The ruby came to him in true knightly fashion on the field of battle. In those days the potentates of Europe were accustomed to lend each other armed forces, large or small, to accomplish such military achievements as might be dear to one or the other or to both. Thus it was that Edward III lent a small force of some four or five thousand English troops to Don Pedro, King of Castille, to be employed during a short campaign in Spain. Mainly through the skill of the Black Prince, aided by the courage of the English soldiers, Don Pedro defeated his enemies at the Battle of Najera, which is near Vittoria, where the Duke of Wellington many centuries later won another British victory. In gratitude for this signal service Don Pedro gave to the Black Prince his most treasured jewel, an enormous ruby. The ruby, red as human blood, had come to Don Pedro in bloody fashion. In 1367 it belonged to the King of Granada, another minor sovereign in Spain, and Don Pedro greatly coveted the greatest gem of the Western world, as it then probably was. He therefore took direct action towards obtaining the stone, and in cold blood slaughtered the King of Granada and carried off the ruby. His gift to the Black Prince, therefore, however generous it may have seemed, was not improbably a decent pretext for getting rid of a treasure ignobly acquired, and which when once possessed lost its value. How old the ruby was in 1367 history does not relate, but it bears visible evidence that it had previous to that date an oriental origin, which may have extended over many centuries. This is judged by the fact that at the top of the ruby may be seen a piercing, made evidently so as to enable it to be worn suspended from a necklace. This piercing of precious stones is of very ancient oriental origin, from which it is concluded that the ruby came from the East, and not improbably from Burmah, where similar rubies have been found. The ancient piercing has in a later century been filled up by inserting a small ruby in a gold setting. However ancient its origin, the ruby came into the possession of the British Crown in 1367-68, and has since been through many and great adventures before it reached its present well-earned security in the Tower of London.