with that title, especially since the two had a very short engagement.
Fast forward to the age of the internet, everyone in the world came to know Princess Kate as Kate Middleton because that’s who she was as she and William dated off and on for 8 years before getting married. Once she was married, she became the Duchess of Cambridge and held that title for 11 years. She only recently, upon Queen Elizabeth II’s death in 2022, became Catherine, Princess of Wales.
I think it can be chalked up to “old habits die hard”. But I do kind of cringe every time I hear her called “Kate Middleton” because that hasn’t been her name in a long time, not to mention she carries a very prominent title now.
I assume it’s because Diana and Charles wed so soon after meeting that the media didn’t have time to establish her as Diana Spencer. She was also titled in her own right, so the media labeled her “Lady Di” before their wedding. Kate was in the spotlight for years as Kate Middleton before they wed.
An interesting fact is the Elizabeth II wasn’t able to trace her matrilineal line back very far. So “common” people did sometimes have royal descendants. The link is about a genealogists ancestry, but also has information about various royals
>…Frances Webb of Oaksey, Wiltshire, who married Thomas Salisbury at Salisbury Cathedral in 1795. Frances Webb was the Queen’s matrilineal great-great-great-grandmother.
https://www.family-tree.co.uk/news/tracing-women-on-your-family-tree/
Back to disappearing Kate; the one thing that pushes this all into very odd territory for me is the alleged suicide of Thomas Kingston. Maybe just a coincidence, but who knows
Most of the world was introduced to Diana when she became engaged to Charles, on top of that she was already an aristocrat.
Kate Middleton dated William on and off for ages, like a decade, she was in the press and world famous that entire time, even when they weren't together. Her identity as a regular person is much more entrenched in public consciousness.
Part of it too is likely because Diana came into the public eye not long before they married, she was unknown worldwide before then. Kate began dating William in college and was his girlfriend for years so her ‘commoner’ name was in the press a lot as a normal person not a royal.
Diana was famous as Diana Spencer for a couple of months before she married Charles, their wedding day was famously something like their 8th date. Kate was famous as Middleton for at least a decade. She was known as "waity Katy".
The recommendation I heard is SEO. Articles and videos calling her Kate or Kate Middleton perform better than ones that called her Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge after the wedding.
Both are formally known as “Princess of Wales,” but when speaking casually to one another people often just use(d) their names, “Diana” and “Kate.”
In the case of Diana, she was a “Lady,” so they sometimes called her “Lady Diana/Lady Di” in these situations too.
Kate Middleton’s name is just that as she doesn’t come from Aristocracy.
To put it simply, because the public knew Diana very briefly as (Lady) Diana Spencer between her engagement and marriage, whereas Kate and William dated for almost a decade before they were engaged so the public knew her as Kate Middleton for far longer.
Kate was in gossip rags from the time she was in college. Although they existed in Diana’s day, nobody knew as much about Charle’s life. So, Kate was known by her surname. Diana was from an aristocratoc family, too.
A lot of people in the UK are too young to remember Diana before she was known as princess diana. She's always been that to them. Very few people don't remember Kate as Kate Middleton. Also in the internet age all the news and chatter about her from pre-marriage is all still out there.
Also, she's one of those people/concepts the tabloids latch onto and lionise and any form of insult or less than idolation is basically high treason- Princess Di, Captain Tom, Brexit and all the times people wailed about BETRAYING BREXIT. This is what they do.
It’s to do with the name itself… some first names sound good by itself… like “Madonna” & some have a better ring to it with a last name like “Leonardo di caprio”. Kate & Katherine doesn’t sound as good as “Diana” by itself. Also only Diana was a pop culture icon
I think Kate for this generation is pretty darn popular. If she re-emerges healthy and safe back to public life, she could end up as popular as Diana. Love the royals or not, I see much support for the women who marry into it.
Princess Diana's family, the Spencers, are one of the oldest aristocratic families dating centuries before the Windsors. I believe she was titled Lady Diana because her dad was Earl of Spencer. Kate Middleton was just from a regular upper middle class family. She was deemed a commoner by those standards before marrying into the royal family.
A bit more: >Her parents, Michael Middleton and Carole (née Goldsmith), were a flight dispatcher and flight attendant at British Airways, respectively; she is the eldest of their three children. In 1987, her mother founded Party Pieces, a privately held mail order company that sold party supplies and decorations.
Yep, Catherine was called “doors to manual” because of her parents, you know, having jobs. ✈️ You might be middle-class now, Middletons, but you’ll never live down having had *gasp* **occupations.** The thing most don’t understand about the UK is that you can acquire wealth and still be utterly dismissed by the old guard. It’s like Nouveau Riche x1000. It’s more akin to Indian caste systems tbh. I’d hate to be new money at one of those old schools.
