Hostage
As a boy, Gruffydd was one of the hostages taken by King John of England as a pledge for his father's continued good faith. On his father's death in 1240 he would under Welsh law have been entitled to consideration as his father's successor. Llywelyn however had excluded him from the succession and had declared his son by his wife Joan, Dafydd, to be heir to the kingdom. Llywelyn went to considerable lengths to strengthen Dafydd's position, probably aware that there would be considerable Welsh support for Gruffydd against the half-English Dafydd.
Read more about this topic: Gruffydd Ap Llywelyn Fawr
Famous quotes containing the word hostage:
“Neither dead nor alive, the hostage is suspended by an incalculable outcome. It is not his destiny that awaits for him, nor his own death, but anonymous chance, which can only seem to him something absolutely arbitrary.... He is in a state of radical emergency, of virtual extermination.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)