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If she were still alive today, Princess Diana would be 61 years old. However, given that she died 25 years ago, it seems impossible to imagine her at that age.
The woman who came to be known as the People’s Princess is forever remembered as a youthful figure, only 36 at the end of her life and far younger than that when she first entered the spotlight as partner to then-Prince Charles, now King Charles III with the death of Queen Elizabeth II.
But just how young was Diana when she met the future monarch — and how much of an age difference was there between them?
Diana Spencer was just 16 years old when she met Charles at her family home, Althorp House, in November of 1977.
The prince, who as the first in the line to the British throne, was a popular and eligible bachelor, but that first meeting wasn’t a romantic one. At the time, Charles was linked to Diana’s older sister, Lady Sarah Spencer.
Born in 1948, Charles was nearly 13 years older than Diana.
But even still, when he later recalled that day, he admitted Diana made a big impression on him.
“I remember thinking what a very jolly and amusing and attractive 16-year-old she was,” he said in an interview the couple gave while announcing their engagement in February of 1981. “I mean great fun, bouncy and full of life and everything.”
When Diana was asked her first impression of him during the same interview, she bashfully replied, “Pretty amazing.”
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She was impressed again when, at age 17, she accepted an invitation to his 30th birthday party at Buckingham Palace.
It was an event she called “fascinating” when she looked back on it in conversations with author Andrew Morton for his book “Diana: Her True Story — In Her Own Words.” When the book was published in 1992, Morton denied that Diana had been a source; after her death in 1997, he confirmed that she had been the primary source.
Diana was 19 when her relationship with Charles became a romance, and she was still a teen when she accepted his proposal of marriage.
By the time they married, in an epic ceremony held at London’s St. Paul’s Cathedral on July 29, 1981, Diana, the newly minted Princess of Wales was 20, and her husband was 32.
Set in the ’90s, the fifth season of “The Crown” will take place around the time of the couple’s separation in 1992. When the couple divorced in 1995, Diana was 35 and Charles was 47.
Diana died a year later at the age of 36.
Ree Hines is a freelance writer and editor who covers pop culture, lifestyle stories and trending news. She’s also a soul-music loving, coffee-obsessed member of both Team Cat and Team Dog. Ree lives in Tampa, Florida, and is a regular contributor to TODAY.com.
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