Richard The Third?

It used to be a church, he was the last English King to die in battle. They now believe he was killed by a Halberg strike to the back of the head near the spine. He looks like he was a tough man, he had a lot of scars on his skeleton.

I work for a company who could sort out his spine problem. May have been able to defeat Henry if he had our implants in him.

I thought his 'spine problems' were one of those myth-type things propagated by Shakespeare, amongst others.

and the jury is still out on the princes - other accounts say Henry had them bumped off to consolidate his claim to the throne.

There was an interesting program on UK TV, last night about the discovery of the remains, the hunt for which were promoted by fund raising by a "Richardian" society, they certainly believed the theory that the humped back was a piece of Tudor propaganda. The woman that had done the research that lead to the dig was on hand when the body was found, was what we call gobsmacked, when they found the body with a curved spine.

Her research as to location though was pretty dam good though, it was found in the first part of the first trench that the archaeologist put in, which is the proverbial needle in a haystack.

Richard did not however have a withered arm, as in the Play, they were both evenly matched if a little "effeminate" to quote the experts on the program, he may not have been a strong fighter. That doesn`t tell us though if he was a skilled fighter or if he had a degree of guile or tactical nouse to make him a good general.

He would have been 32 when killed. and are plenty of professional athletes who are in the peak of their physical condition at that age. He was eating a high protein diet compared to most people the time in England, and would have time to practise his fighting skills. IIRC they gave evidence of first hand accounts that said contemporaries even made note of his slight arms, they stood out compared to other nobles at the time.

But he didn't really have anything to do with York, other than being duke of it.

That was Leicester not Lincoln Silverdragon, but having said that they want to bury him in York Minster, which already is a pretty large tourist attraction itself.

It was also pointed out yesterday on BBC radio 4, Richard endowed the Minster with money for a chantry of 100 priests and chapels, more than any he gave to any other church in England. They are pretty sure his intention was to be buried there.

He also grew up in Yorkshire and was, I forget the exact title was it Marshal of the North?, but basically in command of the northern forces based largely in York.

That's better than Richard the Lion Heart (Richard the First), who in 42 years as King of England managed to spend something like 8 months in the country and ended up buried in France.

At least the later Richard managed to be buried in the country he ruled.

What I am curious about is the re internment ceremony, presumably there will be one. Do they invent one? or is there one on the books? so to speak. Richard III was a Catholic, does this pose a problem? and will a member of the current Royal family attend?