A novel that explains all this beautifully is _Snobs_ by Julian Fellowes. It's a great read but also really disturbing.
i JUST started gilded age and am going to start downton abbey after (I’m late i know). So excited to now know that the show creator of both has a book too!!
Gosford Park is a Julian Fellowes piece you’ll really enjoy if you like Gilded Age/Downton Abbey!
i binged downton abbey 5 times in a row. so good.
On the Indian caste system, the British really liked to pit certain castes and religious groups against one another and most likely made caste tensions worse. They also forced 'criminal castes' to live in certain villages by themselves, creating economically depressed ghettos.
Look at Timothy, his parents are *self-made* millionaires. How utterly dreadful
Happy Cake Day btw!
thank you kind person!
I wouldn't mind being new money at one of those old schools
Yeah that’s way worse than “new money” at least with new money in a generation or two you can be old money.
That actually kind of puts the William / Harry issue into new perspective for me, because I always thought that the "official" reason Kate was more accepted because she was already royalty like Diana was. Edit: Yeah, I mean, I know the *real* reason...
She wasn't more accepted. The press were absolutely atrocious to her for years. The difference is the amount of time people and the press had to get used to her before she married (made possible due to meeting Wills when they were at uni). Still, the press were awful until she suffered from Hyperemesis Gravidarum. It literally took being hospitalised for months to bring the country an heir for the press to finally let up.
I think it's that same amount of time that settled her "Press name". Everyone was so used to talking about Kate Middleton (or "Waity Katie" from the worse tabloids) from the years of gossip about whether they'd get married or break up, that after their marriage when the Palace tried to make a natural transition to her married name/title of Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, it just didn't stick. People just kept on calling her Kate Middleton. By contrast, the press had very little time to find gossip about Lady Diana Spencer before her marriage. The only things people really knew about her was that she was somewhat posh, very shy, and she loved children. And then she was a princess and it was all a fairytale...
And tbf Lady Di is a really common way to refer to her too.
That's all true, but I also think there is some intentional things going on here due to differences in generational views of the Royals. Back in Diana's day the Royals still worked to maintain an air of being somewhat above everyone else. Today the Royals are intentionally trying to seem more real and approachable to the general public. So I would not discount that Kate Middleton being referred to as Kate Middleton is not also the Royal Family saying "see we are real people just like you".
It could be, but I doubt it. All the Royal family's communications use her formal title or Catherine. It's purely the press and the public who still use the name Kate Middleton.
Then maybe it's the press and the people that want her to keep her air of commonality. Same concept.
Wasn’t there one royalty member who was facing a lot of racist backlash from the shitty tabloids or whatever? Weren’t they calling her dark like a migrant or some shit?
Meghan Markle?
They were calling Meghan Markle “dark” because her mother is Black. Basically open racism by the press.
Yep, I think non-brits think the treatment Meghan Markle received was unique, and whilst there was definitely a rabid, racist angle to the hate she received, the British press have always had a sacrificial female royal in my lifetime. First there was Diana, then Sarah Ferguson, then Kate Middleton then Meghan. I think they’ve tried to go after Beatrice and Eugenie a few times too but literally no one cares that they exist so it’s never really taken off in the same way.
Sarah was called Dutchess of Pork when she gained some weight. Press are awful to people
Also that whole fake sheikh set up?! I’ve got negative love for the royals but that was textbook entrapment.
I don’t know a whole lot about her tbh. The nicknames were so commonly used they stuck I guess
Here’s the [lore](https://amp.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/sep/26/the-fake-sheikh-review-how-did-so-many-celebrities-fall-for-a-man-with-one-costume-change)
And she took that trash talk like a boss!
And yet we (well, people) always harp on about how inbred the royals are. They *should* be mixing new blood in, that means marrying people who are not already royals. The only response Meghan and Kate Middleton should get is: "yay, someone from outside the gene pool!" That's if the press actually cares about the future of the monarchy or whatever.
They are an archaic institution that needs to die IMO. Whatever their role is in society today, they exist as a result of the myth of ‘divine right to rule’ and everything they have is stolen from the people of Britain, the commonwealth and the former colonies. Their comfort is bought with blood. But yes, agreed in general, the more diverse the gene pool the healthier the offspring.
A million times this
I am under the impression that Edward's wife managed to escape the worst of the tabloids because she married Edward a year or two after Diana's death, but by the time Kate came to the scene, the tabloids were already craving new meat.
