“Paterfamilias,” episode 9 of The Crown‘s second season, is light on jewelry but heavy on (very altered) “history.” Before we dive in, you can catch up on our previous recaps over here!

We open in 1962. The Queen is having tea at Windsor Castle with the headmaster of Cheam, where Prince Charles has been going to school.

The Queen (wearing a production-invented ribbon brooch) is dismayed to hear that Charles has been isolated and bullied at the school, in part because of his royal title and in part because of his sensitive nature. The headmaster suggests that Charles should be sent to Eton College for senior school, in part because it’s in Windsor.

(The person who actually advocated most for Charles to go to Eton was the Queen Mother. According to the Sally Bedell Smith biography of Prince Charles, the Queen Mum wrote to her daughter in May 1961, calling Eton “ideal” for Charles. I’m guessing the show’s version of the Queen Mum is too busy watching television to take an interest in her grandson.)

Elizabeth talks to Charles about Eton and shows him how close it is to the castle. He’s excited.

And even Uncle Dickie gets in on the school preparations, taking Charles to Savile Row to have his uniforms tailored.

Wearing a production-created pearly brooch, Elizabeth is happy as she shares the plans for Charles’s next educational step with Philip.

But he’s angry at the suggestion that Charles should go anywhere but his own alma mater, Gordonstoun. He pulls rank and demands that Charles be placed there. Elizabeth ultimately agrees, but she says he has to inform Charles of the change.

He tells his son about Gordonstoun, the school run by a headmaster, Kurt Hahn, where “the sons of the powerful can be emancipated from the prison of privilege.” He even gives Charles his old uniform jumper.

And then we flash back three decades to 1934, where Philip puts on the jumper for the first time. He’s at Schloss Wolfsgarten in Germany, the home of his sister, Princess Cecilie of Greece and Denmark (called “Cécile”), and her husband, Georg Donatus of Hesse (called “Don”). As his armband suggests, he was indeed a member of the Nazi party, but the timeline’s not quite right — Don and Cécile didn’t join the party until 1937.

Cécile, who is so afraid of flying that she dresses in funereal black each time she boards an airplane, accompanies Philip to Scotland so he can start at Gordonstoun.

The show is playing very fast and loose with history in this episode, mostly to try to make Don and Cécile seem like pivotal parental figures to Philip in an attempt to increase the drama of their eventual deaths. He did spend time with them at their home, mainly on school holidays, but they were only two of the adult family members with whom he stayed during his childhood. Philip had been in school at Cheam in the United Kingdom from 1929 until 1933, and he’d lived during that period with his grandmother, Victoria, and with other British family members. (His official guardian at the time wasn’t Cécile — it was his uncle George, the Marquess of Milford Haven.) His father, Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark, also made fairly frequent, if sometimes irregular, appearances in his life. (His mother, Princess Alice, was in a clinic in Switzerland during much of this period.)

In 1933, Philip transferred to a German school, Salem, which was run by Kurt Hahn. (This was apparently largely for financial reasons; the Baden family, which included his sister, Princess Theodora, and her husband, Berthold, owned the school, so Philip saved on fees.) Eventually, worries in the family about the rise of the Nazis meant that he’d go back to Britain for the remainder of his education. Around the same time, Hahn (who was Jewish) was arrested and later fled to Scotland, where he founded Gordonstoun.

Philip did arrive at Gordonstoun in the autumn of 1934, but I’ve never read any suggestion that Cécile accompanied him there — this, again, mostly seems like narrative invention to try to create dramatic tension. (I have read, however, that it was actually another sister, Princess Theodora, who took Philip to Scotland.)

Cécile also tells him backstory about Kurt Hahn — a person Philip had already met in reality — largely, I think, to inform in the viewer. She tells him that he’s going to Gordonstoun because “Father” wanted him to be educated by Hahn — sure, but Philip already had been educated by Hahn at Salem, and as I stated above, Andrew does not seem to have been a pivotal part of that decision.

When Philip arrives at Gordonstoun, he seems surprised by the way the school is run, even though he’d already been at its German counterpart. This fellow student is surprised that Philip doesn’t have a surname.

And then we’re back in 1962. Philip flies Charles to Gordonstoun himself, while Elizabeth is left behind. (That’s true.) In pearls, she watches footage of her son’s arrival at school on television.

A thought: there’s something interesting to be said about the number of times this show features women (even a head of state!) passively watching current events on television rather than participating in them.

