DOUBLE JEOPARDY

Spain's royals have maintained a stiff upper lip in the face of recent tawdry claims by the queen's former lover and brother-in-law. But are the romantic rumors obscuring the fact that the monarchy itself may be in trouble?

- SIMON USBORNE

Seven years before Prince William married Kate Middleton, another photogenic bride of modest breeding created the model of the very modern princess. It was the spring of 2004, and Letizia Ortiz Rocasolano was on the arm of the dashing Prince Felipe of Asturias, a member of the 750-year-old Bourbon dynasty and heir to the throne of Spain.

By marrying Letizia, Felipe was putting to bed years of gossip and speculation. The tanned former Olympic yachtsman, who was 36, had been linked to a string of head-turners, including a Norwegian model, a Liechtensteiner princess, and American model turned socialite Gigi Howard. Like Kate Middleton, Letizia, then 31, was notable for being a “commoner,” the middle-class daughter of a journalist and a nurse. Unlike Kate, she was also divorced and established in her profession; as a Spanish TV news anchor, she had reported from Ground Zero after 9/11. She and Felipe hit it off the following year, after, rumor has it, Felipe arranged for a mutual friend to invite them both to dinner.

Despite pearl-clutching in the more conservative corners of Spanish society, the wedding, at the Almudena Cathedral in Madrid, would set the tone for a relationship defined by poise and quiet professionalism. Such qualities, along with Letizia’s cover star smile and style, cemented the comparisons with the Duchess of Cambridge. They also became vital when, in 2014, a royal scandal propelled Felipe, now 56, to the throne far sooner than he could have dreamed.

If any royal couple had the chops to rescue the Spanish monarchy from the mire left by the disgraced King Juan Carlos, whose sins included affairs, allegations of corruption (an investigation was subsequently shelved), and a very poorly timed luxury elephant-hunting safari, it was Felipe, in his sober suits, with the elegant Letizia, now 51, by his side.