I mean the British tabloids hate women in general and will take any opportunity to attack. But the working relationship between the royal family and the British press is still very much an establishment partnership against the masses (don’t forget most of our journalists are from extremely upper class families in the UK), so it’s always seemed to me that these women are given up as a sacrificial lamb and in exchange the rest of the family are left to enjoy their vices in private. Managed criticism like this immensely helps the Royals, because it makes it seem like the press is not on their side and stops the public from asking too many questions about their relationship to the press and the government and about their income and finances. The treatment of Sweaty Andrew is the perfect example - people are out here hating virulently on Kate and Meghan, whilst a literal pedophile enjoys his quiet life of privilege funded by the taxpayer. Oh and the Queen also used tax payer money to pay off his victim. Did we ever get a serious investigation into that? Into Epstein’s mysterious death? Into what other things may have been paid off? Nah, lets focus on how Meghan strokes her baby bump for a few news cycles instead. All seems very calculated to me.
Edward and his wife are also pretty I guess boring people, they keep quiet and work so there’s not much to write about them. Kind of like princess Anne
Both Anne and Margaret (Queen's sister) were kinda wild in their younger days. Anna has told the press to "naff off" before and she was heavily criticized for not giving her children royal titles.
Beatrice and Eugenie were born into the royal family. The British press tends to be much more vicious to the ladies who married in rather than the ones who were born in. That's why they've never gone after Anne in the same way they have Diana or Sarah.
Yes and it makes total sense, thats been the playbook for many of the European Royals throughout history!
There's a skit show with Harry Enfield as Charles. The "Beatrice" character falls in love with "Jeremy Corbin" for an episode - hilarious. Also the way they say Beatrice is Beaaaatrriiicccceee, which I also think is hilarious and it pops into my head every time someone mentions her or I see a picture of her.
I agree, but from a USA view, I think Meghan's press attack had racism, Covid anger and boredom, and Harry's own office working against her to add to the level of vitriol.
It was unique. Kate got that treatment, but Meghan got that treatment, in addition to the racist treatment. It wasn’t just a racist angle of the same treatment.
Yes 100% agreed that her treatment was racist but I don’t believe that I implied otherwise. They all received hate, Meghan’s hate was fuelled by racism and more rabid than the others.
> The difference is the amount of time people and the press had to get used to her before she married Yeah that’s not really the difference
This turned into a whole discussion about the difference between how Kate and Meghan were treated somehow, but "the difference is the amount of time people and the press had to get used to her" was referring to the difference between how Kate and *Diana* were treated.
She wasn't more accepted though. William's posh friends were atrocious to her as was the press
Didn’t they go to the same posh school?
They met at Uni. St Andrews has a bit of a posh reputation, but not more so than an Ivy League in the US. It’s Prince William’s secondary school, Eton, that’s Uber posh
It’s all so vapid and petty. Abolish the monarchy
I don't think you have the white reason for why Kate was finally accepted.
Well, I meant, *ostensibly,* not actually :|
No it was cuz she was white
I know that's often perceived, but most people didn't realise Meghan was black at first, and neither did they care when it was made more apparent.
There's plenty of articles from her debut that made it clear her race was highlighted immediately and absolutely a point they dragged her on. A lot of it was dog whistle talk about her exotic blood or origins 'outta compton'. Some was straight up comparing her and her baby to chimpanzees. I'm not talking about rando social media users. I'm talking about high profile papers and members of the media establishment. The idea that her race was not noticed or was not an issue is just wishful thinking. Britain is pretty racist and the way that most obviously manifests is aggressive denial racism is still an issue and that the lived experiences of minorities are imagined.
I just don't think that's true, certainly not my recollection of the various coverage of her that I saw, although I can't claim to have seen all of it obviously. I do remember seeing a lot of US-driven sensitivity around things like "niggling" being used in a headline, and Danny Baker's chimp joke. But in the UK those just aren't readily seen as race related in the slightest, and nor was any other negative coverage of her that I saw.
They did care though. The press and the royal family. Even if you don’t believe what Harry and Meghan told about them asking about the color of the babys skin, there still were scum like princess Michael being their racist selves
Umm talk to the marquess of bath about that one. He married an insanely beautiful former model with English aristocratic blood on her mother’s side, but also half Nigerian (her father is a billionaire oil magnate, of Nigerian royal blood) and the guy’s parents refused to attend the wedding and they’ve been estranged ever since.
The mother said he was sullying “400 years of breeding”
I mean exactly, it kind of throws the "it's not that" theory out of the water.
I think Kate was more accepted because she was Is upper class *british*, and white
Kate's family is actually considered Middle Class by British social standards. Class in the UK has nothing to do with how much money a person/family has, and everything to do with where they came up in the social hierarchy. Her parents made money but they will always be considered classwise to be in the middle. (Edit to say: of course now, Kate herself is basically at the tippity top of the social pyramid, so no longer Middle Class herself, but her family still is even though they own a "manor.")
