Documentary, Fact Or Fiction - Richard III - Wars Of The Roses King <br /><br />#Documentary #Richard #WarsOfTheRosesKing #RichardIII <br />Richard III, the last king of the House of York, played a pivotal role in the Wars of the Roses, a series of civil wars between the rival houses of Lancaster and York for the English throne. <br /> Born on October 2, 1452, he was the youngest son of Richard, Duke of York, and Cecily Neville. <br /> He distinguished himself as a military leader, playing a key role in the Yorkist victories at the battles of Barnet and Tewkesbury in 1471, which effectively ended the Lancastrian threat during his brother Edward IV's reign. <br /> After Edward IV's sudden death in 1483, Richard was named Lord Protector for his 12-year-old nephew, Edward V. <br /><br />The central controversy surrounding Richard III is his usurpation of the throne. He seized his nephew and his brother, Edward V, and imprisoned them in the Tower of London. <br /> Richard then declared Edward IV's marriage to Elizabeth Woodville invalid, claiming a precontract with Lady Eleanor Butler, which would render Edward V and his brother illegitimate. <br /> This claim, however, lacks contemporary evidence and was never formally adjudicated by a church court. <br /> Parliament subsequently declared Richard the rightful king, and he was crowned on July 6, 1483. <br /> While modern historians debate whether Richard planned this move in advance, they generally agree that his justification was based on the legitimacy of Edward IV's children. <br /><br />The disappearance and presumed murder of the "Princes in the Tower," Edward V and his younger brother Richard, remain one of history's enduring mysteries. Although there is no conclusive proof, popular belief at the time and for centuries afterward held that Richard III ordered their deaths, a notion that significantly damaged his reputation and fueled opposition. <br /> This suspicion contributed to the rebellion led by the Duke of Buckingham, which Richard managed to suppress. <br /><br />Richard's reign was short-lived. He was defeated and killed at the Battle of Bosworth Field on August 22, 1485, by the forces of Henry Tudor, who became King Henry VII, marking the end of the Wars of the Roses and the beginning of the Tudor dynasty. <br /> The discovery of Richard III's skeleton in Leicester in 2012 confirmed he suffered from severe scoliosis, a spinal deformity, but not the hunchback portrayed by later writers like Shakespeare. <br /> This physical condition, while real, was likely exaggerated in historical accounts, which often depicted him as a tyrannical and monstrous figure, a portrayal influenced heavily by Sir Thomas More's 1513 account and Shakespeare's play. <br /> Modern scholarship acknowledges Richard as a capable administrator and military leader who earned popularity in the north, but also recognizes the strong likelihood of his involvement in the princes' deaths, which ultimately led to his downfall
