Richard III

[MinaHarker]

It's him!

[Richard Brinck-Johnsen]

The live results are being announced right now...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21319148

[MinaHarker]

The live results are being announced right now...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21319148

Doesn't work on my device. I am following the Guardian live coverage.

[Richard Brinck-Johnsen]

They shut the live feed on the link I posted after the "final verdict" which is a shame as would've been good to hear from the representative of the Richard III society....

Anyway the DNA examination proves...

It really is Richard III beyond all reasonable doubt.

The skeleton will be reburied at Leicester Cathedral.

[MinaHarker]

It's fascinating.

[SiHart]

Blimey! It's a quite astonishing find and some brilliant work from the archaeologists too

[Dirk Gently]

Interesting stuff indeed.

If you want to see Sir Robert Burgess et al talking about this then BBCi Player the news channel & go back to 10am.

Of course this'll you'll only be able to do this until 12.

[Stuart Wallis]

Doesn't work on my device. I am following the Guardian live coverage.

Really Mina, do you honestly expect the Guardian to publish anything interesting concerning royalty?!

I believe Channel 4's showing a programme about it tonight.

[Philipnet]

Comments between my sister and I have included:

"A carpark, a carpark, my Kingdom for a carpark!"

and

"Now is the winter of our disinterment".

[Andrew Curnow]

Am I the only one who thinks that the 'reconstructed' face looks like Matthew MacFadyen from Spooks?

[MacNimon]

I think it's really interesting. From what I've been reading recently, this is possibly a perfect example of how we ever only hear the version of history that the winning side allow us to hear, isn't it? For all that he's portrayed as a bit of a tyrant and a murderer, this is obviously what the victorious Henry VII wanted people to hear because Richard had a stronger claim to the throne than Richard did. I don't mean that he wasn't a murderer or anything, but his successor would obviously play down his good points (if any - but apparently a lot of the good stuff in our society today which protects the common man stems from his reign) and exagerate his bad ones just to get the people on his side, wouldn't he? It's what I'd do if I were in his shoes! And some people even reckon that Shakespeare was asked/instructed by the Tudors to do a bit of a hatchet job on him on his famous play, thus cementing his place in history as a tyrant.

It's a fascinating story though, whatever is true. A great find.

All they need to do now is find and identify the body of King Harold, which has been missing since the Battle of Hastings in 1066...

[Logo Polish]

And some people even reckon that Shakespeare was asked/instructed by the Tudors to do a bit of a hatchet job on him on his famous play, thus cementing his place in history as a tyrant.

Presumably Elizabeth I, as she was the only one who was still alive in his lifetime?

She probably wouldn't have needed to, as most of the sources available to Shakespeare would have been hostile to the king anyway...

[Richard Brinck-Johnsen]

All they need to do now is find and identify the body of King Harold, which has been missing since the Battle of Hastings in 1066...

Well his tombstone can be visited at Waltham Abbey just down the road from me but it would be interesting to potentially have a sensitive investigation to discover if there are any actual remains there.

Notably through a series of disastrous happenings most of William the Conqueror's bones have been destroyed over the centuries. I believe there is one left on display at whichever abbey it is in Normandy that he was originally buried at.

Also now that we have a definitive DNA sample for Richard III, I'd really like the bones buried in an urn at Westminster Abbey which may, or may not, be those of his murdered nephews to be properly carbon-dated and DNA tested. Sadly it's very unlikely that the Dean and Chapter of the Abbey will grant permission for this.

[Stuart Wallis]

I think it's really interesting. From what I've been reading recently, this is possibly a perfect example of how we ever only hear the version of history that the winning side allow us to hear, isn't it? For all that he's portrayed as a bit of a tyrant and a murderer, this is obviously what the victorious Henry VII wanted people to hear because Richard had a stronger claim to the throne than Richard did. I don't mean that he wasn't a murderer or anything, but his successor would obviously play down his good points (if any - but apparently a lot of the good stuff in our society today which protects the common man stems from his reign) and exagerate his bad ones just to get the people on his side, wouldn't he? It's what I'd do if I were in his shoes! And some people even reckon that Shakespeare was asked/instructed by the Tudors to do a bit of a hatchet job on him on his famous play, thus cementing his place in history as a tyrant.

It's a fascinating story though, whatever is true. A great find.

All they need to do now is find and identify the body of King Harold, which has been missing since the Battle of Hastings in 1066...

Henry had no legal claim to the throne as it happens; whilst he was related to the royal family of the day, he was in a branch of the Lancastrians that Richard II barred from the throne before the start of the Wars of the Roses on the grounds of illegitimacy. The Lancastrians backed him because a) they'd run out of legal heirs themselves; and b) he was related to Henry V's widow - a claim that was dubious to the point of effective illegitimacy as well. In the end, he made his claim by "right of conquest" ie. I won so there!, which he "strengthened" by marrying Richard's neice - ergo, Richard is Henry VIII's great uncle.

And as for Shakespeare, he has a bit of a reputation for using his plays to lick certain bodily orifices of whoever was on the throne at the time; there's no evidence that Macbeth even knew any witches, for instance, but Will put them in his play and made them wicked old crones because James I was all for burning them in real life.

[Stuart Wallis]

Well his tombstone can be visited at Waltham Abbey just down the road from me but it would be interesting to potentially have a sensitive investigation to discover if there are any actual remains there.