Charles faces down his immediate future at Gordonstoun, and things aren’t looking good.

British boarding schools weren’t easy places to live (to put it mildly), and Gordonstoun was especially tough. Boys slept with the windows open in all kinds of weather, and the dormitories were basically run by older students, who often bullied and even abused their younger counterparts. Charles shivers his way through his first night, sleeping in the same bed his father did when he was a student.

Back in 1934, Philip learns the ropes at Gordonstoun, including their tradition of cold showers after a morning run through the mud. Such fun. (This would have been nothing new. He’d already experienced similar unpleasant boarding school traditions at both Cheam and Salem.)

He also faces a bully, who makes fun of Philip’s parents and his sisters — and then tosses him in a lake.

He’s called in to Hahn’s office for a talk. I’m pretty disappointed that they didn’t go with a more accurate portrayal of Hahn here — the real man wore a cape and a big black hat and was, by all accounts, pretty eccentric. The Hahn shown in The Crown could easily be swapped out for one of the production’s cabinet ministers. A really wasted characterization moment, if you ask me.

Philip calls Cécile, begging to come back to Germany. She tells him that she’s having another baby. (That means that the production has condensed the timeline, and we’re skipping ahead to 1937. Cécile was expecting her fourth child; she already had three others: Ludwig [born in 1931], Alexander [born in 1933], and Johanna [born in 1936].)

She also tells him that “Cousin Lu” — that’s Don’s brother, Ludwig — is getting married during Philip’s half term in London, and she’ll stay back in Germany so that Philip can come stay with her. (Lu’s wedding to Margaret Campbell Geddes, daughter of Sir Auckland Geddes, was originally scheduled for October 23, 1937. It was initially postponed until November 20, 1937, following the death of Lu’s father [and Philip’s great-uncle], Grand Duke Ernst of Hesse.)

Back in 1962, Charles is also having a tough time at school. Uncle Dickie arrives with a hamper from Fortnum and Mason and a sympathetic ear. He tells Charles to trust him as a confidant, underscoring the important relationship the two really did have until Dickie’s death.

Elizabeth has heard about Charles’s misery at Gordonstoun, and she confronts Philip, threatening to remove Charles and bring him back home. Philip absolutely refuses her request.

Meanwhile, Charles gets a visit from Hahn. (Hahn still lived in the UK in 1962, but he hadn’t been headmaster at Gordonstoun for almost a decade.) He’s worried that Charles is trying to take on the school’s annual challenge just to please his father. Charles insists he can do it.

In 1934/7/whatever, Philip also has a meeting with Hahn. This time, Philip has punched his bully, and Hahn is unhappy about it. He cancels Philip’s half-term vacation to Germany and orders him to spend his vacation working with the bully to build a wall at the front gate.

Philip relates this news on the telephone to Cécile. Now that Philip’s not coming, she’s got to go to the wedding in England, and she’s getting ready to board the plane.

The idea that Cécile would have stayed in Germany — and avoided the ensuing tragedy — if only Philip had behaved himself is absolute nonsense. The show is simplifying this period of family history in a major way. On November 12, 1937, a large funeral was held in Darmstadt for Cécile’s late father-in-law, and on the same day, she wrote to Uncle Dickie thanking him in advance for hosting her family during Lu’s upcoming wedding festivities. There was no suggestion that Philip would be going to Germany, or that Cécile wouldn’t be going to the wedding. Honestly, I think it’s a little irresponsible, even in this fictional form, for the show to depict Young Philip believing that what happened next was his fault. The real history is tragic enough.

After Philip speaks to Cécile, we see Hahn receiving a phone call. It’s not good news. The plane carrying Don, Cécile, and their family to London has crashed in Belgium, and there are no survivors. (That dates this scene to November 16, 1937.)

He tells Philip, who isolates himself in his grief. Later, he reportedly expressed that the news was a “profound shock.” (He really was at Gordonstoun when he was informed of the accident.)

In his grief, Philip imagines that he can see the crash happening around him. Everyone on the plane, including Don, Cécile, their two sons, Don’s mother, Lu’s best man, a lady-in-waiting, and the flight crew, perished. The remains of Cécile’s stillborn baby boy were also found in the wreckage. (Two family tiaras, the Hesse Strawberry Leaf and the Turquoise and Moonstone, survived.)

