When the United Kingdom’s Queen Elizabeth II makes public appearances, she’s accompanied by all manner of bodyguards, security personnel, and handlers. Perhaps not surprisingly, Her Majesty and her team must be in communication with each other at all times, in order to keep her safe and on schedule. However, the Queen is still a human, and she may find herself tired, unwell, uncomfortable, or otherwise in a hurry to get out of a situation. Since she’s the queen, she can’t come out and actually say that, as doing so could embarrass her or her guests, or could otherwise ruin the carefully-orchestrated image being presented.

In order to keep her private communication on the down-low when she’s in public, Her Majesty uses her purse in a sort of secret code, in much the same way that characters at theme parks use gestures to signal to their own handlers when there’s a problem (as Insider reported). According to The Telegraph, she uses her purse to relay messages to her staff. How she moves it and where she puts it can mean any number of different things.

The position of the handbag signals the degree of urgency

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