Prince Harry wasn’t treated as well as his brother, Prince William, by the Royal Family, which was a factor in the brothers’ ongoing rift, according to royal historian Robert Lacey.
In a new interview on the podcast Pod Save the Queen, Lacey, whose book Battle of Brothers was released this month, explained that since William is the heir to the British throne and Harry is the “spare” and now sixth-in-line to the throne, their lineage has an impact on the way their family treats them.
“I would say William has been more kindly treated than Harry has been, but that has always been the fate of the spare,” Lacey said. “Harry follows, sadly, in the tradition of Princess Margaret or Prince Andrew as number twos in the system, who are treated harshly by the logic of the royal system which actually favours the main bloodline.”
WATCH: New book details Prince William and Prince Harry’s relationship is rooted in trauma. Story continues below.
“When they are born and are young and children, the spare is always so close to the centre of things and it is their destiny, through life, to be pushed ever outwards,” he continued. Harry was born third-in-line to the throne, after his older brother and their father, Prince Charles, however he was pushed down the lineage as William and his wife, Catherine, had children.
The difference in treatment towards the brothers by the royals is also discussed in the book Finding Freedom, by royals journalists Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand, who claim that Harry and his wife, Meghan Markle, felt they were treated with less respect than William and Kate.
At their last public event as senior royals, a Commonwealth Day service at Westminster Abbey, in March, Harry and Meghan were surprised to discover they had been removed from the procession of senior royals who entered the church alongside the Queen.
“Where you are born in this family dictates your position of power, and because of that Harry has always come second to his brother,” a source told Scobie and Durand. “William was always the priority.”
WATCH: Finding Freedom author dispels “trash gossip” surrounding Harry and Meghan’s exit from the Royal Family. Story continues below.
The rift between Prince William and Prince Harry has been discussed in the media ever since the Cambridges and the Sussexes split up their households in 2019.
The tension between the royal brothers isn’t just tabloid gossip — Harry himself addressed their relationship in an interview last October, saying, “We’re certainly on different paths at the moment. I’ll always be there for him and, as I know, he’ll always be there for me. We don’t see each other as much as we used to because we’re so busy, but I love him dearly.”
And we know what happened next: the Duke and Duchess of Sussex stepped down as senior members of the Royal Family and put a whole ocean between them and the other royals. After living in British Columbia for a few months, the couple and their son Archie permanently relocated to the United States (Santa Barbara, Calif., to be exact), paid back taxpayers the $3M used to renovate their U.K. home, Frogmore Cottage, and bought a $14.7M mansion.
Also on HuffPost:
