That’s why Kate Middleton has to bow to Beatrice and Eugenie of York

the real protocol rules they may seem downright bizarre to mere mortals. Bow and curtsey, to say, in the eyes of a “plebeian” they are salamilecchi of other times. But for the members of the British royal family these are daily and very topical gestures. And the future regina consort Kate Middleton is no exception. Indeed, the Duchess he must bow to almost all the other Windsors, including Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie of York, who are also younger than her. “Blame” for Middleton’s bourgeois origins. Kate is forced to curtsey to Andrea and Sarah Ferguson’s daughters because they are “Princesses of blood”.

So he established Elizabeth II updating the so-called “Order of Precedence”, in 2012, following the entry into the royal family of Kate. According to the document, which is said to have circulated informally among members of the royal family, when the Duchess of Cambridge is in the company of the prince William things change: then it’s up to Beatrice and Eugenie to bow before Middleton. As William being of the higher rank of the two cousins, Sarah Ferguson’s daughters must show respect to both him and his wife. In William’s presence, Kate must bow down only in front of regina and his children Carlo, Anna, Andrea ed Edoardo. And he had to do it in the presence of Duke of Edinburgh, who died at 99 last April. One day, when she becomes queen consort, the Duchess of Cambridge will not have to bend over backwards in front of anyone. It will be all the august relatives to pay her reverence. With or without a husband at the side.

The rigid (and complicated) bowing protocol of course did not rule out, before the Megxit, either Meghan Markle. In the famous bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey, Harry’s wife revealed that before joining the royal family she hadn’t documented much about the Windsor label. Like this he found he had to bow to the queen just a few minutes before their first meeting in private at the Palace. Amazed Meghan said to Harry: “But it’s your grandmother!”. He answered her: “She is the queen”. ‘ Providential that day was the intervention of Sarah Ferguson, who showed Markle how to make a perfect curtsy.

In theory, therefore, royalty must bow to those of higher rank even when they are in the family. An anachronistic rule that, according to royal watchers, no one now respects. Kate Middleton, to say, technically it should do curtsy to his three children George, Charlotte e Louis, all three “royals by blood”, even inside the house. A decidedly unlikely scenario.

Little George and Charlotte, 8 and 6 years old, for their part have the obligation, at least in public, to bow in front of the great-grandmother queen. As historian Marlene Eilers Koenig explained, royal babies begin to bow to Her Majesty from the age of five onwards. And they have always respected tradition. For instance Eugenie of York, when he was 7 years old, was immortalized by photographers while doing their utmost in one clumsy and funny reverence to Queen Mother. Behind her, her sister Beatrice and their father, Prince Andrew, watched the scene smiling.