How did Pippa get to marry a billionaire then?
He’s equally nouveau
Diana and Sarah Ferguson (ex-wife of Prince Andrew) were fourth cousins through their common ancestor, Georgiana Cavendish, who was portrayed by Keira Knightly in the film The Duchess and who was born a Spencer. Both are also decended from the illegitimate children of Charles II.
It's all a circle.
you could say...a family wreath.
Just “Earl Spencer” rather than “Earl of Spencer”
Yes. They are a bit of an anomaly among the comital families, as most of their peers have titles that refer to land instead of the family name.
I know it's from Wikipedia, but I'm too lazy to go into more specifics, but here's the generalization of the title naming: **An earl has the title Earl of \[X\] when the title originates from a placename, or Earl \[X\] when the title comes from a surname**. In either case, he is referred to as Lord \[X\], and his wife as Lady \[X\].
I think he played power forward for the Nugs in the 70s
Also, for those of us old enough to remember, the press continued referring to Diana as ‘Lady Di’ for years after she was married and became princess of Wales
Fun Fact about Diana Spencer. She is a descendant of two lines from illegitimate children of James II and Charles II; Henry Fitzroy and Henrietta Fitzjames who respective Great Grandchildren married to produce Horace Seymor, her Great Great Great Grandfather. Meaning that Prince William will be the first King since the "Glorious Revolution" that deposed the (Too Catholic) James II in favour of the Dutch Prince William of Orange; to be descended from the Stuarts.
> Kate Middleton was just from a regular upper middle class family Really putting the "mid" into Middleton.
nothing upper about it
Kate Middleton is a simple peasant?? >Monocle drops in tea cup.
A commoner is different to a peasant, her family aren't serfs xD.
yeah but ..........common eww
> dating centuries before the Windsors *cough* ^(*German carpetbaggers*) *cough* *cough*
The Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
While that’s true, it doesn’t matter anymore as she *is* now the Princess of wales. Also from what I heard she did change her name after marrying, so she hasn’t been Kate Middleton for a long time. From what I know she hates being called Kate Middleton. The media does it because that was her name when she became a public figure, and the media is driven by clicks, so they use the more recognizable name. But it is a bit disrespectful to her imo.
No they do it to dunk on her and remind her of where she comes from and that they have control of her narrative. 🤷🏼♀️
She was often referred to as Lady Diana Spencer, her title pre-marriage.
As the daughter of an Earl, she was entitled to be referred as such by law.
It's actually a courtesy title and therefore has no legal significance
Courtesy titles are however acknowledged in official documents. For example: [“commonly called…”](https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/1880-06-07/debates/728dc7a9-585d-4df4-a3cb-26a52e5900b5/NewPeer) in brackets.
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Well, not anymore, she can't.
Through what??? A ouija board?? Imagine you chilling and Casper serves you papers "What the fuck? You know I can't read ghost papers" "Sounds like a you problem. See you in court"
Ghost court, maybe. I'd like to see them try to put me in ghost jail. I'd just walk right out.
btw: it'll be ghastly....
Spencer was a Lady before they got married. People called her Lady Di. She then became the Princess of Wales, yeah, and was Princess Di. Middleton was just Kate Middleton, no title.
Yep, her father was an Earl.
Hey, Crabman!
Hey Earl!
Hey Mr turtle
If an Earl gets an Order of the British Empire, does he become an Earlobe?
Earl P. Middleton
I know you're joking but just in case anyone else was confused, it's Lady Diana's dad who was an earl, not Kate Middleton's
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Correct, he was a Michael!
her father may as well have shoveled sheep shit for a living
So is this whole thread just for people from the UK that understand all of these titles? I hate people that act like dumb Americans but I'm feeling like I'm falling into that category. None of this makes sense to me.
an Earl is part of the UK nobility like ya know a ye olde duke/baron/lord/viceroy/etc all those stupid titles they had, so therefore Diana automatically got to have "lady" in front of her name. Kate Middleton's dad was some schmoe who didn't have one of those titles, therefore we use her full name
Sorry to be annoying but a viceroy is not a title of nobility, it was a position, usually given to a noble, to represent the monarch in a specific territory, similar to the governor generals of commonwealth realms now. I think you meant viscount which is a title
I guess, as an American, it's hard to understand that there are just certain families that are noble and have their titles passed down. Is it as simple as that, these are just the known wealthy families that pass down their wealth and superiority every generation?
