Wardour Old Castle was built in 1392 by John fifth Lord Lovell of Tichmarsh. During the Wars of the Roses it changed hands several times and, in 1499, was sold to Lord Willoughby de Broke whose grand-daughter re-sold it to a Cornish knight, Sir John Arundell of Lanheme. The family’, wrote John Francis, 12th Baron Arundell of Wardour in 1906, ‘has never ceased to be Catholic since mediaeval times’, and in 1552 Sir Thomas Arundell was executed because he belonged to the old religion. Queen Mary restored Wardour to Matthew Arundell, son of Sir Thomas, who in spite of his faith was knighted by Queen Elizabeth. He modernised the castle and built new Tudor windows into the Norman walls. Matthew Arundell’s son, Thomas, went to the Wars in Hungary, captured a Turkish banner at Esztergoum and was made a count of the Holy Roman Empire. Queen Elizabeth objected to this Popish honour and Count Thomas was sent to prison. James I, who could never quite forget that he had been born a Catholic, set Thomas Arundell free and made him the first Baron Arundell of Wardour. His grandson, the third Lord Arundell, was granted a special licence by James II whereby he and his heir were established as Counts of the Empire for good.

By this time Wardour Castle, though still inhabitable, had during the Great Rebellion, undergone two seiges in the space of ten months. Lady Blanche Arundell, a god-daughter of Margaret, Countess of Salisbury, had not the blood of the Plantagenets in her veins for nothing.