Royal brides: a class act?
Ann Lyon |
Kate Middleton is the first royal bride from outside the aristocracy to marry a man in the direct line of succession. However, three of the Queen's four children have married outside the aristocracy: the Princess Royal and Mark Phillips and then Timothy Laurence; the Duke of York and Sarah Ferguson; the Earl of Wessex and Sophie Rhys-Jones. More distant members of the Royal Family have been marrying outside the aristocracy since the early 1960s, when Princess Margaret, the Queen's sister, married Antony Armstrong-Jones (created Earl of Snowdon) and Edward, Duke of Kent, the Queen's first cousin, married Katharine Worsley, of a Yorkshire landowning family. It seems a natural step for the next Queen Consort but one to be middle class.
Traditionally, royalty married royalty, or at least the daughters of powerful families whose fathers and brothers (it was hoped) would support them and strengthen their position. An example of the latter is Edward the Confessor (1042-66), who married Eadgyth, daughter of Earl Godwin and sister of the future Harold II. Edward's position was precarious, as he had spent most of his life in exile in Normandy, and was scarcely known in England. To marry the daughter of much the most powerful man in the country made very good political sense. On succeeding Edward, Harold put aside his 'hand-fast' wife, also named Eadgyth (the marriage was not recognised by the Church), and married the sister of his two main domestic rivals, the brothers Edwin, Earl of Mercia and Morcar, Earl of Northumbria.
After the Norman Conquest, the eldest sons of kings almost invariably married foreign royalty, while their sisters and younger brothers often married English heiresses. Edward III's second son, Lionel, Duke of Clarence, married Elizabeth de Burgh, heiress of the Earl of Ulster, while the third son, John of Gaunt, married Blanche of Lancaster, heiress to the Duchy of Lancaster, and the fifth son, Thomas, Duke of Gloucester, married Eleanor de Bohun, another great heiress. A foreign bride was sought for their eldest brother, the Black Prince, but he married a cousin, Joan, Countess of Kent.
Kings who ascended the throne as bachelors sought foreign brides, usually the daughters of foreign kings in order to forge alliances. Edward II married Isabella of France, daughter of Philip the Fair. Richard II's first wife was Anne of Bohemia, daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV, and his second wife was Isabella of Valois, daughter of Charles VI of France. Here Richard took marrying for the purpose of securing alliances to extreme - his bride was only seven years old!
The notable exception is King Edward IV (1461-83). While his cousin and leading supporter, Warwick 'the Kingmaker' set off for France to negotiate a suitable marriage with a relation of Louis XI, Edward fell deeply in love with Elizabeth Woodville, a widow from a family of modest means, and married her in secret, severely embarrassing Warwick by announcing at a meeting of the King's Council that he could not marry the lady chosen for him, because he was already betrothed. This set off a chain of events that led to Warwick's rebellion and Edward's temporary deposition during 1470-71.
After 1603, marriage with foreign royalty became the rule, with the exception of James, Duke of York, brother and heir presumptive to Charles II, who hastily married Anne Hyde, daughter of the Earl of Clarendon, in September 1660, because she was pregnant. When the child died shortly after birth James sought to repudiate the marriage, and he and Anne remained unhappily united until her death in 1671. Their two surviving children, Mary and Anne, both became Queens Regnant. James then made a more conventional marriage to Mary of Modena, of a leading Italian family.
In the 19th century, a breach in this practice began when Queen Victoria's fourth daughter, Princess Louise, married John Campbell, Marquess of Lorne, future 9th Duke of Argyll. Her niece, also named Louise and daughter of Edward VII, married Alexander Duff, Earl of Fife (created a Duke by Queen Victoria) in 1889. These were females with brothers, so they or their children were unlikely to succeed to the throne.
At about the same time, royalty began to choose their partners, rather than having their marriages arranged, though they still found love among other royal families. In the winter of 1904-05, Arthur, Duke of Connaught, third son of Queen Victoria, visited Spain with his wife and two daughters because King Alfonso XIII (1886-1931) had shown interest in Princess Patricia. The interest did not last, and the Connaughts went on to official duties in Egypt, where their elder daughter, Princess Margaret, met another visitor, Prince Gustav of Sweden, later King Gustav VI. The two fell in love and married in Stockholm a few months later.
It was the marriage of Albert, Duke of York, later King George VI, to Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, daughter of the 14th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorn, which really broke new ground. The parallels with Kate Middleton are clear. Here was the second in line to the throne marrying a commoner (though his elder brother was then expected to marry and father children, which would move the Duke and his issue down the line of succession). As Prince William and Kate Middleton met at university and became friends before they fell in love, so the future King and Queen met as children and fell in love through moving in the same social circles.
In both cases the decision to marry came after heart-searching on one side at least because of the burden of royal duties - Elizabeth refused Albert twice before accepting his proposal. William was by all accounts slow to propose to Kate, and the couple even separated for a brief period. Kate is by contemporary standards an 'ordinary' woman, so too was Elizabeth in 1923. One reason for Elizabeth's immediate popularity was the public perception that her family had shared fully in the burdens of the First World War. Her parents had turned Glamis Castle into a convalescent home; and her four elder brothers had volunteered in 1914, one was killed and another missing for a considerable period. It was Elizabeth who initiated the tradition of royal brides laying their wedding bouquets on the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior. Will Kate follow her example?
Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother was a most 'successful' royal consort. Though we think of her now as she was during her long widowhood, with her enthusiasm for the Cheltenham races and other entertainments, nonetheless she participated to the full in the 'public service monarchy' of the twentieth century, provided huge support to her husband and then her daughter, and had that indefinable 'common touch' which made her popular with the public.
There has been much media discussion about the similarities between Kate Middleton and Diana, Princess of Wales. Diana was an Earl's daughter, but seen by many as an 'ordinary' woman, since she worked in a kindergarten and shared a flat with two friends. A critical difference is that her marriage to the Prince of Wales was to some degree arranged, whereas William and Kate found one another and made the decision to marry for themselves. They have had eight years and more to get to know one another properly, whereas Charles and Diana knew one another for a matter of months before they became engaged.
Diana is a figure of mythology, was hugely charismatic in her lifetime, but also divisive. She was young at the time of her marriage and, perhaps as a consequence of her parents' acrimonious divorce, emotionally dependent. Kate is almost a decade older and from a united family. It is to be hoped that she will be a 'uniting' figure for the monarchy.
Please note: Views expressed are those of the author.About the author
