Created by Disney, a highly unrealistic interpretation of royalty which involves a cookie cutter adolescent heroine, usually with Barbie doll physique, who may or may not be of royal ancestry.
The main Disney Princesses to date are Snow White, Cinderella,
Princess Aurora,
Ariel, Princess
Jasmine, Belle, Pocahontas, Mulan, Giselle, Tiana, and Rapunzel; Cinderella is actually nobility or gentry while Belle, Tiana, Mulan, and Giselle are actually commoners but the first two married into royalty, Giselle came close, and Mulan marries a general.
A fancy dress and tiara does not a princess make.
The Disney Princesses, despite differing personalities, often have strong similarities: animal companions/comic relief, befriending commoners (discouraged among nobles), an adventure, searching for love and pushing the envelope, all the while as
perfect as can be... and are often depicted as free of royal duties or enjoying them like it's a game, informal rather than like an ultra-formal aristocrat.
Real princesses, at least historically, have, with a few exceptions, enjoyed little political influence; their brother(
s) usually inherit the property while they are married off as pawns in a big political game, existing only as managers of the castles and breeding-mares for their husbands, their freedom sacrificed for the dynasty and the
people; Princess
Jasmine represented this pressure. Not all princesses are
beautiful or intelligent, let alone nice; because
marriage below the nobility was forbidden, inbreeding ran rampant, and royals live a *very* public life, complete with prying eyes and intrigue.
