But what is certain is that this entire process began with one woman, Marion Crawford, the twentysomething student teacher who was persuaded down from Scotland, initially for a trial month. Royal parents now make their own choices. What all this shows is that Royal upbringings, once stiffly uniform, have become highly individual. Harry and Meghan are obviously keen to appear as his principal carers, but according to recent reports they have an extra pair of helping hands in the form of Meghan’s mother Doria Ragland. Mystery has surrounded Archie from the off, from the place of his birth to the identity of his godparents. They have taken the route of the 21st-century mega-celebrity and thrown a veil of secrecy over everything personal that relates to them, their son in particular. Or seem to be doing, as few people really know. This approach, with its suggestions of older Royal procedure, inevitably contrasts with what Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are doing. Her well-scrubbed face has no hint of make-up. In her rare public appearances the fortysomething strikes a subservient figure, often in the Norland uniform of beige dress and brown bowler, set off by a pair of no-nonsense brogues. Maria Teresa Turrion Borrallo, graduate of the ultra-posh Norland College, has none of Tiggy’s tossing hair, tight trousers and exuberant lipstick. While Kate has gone to great lengths to seem normal, referring to “mum guilt” and the “constant challenge” of parenthood, their choice of nanny is traditional. Prince William seems to have steered things back in his childcare arrangements.

She remained close to the princes nonetheless, attending both their weddings. In any case, after a controversy involving abseiling, she left for pastures new. But it is possible she had taken things too far in the opposite direction. Having aristocratic connections herself no doubt had something to do with it Tiggy grew up on a 6,000-acre Welsh estate. She would never have dreamt of crossing that line between employer and employee, Royal and commoner, over which Tiggy bounded so happily. Fresh air, a rifle and a horse.” What Clara Knight would have made of this can only be imagined. Tiggy hit back, reportedly claiming that Diana gave her boys popcorn and cinema, while “I give them what they need at this stage. It is perhaps little wonder that Princess Diana became jealous even the normally genial Camilla Parker-Bowles is supposed to have waspishly referred to Tiggy as “the hired help”. So devoted were the princes that William actually told his parents not to come to Eton’s traditional Fourth of June celebrations and asked With her mane of long hair and form-fitting jeans this turbo-charged super Sloane smashed the dowdy nanny mould to smithereens. After Charles and Diana’s divorce came that most famous of all royal nannies, gung-ho, glamorous Alexandra “Tiggy” Legge-Bourke.

The little princess marion crawford