Posted on 09/17/2014 12:39:21 PM PDT by Scoutmaster
Richard III's last moments were likely quick but terrifying, according to a new study of the death wounds of the last king of England to die in battle.
The last king of the Plantagenet dynasty faced his death at the Battle of Bosworth Field on Aug. 22, 1485, only two years after ascending the throne. The battle was the deciding clash in the long-running Wars of the Roses, and ended with the establishment of Henry Tudor as the new English monarch. But Richard III's last moments were the stuff of legend alone, as the king's body was lost until September 2012, when archaeologists excavated it from under a parking lot in Leicester, England. Now, a very delayed postmortem examination reveals that of nearly a dozen wounds on Richard's body, only two were likely candidates for the fatal blow. Both were delivered to the back of the head.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
He didn't, because he couldn't, and neither can you.
Were you on the Casey Anthony jury?
You are that wonderfully silly specimen of humanity who believe that children can go into a room and mysteriously disappear, while the person entrusted with their health and well-being, who does everything in the world to hinder any attempts to find them, and does nothing but deny that they're missing, says they're still alive but doesn't produce them, who has motives of the nastiest kind to want them dead ... but is ... is ... wait for it ... wait for it ... INNOCENT!
By Jove yes. You are right. All of the people who turned against Richard were wrong about him. All of the contemporaneous accounts that we have must be wrong. Martyred saints lied about Richard. Even the Tudors enemies who hated Richard lied about him. Richard, alone against the world, is right.
Except that he is a traitor, a usurper, and a murderer. History has judged. Go line up on the grassy knoll with all the other kooks.
Not an expert on British monarchy, but if half of what was true in the "Tudors" series, then Henry VIII had to be the most villainous of all.
By personal insults, you get no where with me. Casey Anthony, stupidity, silly specimen - really, are you an amateur historian or just another person who resorts to insults when disagreed with?
The question is not why Richard didn’t produce the children - they were seen at Gipping Hall with their mother after his ascension to the throne - it’s why he didn’t produce their dead bodies. That was the typical behavior of usurpers. Richard himself was put on display in Leicester after his death to show that he was really, truly dead. Richard could very well have produced dead children - dead of pneumonia or any childhood disease. It didn’t happen.
Please stop the insults. I have not insulted you during this entire discussion. I like writing about this subject and find it depressing that you have to resort to such tactics to prove your points.
That’s the one!
“Died from a Sword through the Brain, and you call yourself a King! Amateur!”
And there it is.
The Illuminati. The Bilderberg Conspiracy. The Grassy Knoll. The Wingless Plane that hit the Pentagon on 9/11. The Bermuda Triangle. And of course, last and by no means least kooky, The Richard The III Society
Oh, and by the way, I did say that no attempt was made to determine the sex of the children. That's not the same as saying it can't be done, which was your original claim.
You also repeat the nonsense about "jaw disease." he had degenerative bone loss, entirely consistent with starvation. I note you don't try to refute that, either.
As to More's claim that the children had been moved? That was based on a contemporary account that a female Yorkist, overcome by guilt, had had them moved. He could not have known whether that part, or even the fact that the children were buried there was true by first-hand knowledge. But at least part of his story is verified by the excavation. You on the other hand, credit one part of More's account but not another, denying the part that's upheld by evidence, and choosing to accept that part which isn't. Like most conspiracy nuts -- not least Ricardians -- you're very selective about what parts of the record you cherry pick.
Finally, your suggestion that Mancini's account cannot be factual because he didn't speak English or had a dubious provenance is amusing. Apparently you believe that either foreigners or sinister people [or some combination of the two] can't tell time. Remarkable. Please elaborate on that one.
But even if we stipulate to accept your dubious theory that a man lied to his own diary -- just to make your hero look bad -- you have the problem of Richard's own denials of the murders as contemporary evidence as well. Or are you of the opinion that Richard often lied publicly, just to make himself appear to be guilty?
As I said: you should have been -- perhaps were -- on the Casey Anthony jury. Her defense advanced a similar theory: that she was innocent precisely because she did everything in thew world to make herself appear to be guilty. That she is free is a testament to the Ricardians of the world.
