After the battle of Poictiers, in 1356, John, son of Philip of Valois, King of France, was brought captive to London, together with his third son Philip. Hence, after a short residence at the Savoy Palace, they went to Windsor as guests of the King and Queen Philippa, and were subsequently sent to Hertford Castle. Edward III. soon thought it wiser to transfer them to Somerton, where they were placed under the custody of William, Baron d’Eyncourt of Blankney, during the years 1359 and 1360. The expensive furnishing of the castle (_see_ Chap. XXXVII.) and the provision made for the maintenance of the large number of the king’s French suite, and of the officers and men who were appointed to guard the prisoners, and the style of life there, the tuns of French claret, and the enormous amount of sugar to make French bon-bons, together with the subsequent history of King John, who, on being set at liberty, returned in the most honourable way to England in 1363, because his son Louis, Duc d’Anjou, had broken his parole as a hostage and left England for France, is fully related by Bishop Trollope. King John died in 1364, at the palace of the Savoy. _Somerton Castle_, which we must now visit, was a fortified dwelling-place with outer and inner moats, and with round towers at each corner of an irregular parallelogram, only one remains now at the south-west angle. This is forty-five feet high, and has three storeys—the lower one vaulted, the highest covered with a conical roof and having two chimneys, rising well above the plain parapet, which is still perfect, and springs from a bold and effective moulding. Each floor is lit by small lancet windows, the middle one much enlarged of late years, for it is still inhabited, together with some building adjoining it on the east, as a farm house. The large earthworks around the castle, which are especially noticeable on the south, are very remarkable, and must be much earlier than the castle, which seems to have been planted inside these rectangular embankments, of which the northern side has been levelled, probably at the time of the building. The earthworks are not Roman in character, and are probably of very great antiquity. Outside these are at least two round artificial hills, which have not been as yet explained with certainty. [Sidenote: NAVENBY]