Meghan Markle sat down for a rare interview where she attempted to explain why the British royal family uses their titles as their legal names.
“When I got married I changed my name,” Meghan, 44, told Emily Chang during a recent interview for Bloomberg. “But it’s a complicated one for people to understand because a last name is not typical in that construct.”
Prince Harry was born Henry Charles Albert David, but the former actress explained, “It’s a dukedom.”
“That’s the truth of it. My legal name is Meghan Duchess of Sussex,” she explained. “Sussex for us works as our family name, and it’s the name that we share with our children.”
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Meghan and Harry previously revealed that despite giving their children the last name Mountbatten-Windsor — in honor of their paternal grandparents — at birth, they later decided to use the last name “Sussex” for Archie and Lilibet.
Following the death of the children’s great-grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, their grandfather King Charles III ascended the British throne. At that time, Archie, 6, and Lilibet, 4, were given the titles Prince and Princess of Sussex.
Similarly, Prince Harry and brother Prince William were previously referred to as Harry Wales and William Wales, due to their parents Charles, 76, and the late Princess Diana being titled the Prince and Princess of Wales.
“I get it because I’m American,” Meghan said of the intricate explanation. “I went there and I started to understand, then you come back and as an American, you go, ‘I’m so confused.’”