Reasons why Princess Diana kept her head down in public

Diana is recognized as a wonderful mum, a princess of the people, a committed feminist, activist, and fashion icon.

However, in the early 1980s, shortly after her marriage to Prince Charles, she was dubbed ‘Shy Di' due to her habit of often keeping her head down when pictured.

Diana herself acknowledged that she appeared to be ‘sulking,' but that was not the case.

When she opened up about her hardships in filmed interviews with Andrew Morton, a royal author, she disclosed the explanation for her ‘sulky' look.

In his memoir, Diana: Her True Story – In Her Own Words, he remembered the princess talking about those trying early years in the royal family.

She said, ‘When I first arrived on the scene I'd always put my head down.'

‘Now that I interpret it, that did look sulky. I've never sulked. I've been terrified out of my tiny little mind ‘I've been scared out of my mind.'

‘I never sulked as a child, it's just not in me,' she said, ” I was just so frightened of the attention I was getting; it took me six years to get comfortable in this skin and now I'm ready to go forward.”

‘One minute I was nobody, the next minute I was Princess of Wales, mother, media toy, member of this family, you name it, and it was too much for one person at that time.'

Still, according to Dickie Arbiter, one of the Queen's press secretaries, there was another explanation Diana bowed her head often.

Still, according to Dickie Arbiter, one of the Queen's press secretaries, there was another explanation Diana bowed her head often. He explained to Vogue:

I first saw her about three or four days before the wedding,' he told Vogue. She was just 20 years old. And b ecause she put her head down while she spoke to you, she was dubbed “Shy Di.”

However, she was not shy in the least. Her height – 5 foot 10 – was something she was conscious of.

When she was talking to people, she would hold her head down so as not to make them feel awkward.