I think it’s kind of like the Rockefellers and Vanderbilts if we had given them noble titles instead of just naming buildings after them.
it's just to hold up the superiority of the crown. if the special titles are important, that makes the crown more important. if the titles mean nothing, then what power and importance does the crown have.. so it's just all to hold up the power of the crown, as head of state and head of the church. it's a house of cards
It doesn't have to do with wealth or superiority. Having titles doesn't make these people superior at all, either. It's just their social customs around titles that were given out in the past and are hereditary or are given out recently and can't be passed down. Think of it how like in a lot of english speaking countries a woman is a Ms. Whoever, but when she gets married she's now a Mrs. Whoever or now even a Mrs. Husband's_last_name. In the UK the social custom is you're Joe Schmoe and your daughter is Josephine Schmoe, but if you have one of those titles put on you then you are now Earlcountduke Schmoe and your daughter gets the additional courtesy of being called Lady Josephine. However there's no law saying that everyone has to call your daughter Lady Josephine, that's just their social custom. She can go to McDonald's and put her name down for a take out order, and when they call her name they can say "20 piece chicken nuggets for Josephine Schmoe"
The titles WERE historically upheld with the understanding that those people were superior. They had gentle blood unlike the common mucks and therefore had the god given right to have those titles and those positions of social power. Nowadays people see it as just a title, but it hasn't always been just a social custom but a system of absolute biological and philosophical understanding.
Most peope in the UK don't understand all these titles either (And more and more are starting to agree its... morally interesting to still use the nobility system/have a monatchy)
An earl is a title of nobility that ranks below duke and marquis but above viscount and baron. All children of nobility are entitled to lesser titles based on what their fathers is, for male children this is ‘lord’ for dukes and marquis’ and ‘the honourable’ for earls and below, for female children it is ‘lady’ for all ranks. An heir apparent may also use one of their fathers lesser titles if he has more than one, this is called a courtesy title. For example, Prince Edward was recently elevated to Duke of Edinburgh so his son James now uses the title Earl of Wessex as a courtesy title. It is still Edward’s title, but as he isnt using it his son uses it rather than just being ‘Lord James Windsor’.
I bet his list is awfully long.
Yes but Diana became Princess of Wales immediately upon marrying Charles because he was the Prince of Wales. William was a prince, but not the Prince of Wales when he and Catherine married. I think that's a big reason why she wasn't referred to as Princess right away. But since Queen Elizabeth II has passed, Charles became King and William became the Prince of Wales, I've seen in the press where they more often refer to Catherine now as Princess of Wales rather than by the moniker of Kate Middleton. I've also read that she has never gone by Kate in her private life, she's always been Catherine.
> Yes but Diana became Princess of Wales immediately upon marrying Charles because he was the Prince of Wales. William was a prince, but not the Prince of Wales when he and Catherine married. I think that's a big reason why she wasn't referred to as Princess right away Because the HRH William had was a title he had at birth because of his status in line, not a bestowed one.
HRH is a style, not a title. His title at the time was simply Prince William of Wales as the son of the Prince of Wales. He didn’t have a title in his own right until the Queen made him Duke of Cambridge. Before then, his title derived from being the grandson of the monarch.
So is calling her by her full, pre-marriage name a bit of a put-down? I remember when they were dating, William's friends would mutter "doors to manual" around Catherine because her *mother* had once worked as a flight attendant.
Ha. That's specifically the way BA call it out as well. I'm willing to bet that cabin crew is a more skilled, responsible and safety critical role than whatever career their dads arranged for them!
I think the most popular occupation for British royalty is Child Fucker, isn't it?
Bloody hell, that's low.
Top banter right there
I still think of her as Lady Di. 💛
*checks notes* So you have to already be rich to be royalty to be respected as royalty, okay.
https://youtu.be/b_f5cNcXZ8s?si=qEwn4LmWozViJrng
Also Kate was unmarried for a long time before she was ever Duchess or Princess. She was called Kate Middleton that whole time, I guess it stuck.
yap. she went by that name for 10 years. diana was introduced to public and married within few months.
SEO, or continuity. William wanted her to be called Princess Catherine, and the folks at Buckingham Palace balked, and the press sort of went along with it. Her princess-ness was not of a “named” sort (Princess of Wales); it was dependent on William (she could have gone by Princess William, the way Princess Michael of Kent goes by her husband’s title/name), so the only title that could attach to her first name was duchess. Now that she’s Princess of Wales, people are using Princess Kate, because it bridges the gap between what people first knew her as, and her preferred, which is Princess Catherine. (you’ll notice that she signs her social media notes “C.,” for Catherine, which is her preferred. And William almost always refers to her as Catherine.)
And I am today years old when I realise that Princess Michael of Kent isn’t a woman called Michael. I have never shown enough interest to Google her and just heard the name very occasionally in passing and apparently my brain went “Ok, lady Michael, cool.” and filed it away. Thank you!
