A mixed-race royal couple? It wouldn't be the first

In fact, black women have become royals for years and years, unbeknown to many

Princesses fictional and real, from Cinderella to Sleeping Beauty to Princess Diana, all have in common skin as pure white as the driven snow.

Black girls, popular folklore suggests, don’t grow up to be princesses.

The engagement this week of Princess Diana’s youngest son Prince Harry to a biracial American actress named Meghan Markle delighted many African-Americans, who greeted the news on social media with increasingly rapturous gifs, memes and liberal use of all caps.

#blackprincess gained traction on Twitter and Instagram, with users celebrating Markle’s African ancestry and the fact that Prince Harry’s mother-in-law would be a dreadlocked black Californian. (For the