What is "princess royal"

Princess \Prin"cess\, n. [F. princesse. See Prince, and cf. Princesse.]

1. A female prince; a woman having sovereign power, or the rank of a prince.
   --Dryden.

   So excellent a princess as the present queen.
   --Swift.

2. The daughter of a sovereign; a female member of a royal family.
   --Shak.

3. The consort of a prince; as, the princess of Wales.

   Princess royal, the eldest daughter of a sovereign.

n. the eldest daughter of a British sovereign

Princess Royal is a style customarily (but not automatically) awarded by a British monarch to his or her eldest daughter. Holders retain the style for life, so a princess cannot receive the style during the lifetime of another Princess Royal. Queen Elizabeth II never held the title as her aunt, Princess Mary, was in possession of the title.

There have been seven Princesses Royal. Princess Anne is the current Princess Royal.

The title Princess Royal came into existence when Queen Henrietta Maria (1609–1669), daughter of Henry IV, King of France, and wife of King Charles I (1600–1649), wanted to imitate the way the eldest daughter of the King of France was styled " Madame Royale". Thus Princess Mary (born 1631), the daughter of Henrietta Maria and Charles, became the first Princess Royal in 1642.

Princess Mary (later Queen Mary II) (1662–1694), eldest daughter of King James II & VII, and Princess Sophia Dorothea (1687–1757), only daughter of King George I, were eligible for this honour but did not receive it. At the time she became eligible for the title, Princess Mary was already Princess of Orange, while Sophia Dorothea was already Queen in Prussia when she became eligible for the title.

Princess Louisa Maria (1692–1712), the last daughter of King James II (died 1701), born after he lost his crown in the Glorious Revolution of 1688-1689, was considered to be Princess Royal during James's exile by Jacobites at Saint-Germain-en-Laye and was so called by Jacobites, even though she was not James's eldest living daughter at any time during her life.

Even before the title of Princess Royal came into use in England, the eldest daughter of the King or Queen of England had a special status in law. For instance, according to Magna Carta, the barons of the realm owed aids to finance the first wedding of the king's eldest daughter; and by a statute of the 25th year of King Edward III, sleeping with the king's eldest daughter before her marriage constitutes an act of high treason punishable by death.

Four vessels with the name Princess Royal have served the British East India Company (EIC).

• Princess Royal, of 470-90 or 541 tons ( bm), was launched on the River Thames in 1733. She made two voyages for the EIC, one to Madras and Bengal, and the other to China, between 1734 and 1739. On 21 November 1739 her owners sold her to the Admiralty, which converted her to a hospital ship. In 1743 the Navy converted her to a storeship, and in 1750 sold her.
• Princess Royal, of 878 tons (bm), was launched on 14 November 1769 by Wells, Deptford. She made four trips to India, the East Indies, and China for the EIC. She was sold in 1782 for breaking up.
• Princess Royal was launched in 1786. She made two voyages to India for the EIC. On her third voyage, in 1793, this one to China, the French captured her and used her in the Indian Ocean as the frigate Duguay Tourin. The British recaptured her within a year and she returned to mercantile service. She made one more voyage for the EIC, this one in 1797-98, from Bombay back to England. In 1799 a French privateer captured her and she then disappears from the records.
• Princess Royal was launched in 1794 and made one voyage for the EIC to Madras and Bengal between 1797 and 1798 as an extra ship.
• Princess Royal was building at Northfleet for the EIC when the Royal Navy purchased her on the stocks and launched her in 1796 as . She served the navy, taking part in several two major battles; she was broken up at Bermuda in 1824.

Many ships have been named Princess Royal, including: