Diana's age at time of marriage.

[Peedoffo]

I'm in my 20s so I really don't remember Diana. I did more reading on the subject and I can't believe the establishment thought it was ok to marry a 19 year old off to a man 13 years older than her who had no interest in her. No wonder she struggled this was the 1980s as well not the Victorian times! Could anyone around then tell me , why did her family back/support the marriage? Was there any concerns from the public ? I would be horrified at the thought of marrying my DD off at 19 to a much older man who wasn't really interest.

They got married 40 years ago. I don't think it's possible to really comprehend how different the world was back then if you didn't live through it.

I think there was a wide range of cultural norms at the time, and the Charles/Di marriage was a vestige of an antiquated viewpoint. My parents lived together prior to marriage in the late 70s- and they met at church, and my grandfather was a vicar! Several of their friends and my aunt did too. I'm sure there were a few eyebrows raised, but even then it was starting to become the norm in the educated middle class at least.

Times have really changed and I think people who didn't live through that period will find it hard to believe how different things were then

Im in my mid 60’s and agree with you. In fact I quite often find myself saying to my children (some of them are in their 40’s) honestly, you just don’t know what it was like in those days.

Some strange comments here! I was 15 when she got married and was a bit horrified at the marriage. She seemed like a relatively young women marrying an old fogey. No one I knew saw it as romantic or aspirational. No wonder it ended the way it did.

Everyone was a punk, right? Everyone?

I also raised my eyebrows at the poster who said we were punks and our parents hippies! I liked punk music -wouldn't say I was a punk, I worked in an accountant's office! - but no-one else I actually knew like it. And the idea of my parents, or the parents of anyone I knew, being hippies is laughable.

My friends and I were all married by about 19/20 at a similar time

My mum was 17 and married a 27 year old, they were together until dad died.

Diana was aware of Camilla from what I've read and really wasn't sure about going through with it (on the day) - but her sisters told her it was too late to pull out.

Standing with the posters who are saying social norms are more to do with the class and cash and race group(s) you’re in than time, certainly only 40 years back.

The royal family are their own group; only recently have they tried to be middle class. Toffs like Diana, in theirs, and right at the top of it. She was an aristocrat with money, a rare beast even then, and her family were courtiers. They knew the score.

Her being obnoxious is the reason she is disliked so much.

Self absorbed (Mandela comparison), saying she was once “ugly with frizzy hair and a gap in her teeth” (throwing an entire race under the bus, yes because straight European hair is where beauty lies, right Meghan?), the lies in interviews (woe is me, again the self absorbed character trait).

And in terms of her race, this is where she is now (the birthplace of banning interracial marriage):

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miscegenation#United_States

No. Not at all. I was very afraid of them actually.

The point I was trying to make was not that people in the 50s were socially or sexually repressed. It was that in some aristocratic circles there was still very much a view that you married for position and titles and divorce was frowned upon in those circles. I was particularly referring to the Queen Mother and Diana's grandmother.

I also don't think that people in 2022 are necessarily more enlightened!

She was expected to produce a male heir and had to keep having children until she had given birth to Diana's brother.

She did have a son before Diana who sadly died at a few hours old.

I wonder if there was some disappointment when Diana was born?

And then of course possible the "celebration" when her brother was?

Given that there was only a decade between hippies and punks, it would have been highly irregular if punks had hippy parents.

Omg, I'm a smudge older than William
Could you imagine the news channels this century covering whether Kate had been medically confirmed a virgin???

Prince Philip was actually 18 and spent the encounter where she first really noticed him jumping over tennis nets, apparently. She seemed to quickly develop a massive crush on him but they barely saw each other for quite some while.

I think your use of the word "grooming" between 2 teenagers who were pretty certainly not having sex until much later later diminishes what it actually means for a lot of children and young people.

Simply because he needed a blue blooded brood mare to continue the line. You know nothing of history do you? He already had Camilla and he loved her. He had no reason to like Diana let alone love her. She was a vessel to produce çhildren pure and simple. You need to read a bit more about the history of royal families across the world.

No it wasn't....

I though Diana was meant to have said that ‘I knew I had to keep myself tidy for what lay ahead’ and taken as meaning she knew she would marry into the Royal Family. It might very well be apocryphal

Keep herself ‘tidy, ie not losing her virginity.

Diana had no idea she was going to marry into the Royal Family.

It was.
People married younger, but someone close to their own age.

Once her sister had bottled it, she must have known it was on the cards. The Spencers wanted Charles for one of their girls. They didn’t seem to care which one.

I think your use of the word "grooming" between 2 teenagers who were pretty certainly not having sex until much later later diminishes what it actually means for a lot of children and young people.

18 year old bloke pursues 13 year old girl ? I'll say it again. If you were to remove the names and places, nobody wouldn't call it grooming

Might explain Prince Andrews predictions. Who knows ?

@Blossomtoes You talk as if Charles and the Royal Family had no say in the matter. They had the power. And he had other girlfriends after her sister.

Her grandma Lady Fermoy tried to talk her out of the wedding.

Are you sure? I thought it was the exact opposite.

The asymmetry of power. 'Twas ever thus.