Zara Phillips, daughter of Princess Anne and eldest granddaughter of Queen Elizabeth II

With the arrival of a baby girl for the Queen’s granddaughter Zara Phillips and her husband Mike Tindall last Friday, there has been renewed interest in the size of the royal family of the United Kingdom and Commonwealth.  The new baby is 16th in the line to the throne. Another royal baby born recently, Maud Windsor, granddaughter of the Queen’s cousin, Prince Michael of Kent, is 43rd in the line of succession.

A reader of the Royal Spectacle  blog asked how far down the line of a succession a person must be before they lose all contact with their royal ancestry and are no longer considered a member of the royal family. I addressed that question in a Royal Spectacle blog post, published today.

Click here to read my full answer to “Does a Royal Ever Stop Being a Royal?” on the Royal Spectacle blog.