He wanders away from Gordonstoun, and Hahn and the other students finally find him rowing a boat alone on the lake. Hahn tells him that he’ll be on a train shortly to make his way to Darmstadt for the funeral.

(The next day, Lu married Peg Geddes in London in a somber ceremony. He had lost both his parents, his brother, his sister-in-law, and three nephews in only a few weeks’ time. When he and Peg arrived in Germany, they adopted Don and Cécile’s only surviving daughter, Johanna — but she died less than two years later of meningitis. Not a lot of luck, this family.)

In Darmstadt, Philip walks behind Don and Cécile’s coffins in their funeral procession. (The show paints him as a solitary figure — and the chief mourner. Neither was true. Lu Hesse was the chief mourner in the procession.)

The show depicts Philip’s parents, Andrew and Alice, walking behind the coffins, as well as Uncle Dickie. All three really did attend the funeral, though I’m doubtful that Alice walked in the procession. (This was the first time Alice and Andrew had seen each other in 1931 — and it was also the last time they’d see each other.) Lord Mountbatten was there in an official capacity, representing King George VI and Queen Elizabeth. (Queen Mary was represented by Philip’s grandmother, the Dowager Marchioness of Milford Haven.)

Uncle Dickie comforts Philip, who is overwhelmed both by his sister’s death and by the Nazi propaganda all around him.

And then there’s this scene. Philip’s sister, Princess Sophie, tries to get Alice to recognize him — but to no avail.

This is also ridiculous. Alice was actually doing fairly well at this period — she’d been able to attend her Uncle Ernie’s funeral a few days earlier, and she coped with the shock of Cécile’s death better than most had hoped she would. According to the excellent Hugo Vickers biography, Theodora told Alice’s doctor, “The first curative shock to her was brought about by the plane-crash…. Contrary to what was expected, it apparently tore her out of everything.” Philip had even been urged to get in touch with his mother about his plans for Christmas 1937, so that he could spend time with her. She absolutely knew who he was. But I suppose catatonic Alice was more convenient for the narrative?

The show could also have made links with Alice in the “present-day” 1962 context. She visited London in February of that year while Philip was off on a tour of South America. She was there while Charles recovered from having his appendix removed, and she even attended little Prince Andrew’s second birthday party. Or — going back an episode — Alice even attended that dinner held at Buckingham Palace for the Kennedys. Ah, what might have been, show.

And even worse — Prince Andrew stands up, in front of everyone, and actually blames Philip for Cécile’s death.

I can’t overstate how ridiculous this is. Andrew was in London when the crash happened; he’d been staying with his nephew, King George II of Greece. Philip traveled with his father to the funeral in Darmstadt. Andrew did have a hard time coping with Cécile’s death, because the two were very close, but he had no reason to blame Philip for the accident.

Philip heads back to England, accompanied by Uncle Dickie. (His grandmother, Victoria, would also surely have been with them.) Dickie gives Philip a little paternal advice: one day, when Philip has children, he will disappoint them as deeply as Andrew has just disappointed him. Cheerful, Dickie.

Underscoring the ridiculousness of this entire interlude is Philip’s travel schedule from the end of 1937 and the beginning of 1938. After spending Christmas in the UK, Philip traveled to Rome to meet up with his father. From there, Andrew, Philip, and two of Philip’s sisters, Margarita and Theodora, all went together to Athens for the wedding of Prince Paul of Greece and Princess Friederike of Hanover, which took place on January 9, 1938.

But the show’s version of Philip is alone at Gordonstoun, and he works through his grief by building that wall at the front gate. He works alone until his body almost literally gives out, and then finally goes inside to ask for help.

Hahn, pleased that Philip has seen the value of the community around him, instructs the other students to help Philip finish the project.

Back in the 1960s, an older Philip stands in front of a smug portrait of himself as he prepares to award a trophy to the winners of the school challenge. He waits expectantly to see Charles return with his group.

But Charles doesn’t come back, and his detective, Donald Green, has to go and find him. He offers a shivering Charles a comforting arm in the back of the room when they return. (Green was like a father figure to Charles, and Smith argues that their friendship “set the prince’s lifelong pattern of seeking company with his elders.”)

Still angry at his son, Philip flies them back to Windsor. He is utterly unsympathetic when Charles (like Cécile) is frightened of the turbulence mid-flight. Charles ends up sobbing in the back of the plane.

And when he returns to Windsor, Charles rushes back to the comfort of his nanny and the palace staff.

His mother simply looks on — and then leaves without saying hello.

