Queen’s goddaughter reveals royal curtsy etiquette behind closed palace doors

Victoria Pryor reveals Her Majesty would have loved being a ‘country lady with her animals’

This year’s event will lack the usual pomp and pageantry (Getty)

Victoria Pryor, the Queen’s goddaughter, has revealed new details on royal etiquette behind closed doors, including when she has to curtsy to Her Majesty.

Ms Pryor, who is the Queen Mother’s great-niece, appeared in a new ITV documentary The Queen and Her Cousins with host Alexander Armstrong to mark the monarch’s 95th birthday.

Guests on the show, which aired on Monday night, shared personal letters and photographs, as well as rare memorabilia, as they spoke of their favourite memories of the Queen.

In an interview with host Alexander Armstrong in her home in Norfolk, Ms Pryor revealed how she has to interact with the Queen behind closed doors.

“Mummy called her [the Queen] Lilibet but we call her Ma’am. If she’s staying then the first thing in the morning you curtsy, and then you don’t have to curtsy after that. That’s the etiquette.”

Pryor claimed that the Queen would have loved to have lived a simpler life as a “country lady”, adding that the family were “all just perfectly ordinary people”.

“I mean the Queen would’ve loved just to have been a country lady with her animals,” she said.

Victoria Pryor (ITV)

She said the monarch gave her Twister and Winnie the Pooh books as a child, describing her as “incredible, the way she looks after everybody”.

Ms Pryor is the daughter of Margaret Rhodes, one of the Queen’s closest friends. Her mother was also a bridesmaid at the Queen’s wedding to Prince Philip in 1947.

“The Queen Mother and my granny were very close and the Queen Mother was unbelievable fond of mummy and her siblings,” she told presenter Armstrong.

The one-off documentary, which aired on ITV 1 on Monday night at 9pm, followed Mr Armstrong as he met with some of the Queen’s extended family who shared new details about Her Majesty.

The Queen will make her first major public appearance since the death of her husband Prince Philip on Tuesday at the state opening of Parliament.