Prince Harry and Meghan Markle‘s decision to name their daughter Lilibet has long divided opinion in royal circles.
But it seems her namesake, the late Queen Elizabeth II, was completely on board with it, according to a royal author. Lilibet was the Queen’s childhood nickname, an intimate moniker only used by those closest to her.
Speaking on HELLO!‘s A Right Royal Podcast, author Gyles Brandreth, a close friend of the late monarch, said the Queen responded to the news as any great-grandmother would.
Gyles, who is the author of the new book, Elizabeth: An Intimate Portrait, said the Queen had a very heartwarming reaction when she was told of the name, responding: “That’s lovely.”
He said: “I do know that when she heard they were calling her Lili, she said, ‘Oh that’s lovely. Lili, that’s lovely, isn’t it?’ There was no confusion. In a way, to picture the Queen you’ve got to think of a country woman of her generation. You’ve got to think of a grandmother. So her response would be a grandmother’s response.“
To hear the full details of the Queen’s reaction, you can listen to the latest episode of A Right Royal Podcast, below:
Princess Lilibet, now four, is the younger sister of Prince Archie, six, and Harry and Meghan’s only daughter. She was born on 4 June 2021 at the Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital in California.
Lilibet only met the late Queen once, during her Platinum Jubilee celebrations in June 2022, a few months before she passed away aged 96.
Queen Elizabeth II’s role as grandmother
Queen Elizabeth had eight grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren, with two more arriving after she passed away.
Speaking to HELLO!, Gyles said that the Queen was “told” rather than “asked” about Lilibet’s name. But he said: “I’m sure if she felt no, she could have said no. But she went along with it, because she was a nice, decent person.”
© GettyStill, recollections varied over how it came about, with Gyles explaining in his book: “According to the Sussexes, Harry sought his grandmother’s permission to use her intimate family nickname as the Christian name for her eleventh great-grandchild. The Queen’s recollection was a little different.
“According to the Queen, Harry told her the Sussexes wanted to call the baby ‘Lilibet’ in her honour and she accepted their choice with a good grace, taking it as the compliment it was intended to be.”
He added: “Others in the family found the choice ‘bewildering’ and ‘rather presumptuous’ given that ‘Lilibet’ as a name had always been intimately and exclusively the Queen’s. Later the Queen said, ‘I hear they’re calling her Lili which is very pretty and seems just right.”
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