WITH the support of Philip, French noblemen, and his mother Constance, Arthur raised a small army and besieged the castle at Mirebeau in Aquitaine, where his grandmother Queen Eleanor was staying. King John, however, was not intimidated; he lifted the siege with ease, and replied by imprisoning his twelve-year-old nephew at Falaise in Normandy.

What happened next is not clear. Ralph of Coggeshall says that Hubert de Burgh, Earl of Kent and Arthur’s gaoler, refused to have the boy blinded, and also foiled an assassination attempt. John in frustration removed Arthur from Hubert’s care to Rouen, and one night in April 1203 the prince disappeared. A boy’s body later turned up in the Seine, and was buried in the Abbey of Bec.

Five years later, Maud de Braose wearied of rumours surrounding her husband William, a court favourite, and blurted out that John himself had murdered his own nephew. If anyone believed her, they stayed silent, and Maud died of starvation in the dungeon of Corfe Castle.