It’s time for our recap of “Dear Mrs. Kennedy,” the eighth episode of season two of The Crown — and we’ve got LOTS of replica jewels to critique! (Catch up on our previous recaps here!)

We open in Accra. President Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana is addressing leaders of other African nations, discussing the need to unite to promote the interests of Africa as a whole. (Nkrumah was a proponent of the Pan-Africanism movement, and he was one of the founding members of the Organization of African Unity, which officially formed in May 1963.) Ghana gained its independence in 1957, but the Queen remained head of state until 1960, when Nkrumah was elected president.

As he speaks, we see men removing the Gloriana portrait of the Queen from a government building…

…and replacing it with a portrait of Vladimir Lenin. This visually sets up a central conflict of the episode: will Ghana remain allied with the Commonwealth and the West, or will it align itself with the Soviets? (This was a major question in 1961; President Nkrumah was a self-described Marxist, and that year he made a lengthy ten-week visit to the Soviet Union and its bloc nations.) Ghana was an important part of the Commonwealth and is still one of its largest member nations — of all Commonwealth nations, the country ranks just below Canada and just above Australia in population.

Back in Britain, the Queen is outdoors (at either Sandringham or Windsor, apparently) and she’s dealing with a sore ankle and a heightened sense of her own age and mortality.

Indoors, and in pearls, she complains to the Queen Mother about her age. The Queen Mum dismisses her concerns, telling her she’s still young. (Really, she’s more invested in her mac and cheese. Again, the show paints the Queen Mum as a woman who simply sat on the couch and ate. So frustrating.)

The two of them turn their attention to the television, which is airing footage of the glamorous John and Jackie Kennedy, who will be heading to the UK soon.

In Ghana, Nkrumah has drifted further from the West by hosting Leonid Brezhnev, one of the highest-ranking Soviet officials. This visit took place in February 1961.

Macmillan drops by Buckingham Palace to discuss the government’s concerns about Ghana and the Commonwealth.

They also discuss the Kennedys, including Jackie’s successful charm offensive with President de Gaulle in Paris. HM, wearing her usual pearls, takes all of this in.

Clearly thinking about the elegant Jackie’s upcoming visit, Elizabeth makes a visit to her favorite designer, Norman Hartnell.

Wearing one of the production’s invented floral brooches, she falls in love with a chic blue strapless gown.

We see her getting dressed for the dinner — note that the gown has had straps added to make it more Queen-friendly. She’s also wearing the production’s replicas of the George VI Sapphires — also note the gems resting on a velvet cushion beside her.

We get a better look here. The jewels are fairly faithful replicas of the original — I believe they’re sourced from Royal Exhibitions — and the entire ensemble is a close copy of what the Queen really wore for this dinner, which took place on June 5, 1961. The production’s iffy copy of the Albert Brooch is also pinned to the Queen’s dress.

The entire assembly is breathless as they wait for the arrival of the Kennedys — well, mostly Jackie.

But the Kennedys botch the introductions. Jackie introduces herself first, and they get Elizabeth and Philip’s titles wrong. Adeane and Charteris squirm and cringe in the background.

This “bungling Americans” business all seems a bit unlikely to me. Have the writers forgotten that Jack lived in London on and off during his father’s pre-war tenure as the American ambassador to the Court of St. James?

So do the Macmillans.

After dinner, Elizabeth takes Jackie on a tour of the palace. The production was far less faithful in copying Jackie’s ensemble from this event. Her real gown was sleeveless, but not strapless, and she wore diamonds clipped at her shoulders. She also wore her hair up, with an ornament placed toward the front of her hair.

Unexpectedly, Elizabeth finds herself discovering common ground with the first lady. They’re both shy, and they both love animals. She shows Jackie some of the private rooms in the palace, and even lets her meet the corgis.

Margaret and Elizabeth meet up at the stables for a post-mortem on the Kennedy dinner. Elizabeth reveals that she surprised herself by liking Jackie. But Margaret drops a bomb — a friend said that, after the BP dinner, Jackie made disparaging remarks about Elizabeth at a dinner held at the home of Jackie’s sister, Lee Radziwill.

The friend in question is Lord Plunket, a close friend of the royals who also served as an equerry to both Elizabeth and her father. Elizabeth summons him to the palace, and he reluctantly repeats the statements that Jackie made at the dinner he attended. Jackie called the palace “dilapidated and sad,” and said that the Queen herself was “middle-aged and unintelligent.”

