Royal baby names have always been a signifier of (royal) power. eg when Victoria was born, her father was convinced she would be Queen and wanted her to be called a name seen as v royal, such as Charlotte etc. But his brother the Prince Regent, in charge of christening, said no.
He said - give her the mother‘s name. Victoire was anglicised to Victoria. V herself said she was the first person ever to be called Victoria. Her name was meant by Prince Regent to signify she’d never be near the throne.
When it became clear that Victoria would ascend the throne, the government in panic tried to change her name to something properly royal - Charlotte of Elizabeth. V‘s mother refused and she became Queen with an ‘unroyal’ name.
There’s a lot of this in the current hysteria about Lilibet. It’s a name that signifies royal power, that she is a child firmly in line of succession and people don’t like it that Harry and Meghan get to say so - and they don’t like a biracial child having the name of the Queen.
(Victoria actually not the first to be called so - it occurs in parish records, tied to victory, but it wasn’t common at all. As Alexandrina Victoria, names borrowed from France and Russia she was marked out as ‘foreign’ and not a future monarch of Britain.)
If Eugenie or Beatrice had a little girl and called her Lilibet, everyone would say it was adorable. Harry and Meghan just can’t win!
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