They were murdered within one month of his [pretended] ascension. They have been missing for over five hundred years, of which two encompassed his [pretended] reign. Your claim that he would have produced dead bodies if he was guilty is so nonsensical as to be unworthy of comment.
Ok, I’m done with this. I will only say that the dentists’ paper is available on the Richard the Third Society web site. Read it or not.
They were ALL evil. But I think dethroning your brother’s own sons — a brother to whom your own rise in the world was largely due — and then murdering them, is a very, very special kind of evil.
Thanks for the ping! I saw the documentary. Fascinating!
Cue the spooky music! Seriously I have no dog in this fight. I just find it amazing how people of all backgrounds can believe anything. Maybe this is false (probably is) but maybe it's true. After all, it's not a conspiracy if they really are out to get you.
Or something like that.
His last words were “tis but a scratch”
Saw that same documentary. It was amazing how they created armour for him that allowed him to sit well in the saddle and fight. With it on, you couldn’t tell he had scoliosis. The kid was awesome, and successfully handled every step they put him through.
Actually, as I remember, after his confession he kept him in the Court unharmed for quite sometime. It was only after Warbeck left and mounted another attempt at gathering followers did the King resort to execution.
I think that the King thinking that this character might turn out to be some bastard descendent, didn’t want him abused as a commoner criminal, he wanted to protect himself from critics. Only after those supporting Warbeck against the king made another go at it was the King forced to finally take him permanently out of play.
The era of the Plantagenet’s and the Tudors is of epic sweep. The characters and events are beyond anything a novelist could write.
Richard III wouldn’t have benefited from their deaths. The Titulus Regius delegitimizing Richard’s brother’s children and naming him the successor was passed by the Parliament. Upon Richard’s assassination (he was murdered on the field by some purported allies who were actually in the employ of Henry) Tudor demanded that the earlier Titulus Regius be confiscated and burned and the sister of the princes be legitimized. He married her, and had the princes assassinated (on the down low of course).
The only reason this came out in recent years is, one copy of the Titulus Regius happened to survive in obscurity, laying out the basis for his behavior and laying his plot bare.
During some renovation to the Tower of London, some remains were found under a staircase, or rather supposedly under a staircase. They declared to be those of the missing princes, and slapped into an urn where they remain. Many years ago they were studied a little, measured and described, and found to be, at best, an enigma. The Crown and the Church of England have refused to allow radiocarbon or DNA testing of the bones.
That said, ALL monarchs are tyrants.
I've given some on this thread rough treatment. They deserve it. Richard never behaved as Lord Protector in any way, shape, manner or form. He delayed the coronation of King Edward in order to dig up someone who was willing [although not publicly] to claim the prior king's marriage invalid. Contrary to claims -- falsely -- made on this thread, Richard reluctantly accepted crown. No such thing. He was a legalist, and he arranged a legal coup, manipulated Parliament and got himself crowned.
Those machinations alone tell you that Richard had no respect for the "much-loved" brother to whom Richard's rise in the world was largely owed. Deposing the reigning king with a whisper campaign in front of you and an army at your back is the act of a treasonous villain, not a loving brother. Richard knew that his nephew's claim to the throne were -- and always would be -- stronger than his own. There's no need to ask bizarre questions which lead us into tortured suppositions and theories for which there is no historical evidence, when the obvious answer is so much easier and so much more supported by the facts.
As soon as he met them, Richard IMMEDIATELY had his nephews sent to The Tower. He delayed the coronation. He had Parliament depose the king. He got himself crowned in the space of less than two months. A month later, the princes were never heard from again. Rumors persisted from late summer of 1483 until the end of his short reign that Richard had murdered them. He publicly denied [and thus, publicly acknowledged] the rumors. He never produced any evidence that they remained alive. Had they remained in the Tower, they were already in the one place on earth safest from Henry Tudor. Sending children abroad on a dubious Channel crossing into countries where Richard's writ did not run is a ridiculous idea.
Let's not get too clever about this.
Sounds like a very painful death. RIP.
‘Tis But a Flesh Wound!
Reading about the death of a warrior king would make der Fuhrer Buckwheat crap in his black pampers.
RE Monty python:
I’m glad I’m not the ONLY one who had that thought pop into my head...
But seriously... those are some pretty horrific wounds. They beat the hell out of him, pretty much...
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