Pearl-clad Elizabeth receives the hurtful news with a carefully schooled expression.

(There’s no evidence that Jackie said these specific things, although she reportedly gossip a bit about the visit. Also: I think it’s interesting that the show chose to ignore the other big event happening in June 1961. Only three days after the Kennedy dinner, the royals attended the Duke of Kent’s grand, glamorous royal wedding at York Minster.)

Other, more important matters are at hand, though: Macmillan arrives with news that President Nkrumah has been in Moscow. (Nkrumah’s visit to Moscow actually took place in September 1961.) Stung by Jackie’s comments, Elizabeth decides to prove that she can also be a charming influence when it matters. Over the objections of nearly everyone, she decides to go to Ghana herself.

Philip reads press reports that question the wisdom of the Queen’s visit as the plane lands in Ghana.

She’s indignant in the face of criticism. (This 12-day visit, which took place in November 1961, was indeed politically controversial, but it wasn’t as spontaneous as it’s depicted in the show. The Queen had originally been scheduled to visit Ghana in November 1959, but the trip had to be postponed because she was expecting Prince Andrew. She wasn’t even just going to Ghana — the lengthy trip also included visits to Sierra Leone and Gambia. Anyway.)

Philip, Elizabeth, and Adeane arrive in Accra under the watchful gaze of this weird statue of Queen Victoria.

As the trio stands before President Nkrumah, photographers suddenly swarm the Queen, and Philip and Adeane hold them back. (This is beyond silliness. Because there were major security concerns about the visit, extra measures were taken; Duncan Sandys — a Commonwealth minister and Churchill’s son-in-law — even visited ahead of time to assess the security situation. The Queen would never have been left with only her husband and her private secretary to stand between her and swarming press.)

And as for the jewelry here — the Queen’s dress and hat are fairly decent versions of what she really wore for the arrival, but instead of this production-invented pearl cluster brooch, she wore the Dorset Bow Brooch.

President Nkrumah turns the arrival ceremony into a strange, forced photo-op, clearly intending to use the Queen for his own PR purposes.

(The real welcoming ceremony from this visit was nothing like the show depicts. It was a grand event, including a large military display. It’s all there in the newsreel footage.)

After the photo op, Elizabeth takes a call from Macmillan. He has bad news: Soviet engineers are in Ghana to help with the construction of a dam on the Volta River. (The construction of this hydroelectric dam did begin in 1961.) The Queen’s been played.

At a dinner that evening, the Queen is on edge. She’s wearing the production’s replica of the Vladimir Tiara, with its Cambridge emerald pendants, and the earrings and necklace from the Delhi Durbar Parure. (This dinner and dance really did happen, and this is a decent replica of the gown and jewels that the Queen really wore.)

She and Nkrumah have a tense conversation on the dance floor. Again, we’ve got a replica tiara with a weird extended base. Not sure why they’ve done this — to make it easier to anchor in the actress’s hair?

But Elizabeth disarms Nkrumah and the people of Ghana with a dance. She and Nkrumah glide effortlessly across the dance floor as the band plays “Begin the Beguine.”

A stunned Charteris, who is on the phone with London, has to report that the Queen’s doing the fox trot with an African leader.

Press photographers capture her smiling face as they twirl around the floor. The charm offensive has worked.

Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, the Kennedys attend an official dinner.

Jackie, who is angry as she notes her husband’s continually roving eye, is wearing a piece of real replica jewelry. This diamond leaf ornament was a wedding gift from her in-laws, Joe and Rose Kennedy. In 1962, Jackie quietly sold the diamond leaf brooches so that she could buy her famous diamond sunburst brooch from Wartski in London; she discreetly had copies made of the diamond leaves so that she wouldn’t offend the Kennedys.

As the dinner ends, and Jack schmoozes with every lady in the room, Bobby Kennedy looks nervous. (I know many of you are British mystery fans, so you’ll probably recognize the actor playing Bobby. It’s Julian Ovenden, who played Andrew Foyle in Foyle’s War. Fun fact: Ovenden’s father used to be the real Queen’s chaplain.)

Jack and Jackie have a post-dinner fight as newsreel footage from the Queen’s Ghana visit plays in the background. Jack tells her that she’s influenced international politics once again — her negative comments have gotten back to the Queen, and he thinks they inspired her actions in Africa.

