Principality of Wales longer claim part of the inheritance, which Welsh law had allowed them to do. From 1301, the Plantagenet (and later, Tudor) English kings gave their heir apparent, if he was the king's son or grandson, the lands and title of "Prince of Wales". The one exception was Edward II's son, Edward of Windsor, who later became Edward III. Upon the heir's accession to the throne, the lands and title merged in the Crown. The first "English" Prince of Wales was Edward I's son, Edward of Caernarfon. A late 16th-century story claimed that Edward I gave him the title following his
Principality of Wales the empire to the Kingdom of Scotland. Its existence has been seen as proof that all the elements necessary for the growth of Welsh statehood were in place. The period of "de facto" independence ended with Edward I's conquest of the Principality between 1277 and 1283. Under the Statute of Rhuddlan the Principality lost its independence and became effectively an annexed territory of the English crown. From 1301, the crown's lands in north and west Wales formed part of the appanage of England's heir apparent, with the title "Prince of Wales". On accession of the Prince to the English throne,