05/05/2001 00:00
TW
0

This summer in Majorca all Spanish eyes will be on Prince Felipe of Spain who, as usual, will be joining other members of the royal family for their annual summer break and sailing at Marivent Palace in Palma. The country is transfixed by the Prince's romance with Eva Sannum, whose Nordic good looks seem to have captured the heart of the Spanish crown prince. But as sightings of the couple increase, so do many Spaniards' worries that blonde beauty alone does not make a queen. Although Prince Felipe, 33, hasn't made his intentions known, his frequent appearances with the 26-year-old Norwegian fashion model - skiing in the Alps, dining in a Madrid restaurant, walking arm-in-arm in India - have triggered speculation of an imminent engagement. Monarchists and nobility warn such a marriage risks dragging the widely respected Spanish House of Bourbon into disrepute, on a par with Britain's scandal-ridden House of Windsor. “I would consider as a grave error a wedding which would put us on a level with the English and which perhaps would make me consider the advantages of a republic,” Jose Luis de Vilallonga, the official biographer of King Juan Carlos, wrote in the ABC daily. Felipe, the Prince of Asturias, is the third child and only son of Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia.