Twin princes named Aymeric and Nicolas

15 December 2005

BRUSSELS — The twin boys born to Princess Claire and Prince Laurent on Tuesday night will be named Aymeric and Nicolas.

The names that briefly appeared on the royal website on Wednesday before being removed were therefore correct.

However, only the spelling of one of the names is different: Aymeric and not Emeric. The names of the boys’ godfather and godmother are not yet known.

Princess Claire gave birth at the Cliniques Universitaires Saint-Luc in Brussels shortly before 6pm on Tuesday. Both mother and twins are said to be doing fine.

However, there has been intense speculation about the names of the boys and Belgian media reported on Thursday that Laurent and Claire had initially been in disagreement.

It was reported that Laurent wanted one of the boys to be called Casimir, but the British-born Claire did not like the name. Casimir refers to a very popular children’s television personality in Wallonia.

Claire had already chosen the name Emeric for one of the twins and Prince Laurent had to be content with the second boy being called Nicolas, media reports said prior to the official announcement on Thursday.

And in another twist, the names Emeric and Nicolas were briefly found on the Belgian royal family’s website on Wednesday.

A palace spokesman blamed the over-enthusiastic webmaster for the error. The names were removed from the website about an hour after they appeared.

Subject: Belgian news