Extremely rare photos of the Queen pregnant are going viral

Despite the Queen having had four children - King Charles, Princess Anne, Prince Andrew and Prince Edward - there are very few photos of the late royal pregnant.

However, despite keeping largely out of the public eye during her pregnancies, there are some photos - and one TikTok account has shared them in a video, which you can watch below:

Posted by the Royal fan account @spencer.royal, although some of the pictures in the montage cannot be dated accurately, others can and show the Queen expecting Prince Andrew and later, Prince Edward.

In one dated photo, the late Queen - who passed away earlier this year in September - is around eight months pregnant with Prince Andrew as she walks through London's Liverpool Street Station.

The image was taken back in January 1960 as she returned from spending Christmas at Sandringham.

Meanwhile another one of the verifiable images from the TikTok shows the Queen pregnant with her second son, Prince Edward, who was born in March 1964.

The image shows her arriving at the at Covent Garden Opera, where she saw the ballet in November 1963.

TikTok/@spencer.royal

Although we're used to seeing other royals - such as Princess Diana, Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle - cradling their baby bumps, there is very little photographic evidence of the Queen - but why?

It has a lot to do with past etiquette surrounding royal pregnancies. In fact, the Queen's pregnancies were never officially announced by the palace, in contrast to more modern protocol.

In 1948, when the Queen fell pregnant with Prince Charles, Buckingham Palace released a statement that read: "Her Royal Highness Princess Elizabeth will undertake no public engagements after the end of June."

As well as the secrecy during the royal pregnancies, there were also no public photos of the newborn babies straight after birth, with the Queen giving birth in Buckingham Palace.

It was actually Princess Diana who became the first to break the tradition and in 1982 went to the hospital to give birth to Prince William.

TikTok/@spencer.royal

Since the TikTok was shared, people have been surprised at how few photos there are of the former monarch pregnant.

One person wrote: "It’s mad I actually have never seen her pregnant all this time."

While another said: "Never seen her pregnant but she was gorgeous and still is no matter where she is."

Topics: The Queen, Royal Family, Parenting

Lucy Devine

Lucy is a journalist working for Tyla. After graduating with a master's degree in journalism, she has worked in both print and online and is particularly interested in fashion, food, health and women's issues. Northerner, coffee addict, says hun a lot.

@lucedevine