Catherine, of course, had never seen Arthur. But news of his appearance at different stages of his boyhood was sent back to Spain and, when she was old enough, was, no doubt, eagerly devoured by Catherine.
At first, the auguries were not favourable. Arthur had been born prematurely and had spent his first months fighting for his life. Almost all historians have assumed that this meant he grew up a weak and feeble child. And they have, as we shall see, built great superstructures of argument on the assumption. In fact, however, there is clear and repeated eye-witness evidence to the contrary–starting with the report of the first Spanish Embassy of 1488. The ambassadors were invited to inspect the infant prince first naked and then asleep. And they waxed lyrical at what they saw: ‘He appeared to us so admirable that, whatever praise, commendation, or flattery any one might be capable of speaking or writing would only be truth in this case’.1
Arthur’s development continued on these impressive lines. His tutors gave him an even more thorough grounding in Latin than Catherine herself. He was also introduced to a wider range of heavyweight Classical authors. And his physical progress fully matched his educational achievement.2
His betrothal to Catherine took place in the summer of 1497 as his father, triumphant over the Cornish rebels, was waiting for the trap set by De Puebla to close round Perkin. On 18 July, Henry VII ratified the new treaties with Spain. The following month, at Woodstock Palace to the north of Oxford, in the presence of his father and mother and the whole Court, Arthur pledged his troth to Catherine, and Catherine, impersonated by De Puebla, gave hers to him.3
A few days later, Arthur was present when his father gave audience to the Milanese ambassador; he even spoke to the Embassy himself. The ambassador was as impressed as the Spanish had been ten years earlier. ‘The Prince of Wales’, he reported home, is ‘about eleven years of age, but taller than his years would warrant, of remarkable beauty and grace and very ready at speaking Latin’.4
As such reports were read to her, did Catherine think of how much Arthur seemed to resemble her own brilliant brother, Juan, who had just died? Maybe she thought, too, of his namesake–that other Arthur, the mythical king of Britain about whose exploits she had probably read in the three old Spanish volumes of The History of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table in her mother’s library.