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Richard III (2 October 1452 – 22 August 1485) was King of England from 1483 until his death in 1485, at the age of 32, in the Battle of Bosworth Field. He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty. His defeat at Bosworth Field, the last decisive battle of the Wars of the Roses, marked the end of the Middle Ages in England. He is the subject of the fictional historical play ''Richard III'' by William Shakespeare. When his brother King Edward IV died in April 1483, Richard was named Lord Protector of the realm for Edward's son and successor, the 12-year-old Edward V. As the young king travelled to London from Ludlow, Richard met and escorted him to lodgings in the Tower of London, where Edward V's own brother Richard of Shrewsbury joined him shortly afterwards. Arrangements were made for Edward's coronation on 22 June 1483; but, before the young king could be crowned, his father's marriage to his mother Elizabeth Woodville was declared invalid, making their children illegitimate and ineligible for the throne. On 25 June, an assembly of Lords and commoners endorsed the claims. The following day, Richard III began his reign, and he was crowned on 6 July 1483. The young princes were not seen in public after August, and accusations circulated that the boys had been murdered on Richard's orders, giving rise to the legend of the Princes in the Tower. Of the two major rebellions against Richard, the first, in October 1483, was led by staunch allies of Edward IV〔 p. 105〕 and Richard's former ally, Henry Stafford, 2nd Duke of Buckingham;〔Horrox, R. (1989) ''Richard III: A Study in Service'', Cambridge, p. 132; Buckingham was an exception amongst the rebels as, far from being a previous favourite, he 'had been refused any political role by Edward IV.'〕 but the revolt collapsed. In August 1485, Henry Tudor and his uncle, Jasper Tudor, led a second rebellion against Richard. Henry Tudor landed in southern Wales with a small contingent of French troops and marched through his birthplace, Pembrokeshire, recruiting soldiers. Henry's force engaged Richard's army and defeated it at the Battle of Bosworth Field in Leicestershire. Richard was struck down in the conflict, making him the last English king to die in battle on home soil and the first since Harold II was killed at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. After the battle Richard's corpse was taken to Leicester and buried without pomp.〔Ashdown-Hill, The Last Days of Richard III, p. 94 citing Polydore Vergil's "Historia Regum Angliae"〕 His original tomb is believed to have been destroyed during the Reformation, and his remains were lost for more than five centuries. In 2012, an archaeological excavation was conducted on a city council car park on the site once occupied by Greyfriars Priory Church. The University of Leicester identified the skeleton found in the excavation as that of Richard III as a result of radiocarbon dating, comparison with contemporary reports of his appearance, and comparison of his mitochondrial DNA with that of two matrilineal descendants of Richard III's eldest sister, Anne of York. Richard's remains were reburied in Leicester Cathedral on 26 March 2015. Richard III of England was confirmed to be haplogroup G2 (Y-DNA) and J1c2c (mtDNA).〔(A king's final hours, told by his mortal remains, 2013 )〕〔King, T. et al. (2014), Identification of the remains of King Richard III, Nature Communications, 5, Article number: 5631.〕 ==Childhood== Richard was born on 2 October 1452〔Ross, ''Richard III'', p. 3〕 at Fotheringhay Castle, the twelfth of thirteen children of Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York and Cecily Neville at the beginning of what has traditionally been labelled the "Wars of the Roses," a period of "three or four decades of political instability and periodic open civil war in the second half of the fifteenth century,"〔, p. 15〕 between supporters of Richard's father (a potential claimant to the throne of King Henry VI from birth),〔Johnson, P. A., ''Duke Richard of York'' Oxford 1988, p. 27〕—"Yorkists"—in opposition to the regime of Henry VI and his Queen Margaret of Anjou, and those loyal to the crown ("Lancastrians"). When his father and elder brother Edmund, Earl of Rutland were killed in the Battle of Wakefield on 30 December 1460, Richard, who was eight years old, and his older brother George (later Duke of Clarence) were sent by his mother, the Duchess of York, to the Low Countries.