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.

I think that Harry looks like Henry VIII. I saw a painting the other day, and the eyes and face shape (under Henry VIII's rolls of fat) were the same.

Yes! I also noticed this very recently now that he is growing older!

They also married on the day/month of Anne Boleyn's execution and there are a number of online articles drawing comparisons between the two women. Henry viii also beheaded one of Markle's ancestors, Lord Hussey.

Ooooo, spooky, @oreste . A possible reincarnation of Henry VIII. Good job Meghan had Archie before Lili or she could have met a sticky end. Hehe.

I was 10 when Di and Charles married. I was too young to think about their age difference in any depth. 9 years on amongst my friendship circle, 19 would have been considered v young to marry and a 12 yr age gap large, especially at ages 19 and 32. I see that statistics show the age of marrying did start to rise after 1983.

My mum was married with a baby at age 22 late sixties and she said she felt too young as her friendship circle didn’t marry and have children for another few years.

I remember Charles comment about whatever love is in his engagement interview and my parents thought it was a bit weird and not said as a joke.

I remember Charles comment about whatever love is in his engagement interview too and I took it to mean that it was 'settling'. It was strange that he said it.

I remember thinking at the time that they did not look like a couple.

My mum got married aged 21 to a man (my dad!) who was ten years older in 1980. My MIL married my FIL when she was 19 and he was 23 in 1983. So marrying at that age wasn't unusual clearly, and add the fact that her family would have welcomed the match from a social standing POV (I think her dad was an equerry to the Queen or something similar? And Diana herself grew up on an shouting estate to Sandringham) ... clearly it was all just a bit more socially acceptable than it would be now. All gross though, I agree.

Marrying when young was more common. That age gap was not common.

Charles used to be referred to as the playboy prince and at one time was loosely linked to a catholic royal/socialite which was frowned upon by his family. I think people under estimate the different feelings of the 70/80's. It was always expected that POW wife would not have any past which would be questionable for the heirs paternity ( how little did they know)

I remember Diana arriving at the church and getting out of the carriage - I was a bit bemused at how creased the dress was. And no royal bride’s dress since, has been noticeably creased nearly as much as that puffy gown. At least not the weddings I have watched. I also remember thinking the gown was too much. ( But I have always had a very plain clothing style). Diana was young enough, and tall enough, to make the dress work.

The Spencer Family have the Gene as do the RF.

William looks fuck all like Charles
Indeed. Give that thought.

Yes, but PW looks very in the same mold as Peter Phillips, Freddie Windsor etc.

I think so, anyway.

www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/sep/11/freddie-windsor-sophie-winkleman-wedding

She was the daughter of an earl (about as high up as you can get in the aristocracy without being royalty), she had no qualifications, she was ever only raised and expected to 'marry well', as soon as possible.

Charles was the top prize, and I think it was expected that she'd get on with producing the heirs and then sit quietly back cutting ribbons and living in palaces. Love didn't really come into it, and once she'd had her children she could had have a discrete boyfriend. She had no need to live with Charles, just have a public life with him. Her boys were off in the care of nannies and boarding school, so she wasn't tied to her children's needs.

Everyone around her encouraged the marriage, and she had no life experience to judge whether that sort of arrangement would suit her.

If it wasn't Charles, it would have been some other titled man, but I think the media interest in her played into some of the worst aspects of her personality and no one, including her, really knew what to do with her once she became bored and unhappy. Too late she realised just how little say she had in things, and how little power she had to change anything. That made the whole situation so volatile.

But aristocratic marriages don't have the same expectations as normal marriages - the money, the need for heirs and the avoidance of divorce (and therefore having to split family estates) distorts things.

The fact that the glaring problems were not seen as such by either the Mountbatten Windsor family or the Spencers, and both parties allowed themselves to be effectively railroaded into marriage despite personal misgivings, and despite barely knowing each other shows how little the parents' generation understood of marriage - or the most basic elements of human relationships.

All credit to Diana, even at 19 she wanted to bolt on the eve of the wedding, but was very unfortunately persuaded to go ahead with the sham.

Agree with this. Ironically Diana would have been happy living a life like Camilla , not working, having fun with no real expectations other than that she have children and support hubby in public. If she’d married a man who was faithful and loved her that life would have been fine .

Girls / women in certain circles were supposed to go to boarding school, go to Switzerland to be 'finished' and then do 'the season' and preferably find a good 'match'.

Debs only stopped being presented at court in the 1950s.

These days they tend to go to uni but only for certain subjects,

@Morestrangethings I have always thought that the creased dress was a bit like the king's new clothes. No-one quite dared to say that it was a mess at the time although it has been acknowledged by some people since then, I think.

A creased fairytale.

I agree, the big deal taffeta wedding gown was as creased as fuck when she got out of the carriage. Far too much black eyeliner and mascara for her pale complexion IMO.

Diana's fringe was too long and the dress was fussy and worryingly creasy as she got out of the carriage.
I heard an interview with the hairdresser (sorry, can't remember his name). Diana was supposed to have big rollers in, to style the hair. She had a strop and took the rollers out too early. Hence the fringe flopped. That's the hairdresser's version, anyway.

It was the 80s - that was the make up look of the day.

Like many people, I thought the dress was hideous. And Diana's hair didn't sit right at all under that tiara - it seemed to go flat making the fringe look too long.

So much hype around that wedding. The making of that dress was talked about for months prior.

I don't think the dress was hideous. It was the 1980s and the big flouncy wedding dress was fashionable. It didn't suit her particularly well.

Princess Anne's wedding dress in the 1970s was beautiful.

The dress was a perfect analogy of the marriage: fashionably flouncy, designed to make her stand out on tv but totally flawed because no one thought about the practicalities like creasing, or that she wouldn't be able to sit down properly.

I remember thinking it had a kind of nice Laura Ashley type feel to it which at the time was very popular.

( I agree my comment above that few people got university fees paid and taxp ayers who never were able to go funded the fees of the very few who went is an interesting way to look at it, but it is true. People my age mostly did not get any chance to get to university and had no unvierssity fees paid as a consequence whereas today 50% of teenagers get university fees paid (and 100% of those who go - it just always annoys me when people say it was better in the 1980s - it was only better (on university fees) for a very very rare few who got to go to university).