An aide's review of the papers of Elizabeth II and Prince Philip before a historian does not necessarily break with earlier practice. Older official historians who performed similar work were often embedded in the royal staff, so the deeper change is the absence of a historian in that position. A monarch receives unusually broad access to government information, making the archive exceptionally valuable and potentially sensitive. The scholar handling it therefore needs an unusually high security clearance as well as historical competence.
Notable Point · 1:38:22-1:39:41
Why royal archival access requires more than historical expertise
Reviewing a monarch's papers combines historical judgement with the security obligations created by access to sensitive state information.