celebrity

Overnight, the royal family started writing Harry and Meghan out of their history.

As Prince William and Princess Catherine made their first public appearance since that photoshop drama, some subtle tweaks to the royal records have been made.

While we were sleeping, the royal family's website got revamped and there were some noticeable changes — specifically, to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's profiles.

Firstly, their bios disappeared from the website completely. Within half an hour, they'd returned — but instead of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle having their own profiles each, as they had previously, they now had a shared and very downsized profile.

Harry and Meghan's joint page can now be found at the bottom of 'The Royal Family' section of the website, right next to... Prince Andrew. Meanwhile, King Charles and Queen Camilla sit pretty at the top of the page, with The Prince and Princess of Wales placed neatly underneath.

The royal site. Image: Royal.UK. 

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Prince Andrew — arguably the most controversial royal in modern times — has been accused of sexual assault and battery, and has storied ties to disgraced American billionaire and accused sex trafficker, Jeffrey Epstein. The updates on his portion of the royal website state that the Prince is no longer attending royal appointments.

"On 13 January 2022, Buckingham Palace announced that, with Queen Elizabeth II's approval and agreement, The Duke of York's military affiliations and Royal patronages would be returned to Her late Majesty, and The Duke would not return to public duties," the page discloses. 

The snap of the smiling Sussexes sits to Andrew's left — and as well as being placed at the bottom of the family page, there were also changes to their original profiles.

The Sussexes' entry notes that four years ago, the couple stepped back from their official duties. "As announced in January 2020, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have stepped back as working members of The Royal Family," the top of their profile states.

Listen to The Spill hosts explain the Royal Family's brutal response to Meghan Markle's new business. 

Both Harry and Meghan's personal bios have been heavily cut down, too. The Daily Mail reported that Harry's originally ran for 2,700 words, but it's since been reduced to just five paragraphs. Meghan's original profile was around 1,300 words long, yet the summary of Meghan's life's work now runs at a brief 103 words.

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"The Duchess worked as an actress, appearing in film and television," her profile reads. "She most notably played the role of Rachel Zane on the series Suits for seven seasons, completing over 100 episodes. Alongside her successful career as an actress, The Duchess also wrote and edited a lifestyle website called The Tig."

Considering The Tig shut down in 2017 and the Duchess launched a new lifestyle brand, American Riviera Orchard, just last week, this feels like an odd fact to include.

The pair's entire profile has a combined word count of just 577 words and they're the only married couple in the royal family who have not been allocated separate profiles.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle at the Invictus Games in 2023. Image: Getty. 

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Buckingham Palace did include a link to Harry and Meghan's new website so that's... something?

The website rebrand perhaps doesn't come as a huge surprise, given a palace press office source had insisted that following the death of Queen Elizabeth, they were "slowly" updating the website and would "get round to it in time".

But the timing is interesting, considering the controversy that has plagued the royals of late. First, there were questions about Princess Catherine's whereabouts following an extended leave of absence after abdominal surgery; followed by public condemnation after the Princess of Wales photoshopped an image of their family and shared it on social media for Mother's Day in the UK.

However, with Catherine and William now making their first public outing in months at The Windsor Farm Shop, it seems all eyes are off Meghan and Harry as they slip quietly to the edge of the palace's digital radar.

Feature image: Getty.

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