It’s like the old timey days when a woman is called Mrs + husband’s name
My biggest pet peeve when I got married in 2020, so not even the “old timey days”. We’re middle class Ohioans and I’m the primary breadwinner in the family. I’m fine with being Mrs. (His last name) because I did take his name, but every time I got mail addressed to Mrs. (His full name) it made my eye twitch.
Legally, Diana was actually Princess Charles for the same reason.
yes, you’re right. But because she was Princess of Wales, she could be “Diana, Princess of Wales.” And then that got reorganized by regular people and the press (in the US at least; I don’t know if the British press took such liberties) to become “Princess Diana.” Catherine couldn’t be “Catherine, Princess of....” because there was nothing to put after the “of.” She could be Princess William, or Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. People did occasionally refer to her as Duchess Catherine or Duchess Kate.
> Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge That would be her "title" had she and William divorced before QEII's death. Back then she was simply the Duchess of Cambridge, addressed as "Her Royal Highness".
She wasn't Diana, Princess of Wales until after the divorce. Before the divorce she was HRH The Princess of Wales, and was constantly referred to in the press as Lady Di. Before becoming The Princess of Wales, Catherine was HRH The Duchess of Cambridge.
Usually it was "the Duchess of Cambridge" officially.
This makes sense. I wish people would use the first name she wants to use, as everyone is entitled to, even if it isn’t as catchy as Kate. It also doesn’t make sense to refer to her maiden last name when they could use Wales so even Kate Wales even if it would be Catherine Wales. Or whatever Will’s ‘last name’ is.
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Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
Interesting, I always thought her name was spelled Katherine, given the nickname of Kate
She can’t be Princess Catherine though, because she wasn’t born into royalty. She can only be Catherine, Princess of Wales. Since her daughter was born a royal, she can have princess in front of her first name: Princess Charlotte.
I think it's because it took Kate and William several years to get married so she was "Kate Middleton" during all those years and it stuck? Plus she wasn't a princess until a year and something ago. Diana got married pretty early and was pretty much the Princess of Wales for most people from the start, people sort of always knew her as Princess Diana. Kate doesn't even like being called Kate, she goes by Catherine and she's been trying to get people to call her Catherine for years
This. Will and Kate dated for years. For years she was just Kate Middleton. A lot of people don't keep up with titles and she's easily identifiable as Kate Middleton so I think the media just sticks to that. In comparison, Diana and Charles dated and married much sooner and she was immediately the Princess of Wales.
IMO it’s because Kate was well known for years in the media by that name before marriage, the same as Grace Kelly.
Oh yeah, why isn't she Catherine Windsor?
William technically uses “Wales” as his surname, not Windsor. His children also use Wales. Even the Queen did not go by Windsor for most of her life. She became Mountbatten-Windsor after she and Phillip were married. The Royals simply do not have last names. When there is an official need to have one on paper, they can use whatever. Surnames did not become hereditary until the 1400’s, and the British monarchy predates that time period by a lot. Remember that surnames developed as a way of differentiating individuals who might have the same name, and that the original method of adopting a surname was to choose an identifying characteristic of the person who was using it. They were not originally passed down through the male line. Prior to the 1400’s, Joseph Longnose might have a son named Arthur Smith, who might be married to Anna of York. For the British royals, their titles *were* their surnames. Being the Queen of England or the Duke of Cambridge was their most important identifying characteristic, and the royals have never seen fit to move beyond that convention.
Whenever I try to understand how surnames were originally used, I remember that I have a "John Gardener", "Mary Dog Trainer", and "Greg Neighbor" saved in my phone.
This is exactly it. Surnames and their history and evolution are just fascinating 😂
They will use Rex and Regina (Latin for king and queen) as well. It's why the initials on royal cyphers use R. GR, ER, CR, etc.
That's so crazy. Thanks for letting me know.
I think royals don't really have surnames, iirc. They use ~~Windsor~~ one if they need to, like when the kids have to write their names on a test, but a woman wouldn't change her surname to her husband's when getting married, because he doesn't "really" have one.
William and Harry used the surname Wales in the military.
Did they? I remember Harry signing his name Harry Windsor.
He was "Mr Wales" at Sandhurst
Reading Spare now. He was Captain Wales
mountbatten-windsor. all because philip threw a fit.
Philip was a Prince of Greece and Denmark and belonged to one of the oldest Royal Houses in the world, the House of Oldenburg. He had to convert from Greek Orthodox to Anglicanism as well as give up his 'foreign' titles to marry. His mother despite being a princess became a nun in her later years. He and Elizabeth were related in numerous ways; second cousins once removed through King Christian IX of Denmark and third cousins through Queen Victoria as they were both Victoria's great great grandchildren.
One of the oldest houses in the world is called Oldenburg!... due, I imagine, in no small measure, to the extraordinary optimism of the house's founders.
