Buckingham Palace is to reinstate a hyphen in Andrew Mountbatten Windsor’s name, it is understood.
The former prince was officially renamed last month following allegations over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted paedophile.
It came after the King removed his younger brother’s titles in full and announced that he had surrendered the lease on his Windsor home, Royal Lodge, after initially forcing Andrew to relinquish his dukedom.
At the time, the Palace announced that he would henceforth be known simply as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor.
It is understood that this was the name agreed with Andrew and that his preferred version of the double-barrelled surname was for it to be unhyphenated.
However, subsequent reviews of official documents suggested that a hyphenated Mountbatten-Windsor was the version with “historic precedent” and the way Elizabeth II wished it to appear.
‘My descendants… shall bear the name’
The surname was first introduced in a 1960 Privy Council Declaration made by the late Queen following the birth of Andrew, who was the first of her children to be born after she acceded the throne in 1952.
It was initially created to accommodate her husband Prince Philip’s surname, Mountbatten, within the Windsor family.
A notice made by the late Queen in The London Gazette at the time read: “While I and My children shall continue to be styled and known as the House and Family of Windsor, My descendants other than descendants enjoying the style, title or attribute of royal highness and the titular dignity of Prince or Princess and female descendants who marry and their descendants shall bear the name of Mountbatten-Windsor.”
Official records support the hyphenated use, including the birth certificate of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s eldest child in May 2019. The name listed on the document was Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor.
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