Questions arise over Harry and Meghan naming their daughter Lilibet
A Royals Extra bulletin for all my subscribers
There is a mighty kerfuffle at the moment in London newspapers over a story from a new book by Robert Hardman, a veteran reporter on the royal family. It concerns the decision made by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex to name their daughter “Lilibet,” the pet name for Queen Elizabeth II from her childhood to her death at age ninety-six in 2022. Prince Harry insisted at the time of his daughter’s birth in June 2021 that “Granny” was fine with their name appropriation. “The duke spoke with his family in advance of the announcement,” said a spokesperson for Harry and Meghan. “In fact, his grandmother was the first family member he called. During that conversation, he shared their hope of naming their daughter Lilibet in her honour. Had she not been supportive, they would not have used the name.” They also said that although Lilibet was their daughter’s given name, they would nickname her “Lili.”
Harry and Meghan’s decision struck many people around the Queen as presumptuous, but the Palace refrained from comment. A book about Queen Elizabeth II published by Gyles Brandreth in 2022 seemed to reinforce the Sussexes’ version of events. According to Brandreth, the Queen didn’t mind having a granddaughter named Lilibet. “I hear they’re calling her ‘Lili,’ which is very pretty and seems just right,” Brandreth quotes her as saying.
“As angry as I’d ever seen her”
Now comes a contradictory account from Hardman, who quotes a senior Palace source asserting that the late Queen was “as angry as I’d ever seen her” when Harry and Meghan said she approved of the name. The new book also says that the couple threatened a libel lawsuit against the BBC for reporting that Harry and Meghan didn’t ask the Queen if they could use Lilibet. But according to Hardman, “When the Sussexes tried to co-opt the Palace into propping up their version of events, they were rebuffed.” Added the author, “Those noisy threats of legal action duly evaporated and the libel actions against the BBC never materialized.”
This seems as good a moment as any to clarify how “Lilibet” originated, why it was so special, and who called her by that name.
When the future Queen Elizabeth II was born on April 21, 1926, her parents, then the Duke and Duchess of York, had to seek the King’s permission for her name. Six days after her birth, they told George V that they had chosen Elizabeth Alexandra Mary—honoring her mother Elizabeth, her grandmother Queen Mary, and her great-grandmother Queen Alexandra. “I am sure there will be no muddle over two Elizabeths in the family,” the duke wrote. “We are so anxious for her first name to be Elizabeth as it is such a nice name & there has been no one of that name in your family for a long time. Elizabeth of York sounds so nice too.”
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“I quite approve,” the King wrote back, adding that he didn’t think having two Elizabeths would be a problem. It was the little princess herself who solved any question of confusion by coming up a name that was easier to pronounce. “Liliebeth is her own name for herself,” wrote Anne Ring, a pseudonym for Beryl Poignand, a former governess and longtime confidante of the Duchess of York. Under the guiding hand of the duchess, Poignand described the name’s origin in The Story of Princess Elizabeth Told with the Sanction of Her Parents, when Lilibet was four years old.
“Lilibet walk Self”
Another authorized royal biographer, Lady Cynthia Asquith, echoed Poignand. “The first time I visited Princess Elizabeth,” Asquith wrote, “she was very very young—still at the engaging stage of having to plant each foot in turn upon the same step all the way down the stairs, swaying in her gait, and talking of herself in the third person. `Lilibet walk Self,’ `Lilibet thut door Self.’”
King George V first mentioned his granddaughter’s nickname shortly after her second birthday, when he wrote in his diary on May 5th, 1928, “Little ‘Lilibet’ came for a short time.” Several weeks later, “Lilibet” also began appearing in the diaries of Queen Mary that I read in the Royal Archives at Windsor Castle, along with those of her husband.
The moniker soon gained traction in public. Time put the princess on its cover for her third birthday, although the magazine didn’t get the spelling quite right, calling her “P’incess Lilybet.” But the actual use of the nickname remained strictly within the family: only her grandparents, parents, sister, husband, cousins, aunts, and uncles called her Lilibet. Not even her close friends—and I interviewed a number of them—dared the familiarity of Lilibet. Countless other little girls have carried the name since then, but there was only one Lilibet.