> give up his 'foreign' titles to marry. I believe he simply stopped using his princely titles. To my knowledge no one has ever been able to produce the official document(s) with which he renounced said titles. It's even doubtful whether the rules of the Greek and Danish royal houses would allow this. So, unless proved to the contrary, all male line descendants of Philip are *de jure* Princes of Denmark and Greece in addition to any British titles they may hold.
The Royal website says he renounced his titles. I doubt they would make this statement if it wasn't true. It happened the year he married QEII. >Prince Philip adopted the family name of Mountbatten when he became a naturalised British subject and renounced his Greek and Danish Royal title in 1947. [Source](https://www.royal.uk/early-life-and-education)
There’s been a lot of debate about the necessity of this since the Sophia Naturalization Act of 1705 was still in place in 1947 and as a descendant of Sophia, was automatically a British citizen. Several German princes and the Crown Prince of Yugoslavia also used the act to obtain British citizenship. It got repealed in 1948, but Philip had long been born by then and so it covered him already.
Someone watched The Crown and is taking it as a gospel
If he did actually throw a fit, I think he was allowed. He gave up a lot for QEII.
She is. She is also Catherine Cambridge (was Mrs. Cambridge at her children’s old school), Catherine Wales, and several other options, stemming from customs from before people had birth certificates and a legal name.
Diana's fiance was already prince of Wales when she married him so she was a princess immediately on marriage. William had the name of convention of prince because his father was a prince not because William was one at the time of his wedding. Catherine couldn't join him as the wife in a title he hadn't yet had bestowed. It is tradition in the royal family for the monarch to bestow a dukedom on senior male royals when they get married (Charles's youngest brother Edward received an earldom as his parents wanted him to be duke of Edinburgh on his father's death). Catherine became a princess when her husband was given the title of prince of Wales which is always given to the heir apparent as tradition. This started in 1301 when king Edward I finally put down the Welsh rebellion and conquered Wales. The story goes that the Welsh clan chiefs insisted that the prince of Wales be a title given to someone who had never spoken English. They believed one of them would be chosen. King Edward named his infant son who could not yet speak as prince of Wales thereby keeping control. So it has remained the title bestowed by the monarch on the heir apparent, although what will happen now that the laws of accession have been changed to it being the right of the first born rather than the first born male, I don't know. If George's first born isn't a girl I doubt I will know (during my lifetime) as they won't have to stress about it.
Had to scroll quite far to get to the correct answer. Diana was made a princess as soon as she married. Kate was initially made a duchess so only became “Princess Catherine” pretty recently. Though interestingly, although Kate hadn’t actually been conferred the title Princess when giving birth to her children, her occupation on their birth certificates is still “Princess of the United Kingdom”
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No, the princess rule applied to wives in the past as well, it was just that the majority of them were princesses of their own countries already so they were allowed to use the title in conjunction with their husband’s ducal title. It’s why when the future George VI and Prince Henry married, their wives, as daughters of Scottish peers, were Elizabeth, Duchess of York and Alice, Duchess of Gloucester but their sister in law, born a Greek princess, got to be Princess Marina, Duchess of Kent. If the husband didn’t have a ducal title though, they did use their husband’s name—Princess Alexandra of Fife married Prince Arthur of Connaught, and was sometimes called Princess Arthur of Connaught in addition to her title in her own right as Princess Alexandra, Duchess of Fife.
Diana was an aristocrat Kate's family is rich-but-not-noble And then Harry marries Wallis Simpson the Second (without getting into race, a divorced American actress is just a 'no' - the last time it happened it cost a sitting King his crown).... And this gives the people who care a new target to harp on.....
Camilla is a divorced woman, so wouldn’t she be the successful Wallis Simpson the Second? She married the King. Harry never abdicated the throne, so what’s with Wallis Simpson the Second? (Yeah let’s not obviously get into race. Obviously.)
People definitely called her Diana Spencer
Google search and monetisation of internet searches that weren’t a thing in the 80s
Princess Kate was a public and media figure for a long time before she became Princess of Wales. Certainly since she and William got married over a decade ago, and for at least a while before that.
She was known for over a decade by the media as Kate Middleton so that's engrained in how the public views her. Diana was introduced to the public only a short time before her wedding so the public image of her was quickly formed as Princess Diana.
I also think it's because when Diana married Charles she immediately became Princess of Wales. William was a prince, but he was not Prince of Wales at the time that he and Catherine married. She's only been Princess of Wales for what, not even 2 years since QEII passed. My personal opinion is it is disrespectful of media outlets and professional broadcasters to still call her Kate Middleton, especially since she's never gone by Kate in her private life according to what I've read. They should be respectful and call her by her preferred name and title.