Jackie is mortified. She has to go back to London after her upcoming visit to India and Pakistan, and she’s got a luncheon scheduled at Buckingham Palace with the Queen. Uh-oh. (The visit in question took place in March 1962.)

Meanwhile, Elizabeth is enjoying the positive reviews of her Ghana visit.

But Adeane also tells her that Jackie wants to meet privately before their scheduled lunch. They decide the meeting should happen at Windsor.

Jackie arrives at Windsor. (This would have been in March 1962, but it seems to have been an invented meeting. Other than the scheduled Buckingham Palace luncheon, Jackie seems to have spent her entire three-day London visit at the home of her sister, Lee.)

The two women sit down to tea.

Jackie immediately apologizes for the things she said about the palace and the Queen. She says there are no excuses for her behavior, but she explains the stresses that she had been under on the trip; she was still dealing with the death of her son, Patrick, and the health problems of her husband. Jack was also angry with her for outshining him in Paris. And then there’s the kicker: to help her endure the trip, she was given drugs by a doctor. She was under the influence at the Radziwill dinner where she made the indiscreet remarks.

As she white-knuckles her way through the apology, we get a glimpse of Jackie’s famous diamond and emerald engagement ring.

The Queen accepts the apology without saying much of anything in response.

Later, she discusses the conversation with Philip. He compliments her for her strength — for having ice in her veins when she needs to.

And then we fast forward more than a year. The Queen is in the forest again when she’s called back to the palace to hear horrible news: Kennedy has been shot in Dallas.

(The assassination took place in late November, and the news broke in the early afternoon in America. Wouldn’t it be dark out in England?)

Elizabeth and Philip hold each other tightly after finding out that Kennedy has died.

And the two Elizabeths discuss Jackie’s decision not to change out of her bloody clothes after Jack’s death.

The Queen goes to Adeane and makes a bold request: she wants the court to officially mourn Kennedy for a week, and she wants the bell rung at Westminster Abbey in his honor, something usually done only for members of the royal family. Both of these things really did happen.

(Also of note: in real life, Elizabeth was several months pregnant with Prince Edward in November 1963. Philip attended Kennedy’s funeral in Washington on his wife’s behalf because of the pregnancy.)

And then, Elizabeth goes into her study alone, so that she can send her condolences to Mrs. Kennedy.

Our bejeweled recaps of The Crown continue today with “Matrimonium,” the seventh episode of season two. As the title suggests, the episode includes a royal wedding, so you know we’ve got some jewels to critique! (You can catch up with our previous recaps here!)

We begin in Brussels on August 3, 1959. Peter Townsend writes to Princess Margaret. He needs to break a pact they made — that if they couldn’t marry each other, they’d never marry again at all — because he’s fallen in love with his (extremely young) assistant.

Margaret wakes up still in her clothes and gold jewelry from the night before, and a servant brings her Townsend’s letter on a silver platter. She is distraught.

She meets up with Tony Armstrong-Jones while he’s prepping for an exhibition of his photographs. They talk about Townsend and marriage — and Margaret basically proposes to him.

When Tony doesn’t answer satisfactorily, she storms out, leaving him to face all of the press who have gathered mainly to see the princess, not the photographer.

The opening is a success, and Tony is ready to brag about it at a dinner with his mother, the Countess of Rosse. (Tony’s parents were Ronald Armstrong-Jones, a barrister, and Anne Messel, sister of the famous stage designer Oliver Messel. Ronald and Anne divorced when Tony was four, and each married subsequent spouses. Anne’s second husband was the 6th Earl of Rosse. In 1959, Ronald had just divorced his second wife and was about to marry his third.)

In The Crown, Lady Rosse is played by the fabulous Anna Chancellor, whom you’ll recognize from films like Four Weddings and a Funeral and Pride and Prejudice. Chancellor is particularly well-suited for a role like this one; her grandfather was the 4th Baron Hylton, and she also has family ties to Prime Minister H.H. Asquith and to Jane Austen.

Lady Rosse is wearing colorful beads and a scowl. She’s not really interested in Tony’s art exhibition. And when she hears that he turned down Margaret’s proposal, she’s really unimpressed.

Back at Tony’s studio, he indulges in some of his other ongoing affairs. He takes photos of Jacqui Chan, an actress who was also one of his girlfriends. (His biographer, Anne de Courcy, called her one of Tony’s first loves.) And then The Crown feels the need to include some fairly graphic sex scenes, apparently to really prove to us that Tony was exploring other avenues of pleasure? Not sure most of us needed a lot of convincing, but whatever.