〔, pp. 41–42〕 They returned to England following the defeat of the Lancastrians at the Battle of Towton and participated in the coronation of Richard's eldest brother as King Edward IV in June 1461. At this time Richard was named Duke of Gloucester and made a Knight of the Garter and Knight of the Bath; he was involved in the rough politics of the Wars of the Roses from an early age (for example, Edward appointed him the sole Commissioner of Array for the Western Counties in 1464, when he was eleven). By the age of seventeen, he had an independent command.〔Kendall, Richard the Third, p. 40〕 Richard spent several years during his childhood at Middleham Castle in Wensleydale, Yorkshire, under the tutelage of his cousin Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick (later known as the "Kingmaker" because of his role in the Wars of the Roses) who took care of his knightly training: in autumn 1465 King Edward granted the earl £1000 for the expenses of his younger brother’s tutelage.〔Tellers’ Roll, Mich. 5 Edw. IV (no. 36), m. 2; quoted by Scofield, I, p. 216, note 6〕 With some interruptions, Richard stayed at Middleham either from late 1461 until early 1465, when he was twelve〔Kendall, Richard the Third, pp. 34–44, 74〕 or from 1465 until his coming of age in 1468 when he turned sixteen.〔 pp. 36–37, 240 From November 1461 until 1465 all references to Richard place him in locations south of the river Trent. It may have been partly to appease Warwick’s injured feelings towards the rising influence of the king’s new Woodville in-laws that he was given the honour of taking Richard into his household to complete his education, probably at some time in 1465.〕 While at Warwick's estate, he probably met Francis Lovell, a strong supporter later in his life, and Warwick's younger daughter, his future wife Anne Neville,〔 * p. 8; 'It is a fair presumption that here Richard, in his formative years, made the acquaintance of his future wife, Warwick's younger daughter, Anne.'〕 It is possible that even at this early stage Warwick was considering the king’s brothers as strategic matches for his daughters, Isabel and Anne: young aristocrats were often sent to be raised in the households of their intended future partners,〔 p. 63〕 as had been the case for the young dukes’ father, Richard of York.〔# Kendall|Kendall, Richard the Third, pp. 16-17.〕 As the relationship between the king and Warwick became strained, Edward IV opposed the match.〔Kendall, Richard the Third p. 68〕 During Warwick’s lifetime, George was the only royal brother to marry one of his daughters, the eldest, Isabel, on 12 July 1469, without the king's permission. George joined his father-in-law's revolt against the king,〔 p. 45〕 while Richard remained loyal to Edward, even though rumour coupled Richard’s name with Anne Neville until August 1469.〔Kendall, Richard the Third p. 522 As late as 1469 rumour was still coupling Richard’s name with Anne Neville’s. In August of that year (by which time Clarence had married Isabel), an Italian observer in London mistakenly reported that Warwick had married his two daughters to the King's brothers (Cal. Milanese Papers, I, pp. 118–20)〕 Richard and Edward were forced to flee to Burgundy in October 1470 after Warwick defected to the side of the former Lancastrian Queen Margaret of Anjou and for a second time, Richard was forced to seek refuge in the Low Countries, which were part of the realm of the Duchy of Burgundy. In 1468, Richard's sister Margaret had married Charles the Bold, the Duke of Burgundy, and the brothers could expect a welcome there. Although only eighteen years old, Richard played crucial roles in the battles of Barnet and Tewkesbury〔Kendall, Richard the Third pp. 87–89〕 that resulted in Edward's restoration to the throne in spring 1471. During his adolescence, Richard developed idiopathic scoliosis. In 2014 the osteoarchaeologist Dr Jo Appleby, of Leicester University's School of Archaeology and Ancient History, imaged the spinal column and reconstructed a model using 3D printing, and concluded that though the spinal scoliosis looked dramatic, it probably did not cause any major physical deformity that could not be disguised by clothing. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Richard III of England」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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