Princess Royal

Princess Royal
Incumbent The Princess Anne since 13 June 1987
Style	Her Royal Highness Ma'am
Residence	St James's Palace
Appointer	Monarch of the United Kingdom
Term length	Life tenure (or until succession to the Throne)
Inaugural holder	Mary, Princess Royal and Princess of Orange

Princess Royal is a style customarily (but not automatically) awarded by a British monarch to his or her eldest daughter. The holder retains the style for life, or until she succeeds to the Throne (although to date no Princess Royal has ever done so). No princess can receive the title of Princess Royal whilst it is being held by another. 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.