"Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain " Topic

Quite interesting article here.

"So the science is in, and it looks like the bones found under a Leicester car park really were that of the late King Richard III. To the great credit of the dedicated sleuthing of his modern cheerleaders, the Richard III Society, he was exactly where they said he would be. To their great disappointment, he turned out to genuinely have a severe spinal deformity, if not exactly a hunchback, and to be rather slender, even feminine, in appearance, just as the contemporary historians (many of them Tudor propagandists) said he was. Still, it's nice to have the Middle Ages on the front page for a change.

As the Richard III Society were intimately involved in the discovery, the question of his posthumous reputation came up again, and I find this the more interesting part, since it involves history rather than archaeology. The Society seem occasionally slightly alarming in their devotion to a canny usurper and probable child murderer, and it's interesting to think about why people are so intrigued by perceived historical grievances in this way. I once shared a house with a woman who would literally rage at the historic indignities heaped on 19th century Native Americans, or Britain's actions during the Irish potato famine, but who was largely indifferent to the fate of present day Somalis or Ethiopians.

There is no doubt that Richard III was ill-served by history. Tudors (themselves usurpers) deliberately bolstered their own claim by blackening his name with that commonplace of history, victor's justice, and their accounts went unquestioned by Regency and Victoran historians who liked to pigeonhole historical figures into what '1066 And All That' parodied as Good Things and Bad Kings. Richard III was a Bad King, and that was that. Most damaging for his reputation has been that the main fictional portrayal of him in public circulation is as the Machiavel in Shakespeare's play. The Richard III Society feel this is unfair, and they have a point. But it's not a great one. Richard undoubtedly was a loyal brother while Edward was alive, but when he died he seized his chance with both hands and wasn't too fussy about what happened to those who got in the way, fabricating evidence of his brother's bigamy, ambushing and murdering his sister-in-law's family, arresting and 'disappearing' his nephews, and generally going about removing opponents with a terrible steely-eyed ruthlessness…"
Full article here.
link

Hope you enjoy!.

Amicalement
Armand

History don't you love it. If a script writer wrote it, he'd be laughed at.
Makes me proud.

Our history makes me proud, and it dont need a script writer to make me laugh at it at times, it simply is unbelievable

Well said Whiterose.

How can one be "proud" of history? It is what it is, to you, and we probably don't agree on what history "is"….

Great War Ace wrote:
"How can one be "proud" of history? It is what it is, to you, and we probably don't agree on what history "is"…."

It is very easy to be proud of your history as it is to be proud of your son or daughter or your achievements in life etc. History was made by the people that lived it ergo you can be proud of their contributions to making it or not depending on your interpretation of the events that took place.

"and we probably don't agree on what history "is"…."

I don't know exactly what you mean by this, but as I've never discussed history with you I don't know whether we would agree or not, however the interpretation of historical events can be a very personal thing so it it possible we may disagree on certain subjects. If you mean the actual definition of the word 'history' then it's unlikely we would disagree, I think.

'Great War Ace' is a fantastic handle by the way.

Oh, thank you very much.

I've found that my "version" of history is frequently out of step with most people's, but that's because I doubt the literal factuality of most of what I read….

What's Richard of York doing in the title?