{"id":149137,"date":"2025-06-01T09:47:12","date_gmt":"2025-06-01T09:47:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/149137\/"},"modified":"2025-06-01T09:47:12","modified_gmt":"2025-06-01T09:47:12","slug":"prince-harry-considered-changing-his-familys-surname-amid-feud-with-king-charles-and-prince-william","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/149137\/","title":{"rendered":"Prince Harry \u2018considered changing his family\u2019s surname\u2019 amid feud with King Charles and Prince William"},"content":{"rendered":"

Prince Harry was considering changing his surname to Spencer, his mother Princess Diana’s maiden name, as his apparent rift with King Charles and Prince William deepens. <\/p>\n

The Duke of Sussex is thought to have sought the aid of his uncle, Earl Charles Spencer, in his attempt to drop his current family name, Mountbatten-Windsor. <\/p>\n

It is understood Harry had addressed the issue with Earl Spencer during a trip to the UK, reported the Daily Mail. <\/p>\n

However, Earl Spencer quickly threw cold water on his nephew’s idea \u2013 citing the apparently daunting legal issues in making the change.<\/p>\n

\"Prince<\/p>\n

Prince Harry investigated adopting his mother’s maiden name amid his feud with King Charles and Prince William <\/p>\n

Getty<\/p>\n

If successful, it would have seen Harry\u2019s and his wife Meghan Markle\u2019s children, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, change their names to Spencer too. <\/p>\n

News of the proposal comes at an awkward time for the duke given the apparent rift between him and the rest of the Royal Family. <\/p>\n

In 1960, the late Queen Elizabeth II and her husband Prince Philip decided that Mountbatten-Windsor would be the surname given to descendants their direct decedents. <\/p>\n

It combines the Royal Family’s name of Windsor, changed from the historic Saxe-Coburg-Gotha in 1917, and the former Duke of Edinburgh’s adopted surname. <\/p>\n

\"Prince<\/p>\n

Harry is thought to have approached Earl Charles Spencer, the brother his late mother Princess Diana, about the change <\/p>\n

Getty<\/p>\n

The development will most likely come as a particular disappointment to King Charles, who is known to regard his family name with the same pride and adoration as his own father, Prince Phillip. <\/p>\n

Mountbatten as a royal surname originates with the 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, who was a mentor to Phillip and a close confidant of his great-nephew and the-then Prince of Wales, King Charles. <\/p>\n

Philip took on the Mountbatten name when he renounced his Greek and Danish royal titles and became a naturalised British subject in 1947. <\/p>\n

Evidently, names and titles are not just a sensitive subject for King Charles but also for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex \u2013 titles that were granted on their 2018 wedding day by the late Queen. <\/p>\n

\"Queen<\/p>\n

Mountbatten-Windsor was chosen as the name available to the direct descendants of the late Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip in 1960<\/p>\n

Getty<\/p>\n

Further naming disputes became apparent earlier this year during an episode of the Duchess\u2019 Netflix show, With Love, Meghan. <\/p>\n

In a viral moment from episode two, actress Mindy Kaling reminisced about childhood dining habits, joking: “People wouldn’t believe that Meghan Markle ate at Jack in the Box.” <\/p>\n

Meghan took the opportunity to correct the actress over her preferred surname. <\/p>\n

“It’s so funny, too, that you keep saying, ‘Meghan Markle.’ You know, I’m Sussex now.”<\/p>\n

\"Meghan<\/p>\n

A hypothetical name change would have an impact on Harry and Meghan’s children, , Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet<\/p>\n

Getty<\/p>\n

The Duchess then explained the significance of the name change, adding: “You have kids, and you go, ‘No, I share my name with my children.'”<\/p>\n

“I didn’t know how meaningful it would be to me but it just means so much to go ‘This is OUR family name. Our little family name,'” she insisted. <\/p>\n

Kaling appeared to take the correction in stride, nodding in agreement and responding: “Now I know, and I love it.”<\/p>\n

Meghan sparked controversy more recently with the claims she had been using the HRH title privately \u201cfor years,\u201d despite an agreement with Buckingham Palace not to do so.<\/p>\n

The debate intensified when a gift basket she sent to a friend appeared on a podcast, bearing a printed message from “HRH The Duchess of Sussex”.<\/p>\n

\"Meghan<\/p>\n

Meghan previously made headlines by insisting her and her children’s preferred family name was Sussex<\/p>\n

Netflix<\/p>\n

After stepping down as working royals in 2020, Harry and Meghan\u2019s HRH titles were subsequently put into abeyance and removed from the Royal Family’s website. <\/p>\n

Palace courtiers believed the couple had from then on agreed not to use their titles in any form, “out of respect”. <\/p>\n

However, sources close to the Duke and Duchess insist they interpreted things differently. <\/p>\n

The Sussexes believe they simply agreed not to use HRH for commercial purposes. Their understanding is that their titles remain, and they are free to use them in private settings. <\/p>\n

The Duchess has referred to herself as HRH “ever since they relocated to the US, on private letters, gifts and invitations”, according to reports in the Telegraph.<\/p>\n

GB News has approached the Duke of Sussex’s representatives for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Prince Harry was considering changing his surname to Spencer, his mother Princess Diana’s maiden name, as his apparent…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":149138,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7708],"tags":[63457,447,5105,7710,519,448,978],"class_list":{"0":"post-149137","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-royals","8":"tag-earl-charles-spencer","9":"tag-prince-harry","10":"tag-royal","11":"tag-royal-families","12":"tag-royal-family","13":"tag-royals","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114607478980564324","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149137\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/149138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=149137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=149137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}