Meghan Markle’s biographer believes she was mistaken about her son’s royal title after her bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey in March.
During the couple’s two-hour interview with Oprah Winfrey on CBS in March, the Duchess of Sussex opened up about why her and Prince Harry’s son isn’t a prince.
In the interview, Meghan, 39, said that her son Archie was entitled to a royal title, but that the policy had been revised shortly before his birth.
According to a new article, Omid Scobie, co-author of “Finding Freedom,” the Duchess of Sussex may have misinterpreted royal rules when she said that Archie was not declared a prince owing to a shift of policy and was treated differently than his cousins.
During the interview, Meghan, who is expecting the couple’s second child, revealed that the royal family had discussed if the child will be given a title, telling Winfrey: “They were saying they didn’t want him to be a prince or princess, not knowing what the gender would be, which would be different from protocol, and that he wasn’t going to receive security.”
“This went on for the last few months of our pregnancy where I was going, hold on for a second.”
“They said [he’s not going to get security], because he’s not going to be a Prince,” Meghan, who is said to have secretly congratulated William and Kate on their wedding anniversary, added.
“Okay, well, he needs to be safe, so we’re not saying don’t make him a Prince or Princess, but if you’re saying the title is going to affect that protection, we haven’t created this monster machine around us in terms of clickbait and tabloid fodder, which means our son needs to be safe.”
Meghan clarified that while the “grandeur around this stuff is not really important to me,” she thought it was important for him to have a title to “be safe.”
Archie, who turns two this month, does not have a royal title like Prince William’s children, Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis.
The duchess, according to Omid Scobie, co-author of Finding Freedom, may have misunderstood the royal custom that governs who gets a title.
“If we are only going by what Meghan said to Oprah and what the palace have said so far about the situation with Archie, perhaps one can assume that Meghan was wrong in her interpretation of it,” said Scobie, whose remarks are featured in Discovery’s latest documentary “Harry and Meghan: Recollections May Vary.”
“But we also know that there is much more to this story that we don’t know about,” he continued.
Royal scholars have since said that Archie is not yet entitled to be a Prince or Princess.
“When Charles becomes King, Archie will be able to use the title of HRH Prince,” royal historian Carolyn Harris told Town and Country Mag.
“But it is possible that he will not use this title. Archie will not be able to pass the title of Prince or Princess to his children as they will be another generation removed from the sovereign, but the title of Duke of Sussex will pass to Prince Harry’s male line descendants.”
HRH titles are only given to the monarch’s children and grandchildren, as well as the Prince of Wales’ eldest grandson, according to rules developed in 1917.
Only the descendants of the monarch in direct line of succession, as well as the eldest son of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales, is allowed to use the titles of prince or princess and HRH, according to a Letters Patent issued by King George V in 1917.
The Queen, though, released new Letters Patent in 2012, declaring that any of Prince William and Kate Middleton’s children will be entitled to the title of prince or princess.
Archie is entitled to a prince title when Prince Charles, Prince Harry’s father, becomes king, according to the 1917 letter, since he would be the monarch’s grandchild. The couple’s daughter would also be entitled to the title princess at this point.
During Meghan’s interview with Winfrey, though, she said that the royal family tried to amend the rules so that Archie might never be given a title, telling the TV host, “They want to change the convention for Archie.”
