As an aunt of the reigning monarch, King Willem-Alexander, she is a member of the Dutch Royal House and currently eighth and last in the line of succession to the throne.

Some of these functions have taken her back to Canada, the country where she was born de facto, and to events organised by the Dutch merchant navy of which she is a patron.

This would have applied if the child had been male, and therefore heir apparent to Juliana, or if her two older sisters died without eligible children.

Princess Margriet was named after the marguerite, the flower worn during the war as a symbol of the resistance to Nazi Germany.

Princess Juliana and Prince Bernhard returned to Soestdijk Palace in Baarn, where the family had lived before the war.

While she was studying at Leiden University, Princess Margriet met her future husband, Pieter van Vollenhoven.