During the time that her sister Leonor has been studying at the boarding school in Wales (United Kingdom), the infanta SofÃa has been the queen of the house. Being born the second in a royal family is not easy and if not, ask the spirit of Margaret of England, as Helena Bonham-Carter says she did to play her in The Crown.
The Infanta SofÃa, who turns 16 today, was born with a particularity more typical of common families and never seen in royal families: even in her mother’s womb, it was made public that she was a girl and thus calmed down those who were already speculating with which, if the baby that the then princess Letizia was expecting was a child, she would overtake Leonor in the succession order. That the Constitution marked, as it still dictates, the preference of men over women, is an anachrony that has not yet been resolved.
Everyone who knows her affirms that SofÃa de Borbón Ortiz has inherited (or perhaps has copied) the determined character of her mother, Queen Letizia, although physically she is the same as her great-aunt Princess Irene of Greece when she was young. Her condition as second to her in her succession order marks her public life but not her private life, since the Kings educate her daughters on an equal footing. Leonor has set her future as Princess of Asturias and Infanta SofÃa also has a singularity: that of being the support and company of her sister, perhaps the only one that she, over the years, can keep.
The girl SofÃa received that name from her paternal grandmother, after the infantas Elena and Cristina preserved that name for their brother Felipe’s first daughter.
Probably if Leonor had been born after a boy, called to be king, she would have been called Sofia, but since she was the first and heiress, a new name was chosen in the dynasty so that, over the years, there would be no confusion between who was the queen Sofia and a new queen of the same name. So the second daughter of Felipe and Letizia inherited the name of her grandmother.
SofÃa de Borbón has always followed in her sister’s footsteps. First in the El Pardo nursery; Until now, she has been at the Santa MarÃa de los Rosales school, and in a few months at the Atlantic College of Wales, where she, like Leonor, will take two years of the International Baccalaureate. In a few weeks, Sofia will receive Confirmation, just like her sister did two years ago. The two daughters of the Kings are educated in Catholicism, following the beliefs of her father, while her mother is an agnostic.
The last time she was seen in public was on April 8 in Chinchón, where, together with her parents and sister, she went to see the living passion. Taller than Leonor and freer when it comes to dressing and moving; She is extroverted, spontaneous and talkative, characteristics known to those who share her life or studies, since in public, however, she is just as shy as her sister and never takes the initiative, aware that her position is that of the background.
We know his voice for the only occasion in which, together with Princess Leonor, he spoke in two recordings that were made public on April 23, 2020, in the midst of a pandemic. The two sisters read paragraphs from Don Quixote and then sent a message to the children and adolescents who, like them, had to continue their studies from home. Until she leaves for Wales at the end of August, coinciding with Leonor’s entry into the Zaragoza Military Academy, SofÃa will live the last months of adolescence and family relative normality. From then on she will really start to get older.
