Prince Arthur

Arthur was the first son of King Henry VII. He was raised to be King Arthur of England, but died at age 16, before his father.

Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales, was the first son of King Henry VII and his queen, Elizabeth of York. Born about 1487, he died about 1502, at age 16, probably of TB or a related disease.

If Arthur had lived, he would have been the first King Arthur of England In picking that name, Henry VII - whose claim to the throne was pretty shaky - was killing a couple of propaganda birds with one stone. The Arthur of legend had been a Welsh national hero, not English - the early English were the Saxons he fought. Henry Tudor himself was of Welsh descent, and King Arthur by this time was everyone's hero. (Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur, published about 1469, was one of the first printed English bestsellers.)

As a boy Arthur received the education and training thought fit for a king. At age fifteen he married Catherine of Aragon, a marriage of state that allied Henry with Europe's leading power couple, Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile. Arthur and Catherine were sent to Ludlow Castle, near Wales, to take up the formal role of Prince and Princess of Wales. A few months later Arthur was dead.

His father seems to have genuinely grieved him, and Arthur's death probably contributed to Henry VII's dour personality in his later years. Otherwise, Prince Arthur has been remembered almost entirely for his brief marriage to Catherine of Aragon - specifically for the debate about whether they ever had sex. Such are the perils of royal birth.