Royal Blood: Richard III and the Mystery of the Princes
Notoriously immortalied by Shakespeare and historians, he is history's most infamous royal villian: Richard III, king of England from 1483 to 1485. Crazed with power and paranoia, he is generally supposed to have killed the youthful Prince of Wales and the aged Henry VI, drowned his brother in...
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Notoriously immortalied by Shakespeare and historians, he is history's most infamous royal villian: Richard III, king of England from 1483 to 1485. Crazed with power and paranoia, he is generally supposed to have killed the youthful Prince of Wales and the aged Henry VI, drowned his brother in a vat of wine, poisoned his wife, and, worst of all, murdered his two young nephews, the older of whom was the rightful king--a reign of terror ending only with his own cowardly death on the blood-soaked field of battle.But is all this true? Modern revisionists, citing the unreliability of Shakespeare's sources and the political agenda of historians in Richard's own day, have offered a far different portrait. A brave and valiant soldier, a loyal brother, and an intelligent, able king popular with his subjects and defeated only through treachery, their Richard is the victim of a deliberate campaign of slander devised by his Tudor successors to the throne.In this comprehensive, meticulously researched book, renowned litigator Bertram Fields outlines and evaluates the arguments of both sides, sifting through five hundred years of legend to apply his highly successful courtroom techniques to the available evidence. Clearing away the dust of time, Fields reconstructs one of the most dramatic and turbulent episodes in history, analyzing the motives and machinations of the many players and emerging with the most definitive account yet of this most fascinating figure--and a powerful argument against acquiescing to common belief.
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Format: paperback
ISBN:
9780060987381 (0060987383)
Publish date: June 20th 2000
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Pages no: 352
Edition language: English
Spoiler Alert***The fate of the Princes in the Tower has long been one that has drawn speculation and debate. Many historians have laid the blame at their Uncle's feet, claiming that he murdered them in order to claim the throne for himself, and thereby removing any claim that they would have. Bertr...
So I haven't brought my self a book for a while. Well I have but not a paper one. I love a bit of history and why not one of the most “Strangest moments in history” The disappearance of the princes in the tower. For years this has fascinated people because its one of those “Who did it??” Was it ki...
This book was impossible to put down! Fields does an excellent job of analyzing the difficult questions relating to Richard III and the princes in the tower. He expertly separates the issues of Richard's motivations for taking the throne, whether or not the princes were really killed, and if they we...
Okay - there are books at each of my destinations, all hovering around the mid-way point. However I have been wined and dined today in glorious style (can't remember the last time moussaka was on my plate) so I shall pick up a fancy, which brings me to this point...Now is the winter of our disconten...
A very interesting concept, an attorney preparing a defense of Richard III and seeing the mystery of "who done them in" from his point of view. Fields takes the reader through the history of the Wars of the Roses, Edward IV, Richard III and those hated Woodvilles as he analyses the pros and cons of ...