Eight cars with royal names fit for a King | Axon's Automotive Anorak

1. Daimler Sovereign

Jaguar’s more prestigious Daimler division appropriately first used the Sovereign name for its more palatial Jaguar 420G derivative in the last 1960s, distinguishable over its lesser Browns Lane sibling by its signature chrome fluted grill and plusher wood and leather interior.

The original Sovereign of 1967 was based around the Jaguar S-Type (420) body, which gave way to a more modern Jaguar XJ6-derived Daimler model in late 1969, this version being as per the Jaguar with a choice of 2.8-litre or 4.2-litre powerplants, but with more luxury make up slapped on.

The Sovereign enjoyed a long and successful career, surviving each of the XJs three main incarnations, up to 1986, plus the successor XJ40 derivative. Daimler enjoyed Royal patronage up until the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, when she changed the Palace’s motoring allegiance to Rolls-Royce, but keeping Daimler as the favoured marque for the Queen Mother.

2. Toyota Crown

Toyota’s longest surviving model name, the Crown, has always been used for the Japanese brand’s most prestigious traditional saloon models since the late 1950s, often festooned with a crown logo on the car and embossed into its head restraints.

The Crown was the first Toyota model to be exported to many overseas markets, including Australia and the USA, where initially the car bombed as it was not engineered to suit demanding American roads or its consumer. The initial Crown models quickly withdrawn from the local US market, only to return again (somewhat more triumphal) a few years later once Toyota’s engineers had learned the need to develop its models specifically to suit its export market needs. By the time the Crown was first offered in the UK in the late 1960s, the range-topping six-cylinder model was in its third generation.

The car proved to be a slow but steady seller over here, failing to make much a dent in the sales of home-grown prestige executive rivals such as the Rover 2000, Triumph 2000, Ford Zodiac and Vauxhall Cresta. A more successful and distinctive Mark IV Crown debuted in Britain in 1971 in three body configurations, all of which were replaced by the more sedate and dated Mark V in 1974. This formal but dull square-cut Crown itself was superseded in 1979 by an even more old fashioned and boxy model 2.8-litre Mark VI, this being dropped from the UK and most European and American export markets in 1983.

Since then, the Crown has remained a very strong seller in its home Japanese market, with the latest incarnations now offered in modern cross-over form, as well as the more traditional sedan format that has typified the prestigious Toyota Crown model for almost 70 years.  

3. Mercury Monarch

The Mercury Monarch was an upmarket version of the American Ford Granada, not to be confused with its European cousin which shared a model name, but little else.  It was launched in 1974, and amazingly Ford briefly tried to sell the bulky Mercury Monarch here in the UK in the late 1970s, but very few were sold. The rear-drive 4.0-litre model failed to win many friends over here as the car was poorly suited to British tastes and road conditions.

When Ford replaced the original 1974 Monarch with a new, boxier second-generation body in 1980, sales were wisely confined to the more appreciative North American markets only.  

4. Humber Sceptre

One of the pioneers of British motor car production (having established itself making bicycles in Coventry in the latter 19^th Century); Humber enjoyed a fine reputation with well-to-do British motorists in the 20th Century, ultimately becoming part of the Rootes motoring empire around 1932 as the Group’s prestige marque. With Rootes being the masters of badge-engineering (making BMC/BL look like amateurs by comparison), Humber inevitably fell victim to component swopping and sharing with its lesser Rootes sister companies like Hillman, Sunbeam and so on.

Having only built prestige top line models post war, in 1963 Rootes did the unthinkable and took its Humber marque more down market with its now 1,725cc Sceptre model, an ‘executive’ saloon based on the more affordable Hillman Super Minx. An instant sales success, for the 1966 model year the Sceptre received a frontal facelift, but retained the pre-updated Super Minx bodyshell, with its date 1950s-esque rear wrap around screen.

For 1968, a new Sceptre Mark 2 was introduced, using the cleaner more modern boxy Rootes Arrow (Hillman Hunter, etc.) bodyshell. The new luxury Sceptre continued in this guise (including a late Estate addition in 1974) until Chrysler UK (the new Rootes custodian) killed off the historic Humber brand in 1976.

5. Vauxhall Royale

Probably far more synonymous a model name with Bugatti Type 41 (as the nicknamed Royal), plus a builder of successful British hillclimb competition cars, General Motors chose to name its range topping models as Royale (with an ‘e’) when it badge-engineered the contemporary Opel Senator and Monza Coupe models in late 1978.

Though badged as Luton products, the Royale saloon and coupe were all made in Germany, where the 2.8-litre Vauxhall’s badges were applied. The short-lived Royales were replaced in 1982 by facelifted versions of the Opel Senator and Monza.

6. Innocenti Regent

The Regent name was given to this very short-lived Innocenti, the Italian division of British Leyland, because of its very British-sounding nomenclature. A Latin-built version of the infamous Austin Allegro, unsurprisingly the Italians failed to warm to the Allegro’s chubby charms – especially in view of far superior local opposition in the shape of the Fiat 128 and Alfa Romeo Alfasud – and by early 1975 the Regent was dead. It had been launched at the beginning of 1974, despite the model being (expensively) re-engineered specifically for the Italian market. 

7. Reliant Regal

The Regal name is shared by Buick in North America, plus, more inappropriately, the three-wheeled Reliant here in the UK (arguably one of the least regal of vehicles ever produced). First used by the Tamworth three-wheeler maker in 1952, the austere Regal survived through four generations, with more than 120,000 being built during the car’s 21-year year career, its most famous incarnation being the mucky yellow Supervan version frequently featured with Del boy at the wheel in the popular BBC comedy; Only Fools and Horses.

8. Austin Westminster

The most prestigious Austin model of the 1950s-‘60s gets an honourable inclusion here due to the King’s coronation being held at the historic Westminster Abbey, as it has for generations of British monarchs. The Longbridge marque originally used the Westminster designation for its range-topping Cambridge-derived A90/A105 model in 1955, linking in with Austin’s naming policy of using popular English towns and counties, such as Devon and Hereford.

Austin introduced new Pininfarina-designed A99/A110 Westminster in 1959, this wood and leather festooned version selling to conservative buyers with traditional tastes until the formation of British Leyland and model’s demise in 1968.