We also see Tony in bed with his good friends, Jeremy and Camilla Fry. (We know that Camilla was his lover; we know less about his relationship with Jeremy. The show draws its own conclusions.) Afterward, he talks to them about Margaret and decides to propose. He looks extremely happy about his decision, doesn’t he?

It’s Margaret’s turn to take part in the show’s soapy Mirror Reflection Moment.

As Margaret heads out of Clarence House, the Queen Mother doesn’t even notice — she’s too busy snacking, drinking, and watching nature shows on television. (I suppose we’re supposed to see the Queen Mum as someone totally detached from what’s going on around her, but in reality, she knew about Margaret’s romance with Tony early on, and she and Tony developed a close friendship of their own. She also wasn’t just sitting around eating bon-bons — she had a full slate of official duties. But you all know that the portrayal of the Queen Mother is one of my least favorite parts of the show, so I won’t go on!)

Tony picks Margaret up on his motorcycle, and they speed off down the Mall.

At his studio, he produces a large box full of shredded film, with a nesting box of film canisters and small boxes inside.

Margaret figures out what’s going on halfway through the unwrapping process.

It’s an engagement ring — a ruby in a cluster of diamonds, to be more exact. Unlike the Queen’s engagement ring, the show has done a decent job of replicating Margaret’s ring. Theo Aronson describes the ring as “a ruby surrounded by diamonds in the shape of a flower.” Their private engagement took place in December 1959.

She accepts — but they both have conditions. He wants her to promise never to be boring; she wants him to promise never to hurt her. (Historical spoiler alert: not gonna happen on either count.)

Margaret, defiant and smoky in bright red beaded jewels, arrives to tell her sister that she’s off the market.

The Queen reacts mostly positively, but when Margaret also tells her that Peter has gotten engaged, she’s a little less thrilled. (In reality, it was Tony who asked the Queen for her permission for the marriage. That happened at Sandringham in January 1960.)

Tony tries to call his mother to let her know that he’s engaged to Margaret after all, but Lady Rosse isn’t taking his calls.

He and Margaret make plans anyway, deciding that they should go for broke and get married in Westminster Abbey.

Margaret hurries over to tell Elizabeth about the plans they’ve made, but Elizabeth has to inform her sister that they have to delay the announcement — because Elizabeth is expecting a baby.

Margaret, wearing her engagement ring already, sees this as one more betrayal. (In reality, Margaret and Tony sought official permission only a few weeks before Prince Andrew’s birth, not months before. They did postpone the official announcement until after the baby was born.)

Elizabeth tries to soothe Margaret’s anger by offering to throw her an engagement party at the palace. (Which seems like it might have tipped off the press, doesn’t it?)

Meanwhile, Tony is visiting the Frys. They watch the results of the 1959 general election, which took place on October 8. (The show is, shockingly, playing fast and loose with the timeline here to make the Margaret and Tony storyline even soapier than it already was.) He talks about the engagement and his family. He’s pretty excited that he might eventually get an earldom — which would put him on par with his stepfather and (eventually) with his half-brother, Brendan. (Tony didn’t get an earldom when he married; he got one just before the birth of his first child.)

We skip a few months ahead. The heavily-pregnant Queen is getting ready for Margaret and Tony’s engagement party. She and Philip are clearly getting along.

Margaret arrives at the palace for the bash. Lots of her friends are on the guest list, giving the party a bit of a different tone than usual palace festivities.

The Queen, in diamonds, chats with the Queen Mother (in pearls), and Lady Rosse. But she also keeps an eye on other goings-on in the room.

She’s especially suspicious about Tony’s conversations with Camilla Fry, and rightly so — because Camilla tells him that she’s pregnant. Guess who the father probably is? (This is true. Polly Fry, Camilla’s third child, was indeed fathered by Tony. The truth about Polly’s paternity wasn’t made public until 2004.)

Also suddenly having a very bad time is Philip, who is jealous at how easily Tony is being accepted by the family, when he was so ostracized.

And Tony is getting along very well with his future mother-in-law, who is leading a conga. (Fun fact: King George VI and Queen Elizabeth apparently loved a good conga line. They truly were party people.)

Elizabeth, who is grumpy after Philip’s tirade, tells Michael Adeane to dig up any dirt he can find on Tony. (This angle also gives us a good look at her earrings, which are the production’s replicas of the Coronation Earrings.)

