Queen Elizabeth's gaffe-prone husband Prince Philip was reported on Friday to have told a boy he was too fat to be an astronaut.
Several British newspapers said Philip, 80, made the remark when 13-year-old Andrew Adams said he had an ambition to go up in a space rocket.
"He told me 'You'll have to lose weight if you want to go in that,' " Andrew was quoted as saying. "I didn't feel too good about what he said. It did hurt my feelings, but I tried to laugh it off by pretending he was only joking."
Philip was visiting a rocket project at Salford University in northern England.
Andrew's mother Jacqueline told newspapers she was furious at the prince's comment. "I couldn't understand why someone of that caliber should make such a distasteful remark," she said.
Buckingham Palace was not immediately available for comment.
Philip is legendary for gaffes that have managed to offend, among others, the deaf, Hungarians, Chinese and Scots.
During a visit to China in 1986 Philip described Beijing as "ghastly" and told British students: "If you stay here much longer you'll all be slitty-eyed."
In 1995, he asked a Scottish driving instructor: "How do you keep the natives off the booze long enough to pass the test?"
And in 1981, when Britain was in the grips of a savage recession, he remarked: "Everybody was saying we must have more leisure. Now they are complaining they are unemployed.">