Notably through a series of disastrous happenings most of William the Conqueror's bones have been destroyed over the centuries. I believe there is one left on display at whichever abbey it is in Normandy that he was originally buried at.

Also now that we have a definitive DNA sample for Richard III, I'd really like the bones buried in an urn at Westminster Abbey which may, or may not, be those of his murdered nephews to be properly carbon-dated and DNA tested. Sadly it's very unlikely that the Dean and Chapter of the Abbey will grant permission for this.

My brother was born in Waltham Abbey as it happens. The Abbey of Waltham Holy Cross was built on Harold's orders in 1060. There appears to be no definitive evidence that he is still there, but don't tell anyone as the local tourist industry relies on his presence.

William I was buried at Abbey-aux-Hommes in Caen. We shan't go into his funeral, it was very Horrible Histories...

The bodies in Westminster Abbey Richard's referring to may or may not be the Princes in the Tower, one of whom was actually King Edward V rather than a prince. Just after the restoration, the skeletons of two boys were found bricked up behind the outer wall of the White Tower in the Tower of London. Charles II requested them interred at Westminster in case it was them.

Can I stop being Royal Wikipedia please...?

[Anthony Williams]

And some people even reckon that Shakespeare was asked/instructed by the Tudors to do a bit of a hatchet job on him on his famous play, thus cementing his place in history as a tyrant.

By the time of Shakespeare, the damage was already done. The Tudor propaganda machine had already steamrollered over Richard III's reputation. Most of Shakespeare's portrayal appears to come from the Croyland Chronicle, and the works of the likes of Polydore Vergil and Thomas More, who were keen to ingratiate themselves with the Tudors.

Richard, in actuality, was known during his reign as a "Good Lord" who punished "the oppressors of the commons". He was known for his pursuit of legal fairness in England.

Certainly, Shakespeare's portrayal of him was unfair, but he was not the originator of Richard's bad reputation.

[Dirk Gently]

Blackadder:- "Baldrick! Are you telling me your cunning plan is to hide him under a car park!?"

[Stuart Wallis]

"It worked for Lord Lucan, Mr. B! Only it was that or hide in a lasagne like Shergar did."

[shada pavlova]

I once came across a Richard III in a car park and I never got on the news.

[Dirk Gently]

I once came across a Richard III in a car park...

Yes, but it was dark & you were being dirty.

[Stuart Wallis]

It wasn't a Richard III, it was a wife of Henry VIII, and they're so common they come in sixes. That's why you're not on the telly!

[Philipnet]

Richard III may have been the King of England and the subject of a Shakespearean play, but even that couldn’t keep him safe from ending up in a hastily-dug grave that ultimately became part of a parking lot, according to a new study published in the journal Antiquity.

And while a century of peace followed his death, the late king’s body was reportedly stripped naked, despoiled and publicly displayed for three days before it was buried in what was at the time the Greyfriars monastery in Leicester.

The grave, described for the first time in an academic paper, highlights five specific points regarding the ill-fated king who died in 1485 in the Battle of Bosworth.

First of all, the grave Richard III was placed in was “badly prepared,” which, the researchers from the University of Leicester said, suggests gravediggers were in something of a rush to get the corpse underground.

Second, the king is placed in an “odd position,” with the skeleton’s torso crammed into the small space and its head propped up on one side of the grave, which (and this is the third point), is “too short at the bottom to receive the body conventionally.”

Fourth, someone apparently stood in the grave at the time the body was placed in it in order to receive it, suggested by the fact that the body is not placed centrally in the grave.

And finally, there is evidence that the man’s hands may have been tied at the time of burial.

All of this, the researchers write, is in stark contrast to the other medieval graves found in the same area, which were all standard, correct lengths and dug neatly with vertical sides.

In short, either the gravediggers were in a hurry or they had little respect for the deceased, according to the study’s authors.

Such a find is in keeping with accounts from the medieval historian Polydore Vergil, who recorded the king’s death as having been "without any pomp or solemn funeral.”

Moreover, the authors of the study argue, the skeleton itself points to the fact that the man buried in the ignominious grave discovered within the last year is in fact Richard III.

"The radiocarbon dates, evidence on the male skeleton of severe scoliosis, trauma consistent with injuries in battle and potential peri-mortem 'humiliation injuries', combined with the mtDNA match with two independent, well-verified matrilineal descendants all point clearly to the identification of this individual as King Richard III,” the researchers said in a statement. “Indeed, it is difficult to explain the combined evidence as anyone else.”

http://www.natureworldnews.com/artic...chers-find.htm

[Stuart Wallis]

"The radiocarbon dates, evidence on the male skeleton of severe scoliosis, trauma consistent with injuries in battle and potential peri-mortem 'humiliation injuries', combined with the mtDNA match with two independent, well-verified matrilineal descendants all point clearly to the identification of this individual as King Richard III,” the researchers said in a statement. “Indeed, it is difficult to explain the combined evidence as anyone else.”

mtDNA - DNA material that's passed down from mother to child, and give or take the occasional mutation, can remain largely similar for tens of thousands of years.

perimortem - at or around the time of death.

[Dirk Gently]

Thanks for that, Stuart. I'd be lost with out you.

[Stuart Wallis]

My sense of direction, you'd be untraceable with me!