Adeane employs his favorite private investigator, Tommy Lascelles, who digs up a LOT of dirt on Tony. He brings his findings to the Queen, who is just about ready to have the baby right there in the room.

In her usual pearls, the Queen grows more and more troubled as she learns of Tony’s various relationships and proclivities, some of which are continuing during his engagement to Margaret.

She’s so upset, in fact, that she actually goes into labor. She’s brought into a bedroom where her foremothers literally loom over her in portrait form. We’ve got Winterhalter’s 1859 portrait of Queen Victoria, a tinted photograph of Queen Mary from 1901, and a production-created portrait of Victoria Hamilton as the Queen Mother. (The actual birth took place in the Belgian Suite at Buckingham Palace on February 19, 1960.)

We get glimpses of Elizabeth’s wedding and engagement rings as the doctors administer twilight sleep medication.

Meanwhile, the cabinet prays…

…and Philip plays squash. (This detail is actually taken from another royal birth; Philip was playing squash during the birth of Prince Charles in 1948.)

After the baby is born, Margaret drives through the cheering crowds to greet her new nephew. She’s clearly enjoying the attention, and we get a good view of her gold earrings.

She arrives and admires the baby.

We get a glimpse of Margaret’s right-hand ring as she greets little Andrew Albert Christian Edward. Margaret’s pretty dismissive about Andrew’s namesake. (That’s Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark, Philip’s father, who died in 1944.)

Margaret tells Elizabeth that she wants to announce her engagement right away, now that the baby’s born.

Elizabeth says yes, but asks Margaret if she’s really sure about Tony. Margaret gets extremely defensive and asks Elizabeth what she’s referencing — but Elizabeth ultimately doesn’t tell her any of the information she got from Tommy. She does point out that Margaret will never truly rebel, because she loves the trappings of royalty too much. Margaret angrily leaves, telling Elizabeth that she’ll see her at the Abbey.

(I wish we’d gotten a little more coverage of Margaret and Tony’s wedding plans. The debacle about Jeremy Fry as best man — he was removed when evidence of past arrests for “homosexual offenses” was discovered — is a complicated story worth telling. So is the fact that nearly every European royal who was asked turned down the invitation, some using fairly flimsy excuses.)

But instead, we skip straight to the wedding day: May 6, 1960. We see Jacqui Chan getting ready…

…and heavily pregnant Camilla Fry getting ready, too. (Her daughter, Polly, was born only a few weeks after the wedding.)

The Queen Mother wears a necklace that looks like the Duchess of Cambridge’s costume necklace from Zara. (This choice makes zero sense to me. There are so many photographs available of the Queen Mother from the wedding day. She wore Queen Alexandra’s Wedding Necklace — which the production has already featured in replica form multiple times.)

She also wore the Greville Peardrop Earrings, which feature a much simpler design than these production-created earrings.

Princess Anne gets ready to be a bridesmaid…

…and Prince Charles is dressed up to be a page boy. (Fun fact: both Margaret and Tony were really short, and the press speculated at the time that they decided to have children as their attendants so that no one in the bridal party would be taller than the bride and groom.)

The Queen gives her full Miss Piggy Face as she gets ready. This is a decent replica of her real ensemble for the day; she really did wear a double strand of pearls, pearl earrings, and Queen Mary’s Lover’s Knot Brooch.

Tony shares a car on his way to the Abbey with his mother…

…who wears pearls with emeralds. Lady Rosse really did have a spectacular suite of emeralds, but these jewels aren’t precisely what she wore on Tony’s wedding day. Her accessories included simpler earrings, a multi-stranded pearl choker, and a large brooch.

And last but not least, we finally see Margaret, who meets Philip outside Clarence House. (He’s the one who walked her down the aisle.) The replica of her famous wedding gown is pretty good.

And so is the replica of the famous Poltimore Tiara. (The diamond riviere she wore isn’t quite right, but it’s close.) She laps up the good wishes of the public as they ride toward the Abbey, and she’s genuinely touched when Philip tells her that her father would be proud of her.

And then, just like the coronation episode, the show decides not to replicate the famous television footage of the actual wedding. Instead, we see glimpses of other characters watching the broadcast on television.

We even get glimpses of the real Tony and Margaret during their engagement announcement…

…and Margaret’s carriage heading toward the Abbey. But as for the actual wedding? We weren’t invited.