Zara Tindall may ‘turn down’ offer from Queen says expert

Zara Tindall, 39, and her husband Mike are often praised for their down to earth ways and while the couple are regulars at Royal Family events neither of them are working members of the monarchy. That’s because Zara’s mother Princess Anne, 70, rejected royal titles for both her children, choosing to raise them as private citizens instead.

Zara and her brother Peter Phillips, 42, have previously praised their parents for raising them outside the royal bubble and in some ways, they have their father to thank.

Speaking to the Times in 2015, Zara said: “I’m very lucky that both my parents decided to not use the title and we grew up and did all the things that gave us the opportunity to do.”

Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips tied the knot in 1973 and it was a decision they made on their wedding day that ultimately led them to not give their children titles, an expert has claimed.

In keeping with royal tradition, the Queen usually offers her children’s spouses royal titles when they marry into the monarchy.

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But Captain Phillips rejected the Queen’s gift of a royal title on his wedding day.

Constitutional expert Iain MacMarthanne told Express.co.uk: “In 1973, the then Princess Anne married Captain Mark Phillips and at that juncture both refused a title for Captain Phillips.

“It in effect meant that any children born of the marriage would pass through life without a title.

“With the birth of their son Peter in 1977, and daughter Zara 1981, they continued to eschew titles for the grandchildren of the Queen.”

According to Mr MacMarthanne, Princess Anne and Captain Phillips went on to set a new royal precedent by later rejecting titles for their children.

“There had been an earlier precedent of this decision when Princess Alexandra of Kent married Angus Ogilvy, and they too had refused a title.

“However, in the case of Anne, this was the first time that the child of a sovereign had taken this decision.”

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He added: “Earlier, in 1960, when Princess Margaret, daughter of George VI, married Antony Armstrong-Jones he received and accepted the Earldom of Snowdon prior to the birth of their first child, a son, who would take the courtesy title Viscount Linley.”

When did Princess Anne and Mark Phillips divorce?

Princess Anne and Mark Phillips finalised their divorce in 1992.

Anne went on to marry her current husband Timothy Laurence just months later.

Will Zara’s royal baby take a title?

Zara is currently pregnant with her third child and is expected to give birth in spring.

Zara is already a mum of two and given that neither Lena, two, nor Mia, six, have official titles it seems highly unlikely that her third child will take one.

Zara and Mike live close to Princess Anne on the Gatcombe Park Estate in Gloucestershire.

The stately home and grounds were a wedding gift to Anne from the Queen.

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