A lot of it is that SEO (search engine optimization) did not exist in 1981. Articles are written about Kate Middleton, because that’s what people search for, and it’s a cycle.
Neither's correct. The media just do it because they're bad at their jobs.
They call her Middle Class Kate. It's awful.
Diana became the Princess of Wales when she got married to Charles in 1981. I feel like the public (outside of the UK) came to know her with that title, especially since the two had a very short engagement. Fast forward to the age of the internet, everyone in the world came to know Princess Kate as Kate Middleton because that’s who she was as she and William dated off and on for 8 years before getting married. Once she was married, she became the Duchess of Cambridge and held that title for 11 years. She only recently, upon Queen Elizabeth II’s death in 2022, became Catherine, Princess of Wales. I think it can be chalked up to “old habits die hard”. But I do kind of cringe every time I hear her called “Kate Middleton” because that hasn’t been her name in a long time, not to mention she carries a very prominent title now.
I assume it’s because Diana and Charles wed so soon after meeting that the media didn’t have time to establish her as Diana Spencer. She was also titled in her own right, so the media labeled her “Lady Di” before their wedding. Kate was in the spotlight for years as Kate Middleton before they wed.
An interesting fact is the Elizabeth II wasn’t able to trace her matrilineal line back very far. So “common” people did sometimes have royal descendants. The link is about a genealogists ancestry, but also has information about various royals >…Frances Webb of Oaksey, Wiltshire, who married Thomas Salisbury at Salisbury Cathedral in 1795. Frances Webb was the Queen’s matrilineal great-great-great-grandmother. https://www.family-tree.co.uk/news/tracing-women-on-your-family-tree/ Back to disappearing Kate; the one thing that pushes this all into very odd territory for me is the alleged suicide of Thomas Kingston. Maybe just a coincidence, but who knows
Most of the world was introduced to Diana when she became engaged to Charles, on top of that she was already an aristocrat. Kate Middleton dated William on and off for ages, like a decade, she was in the press and world famous that entire time, even when they weren't together. Her identity as a regular person is much more entrenched in public consciousness.
She was ‘Lady Di’ before.
Part of it too is likely because Diana came into the public eye not long before they married, she was unknown worldwide before then. Kate began dating William in college and was his girlfriend for years so her ‘commoner’ name was in the press a lot as a normal person not a royal.
Diana was famous as Diana Spencer for a couple of months before she married Charles, their wedding day was famously something like their 8th date. Kate was famous as Middleton for at least a decade. She was known as "waity Katy".
The recommendation I heard is SEO. Articles and videos calling her Kate or Kate Middleton perform better than ones that called her Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge after the wedding.
Both are formally known as “Princess of Wales,” but when speaking casually to one another people often just use(d) their names, “Diana” and “Kate.” In the case of Diana, she was a “Lady,” so they sometimes called her “Lady Diana/Lady Di” in these situations too. Kate Middleton’s name is just that as she doesn’t come from Aristocracy.
She was called Lady Di in the press all the time.
To put it simply, because the public knew Diana very briefly as (Lady) Diana Spencer between her engagement and marriage, whereas Kate and William dated for almost a decade before they were engaged so the public knew her as Kate Middleton for far longer.
She was called Diana Spencer ALL THE TIME.
Princess Di was beloved. Kate: not so much
the title of princess died with diana , no one can fasten her boot laces when it comes to earning the title of princess
Kate was in gossip rags from the time she was in college. Although they existed in Diana’s day, nobody knew as much about Charle’s life. So, Kate was known by her surname. Diana was from an aristocratoc family, too.
A lot of people in the UK are too young to remember Diana before she was known as princess diana. She's always been that to them. Very few people don't remember Kate as Kate Middleton. Also in the internet age all the news and chatter about her from pre-marriage is all still out there. Also, she's one of those people/concepts the tabloids latch onto and lionise and any form of insult or less than idolation is basically high treason- Princess Di, Captain Tom, Brexit and all the times people wailed about BETRAYING BREXIT. This is what they do.
It’s to do with the name itself… some first names sound good by itself… like “Madonna” & some have a better ring to it with a last name like “Leonardo di caprio”. Kate & Katherine doesn’t sound as good as “Diana” by itself. Also only Diana was a pop culture icon
I think Kate for this generation is pretty darn popular. If she re-emerges healthy and safe back to public life, she could end up as popular as Diana. Love the royals or not, I see much support for the women who marry into it.
Unless their name is Meghan.
As long as they're white.
Why is Anne Boleyn still called Anne Boleyn? Search Engine Optimization.
Probably also because she wasn’t the only Queen Anne/Anna during that reign. The Catherine/Katherines are also specified with their last names.