Richard The Chird (82 page)

within the forebuilding running up to the door; the third account simply says that the foundations were "in ye Tower"; the fourth says that the stairway was "in the White Tower."

As Tanner points out, however, it is almost impossible to believe that the bones were dug out of the spiral staircase 'within the Tower. If they were, though, these bones can scarcely be those of the Princes, since they could only have been buried there before the staircase was built, hollowed out of solid stone, several hundred years before Richard's time. In all likelihood the skeletons were discovered just beneath or within (why dig lower than the bottom of the foundation?) the foundation of the staircase leading up to the door in the south wall.

In order to bury the bodies, therefore, a hole had to be dug downward about ten feet, and then an excavation made inward —that is, under or within the foundations of the staircase. This Herculean operation cannot be said to be described by More's words, ". . . at the stair foot, meetly deep in the ground under a great heap of stones." It seems likely that the gossip which More—and no one else—retails, accidentally happened to approximate the actual mode of buriaL See Lawrence E. Tanner and William Wright, "Recent Investigations regarding the Fate of the Princes in the Tower," Archaeologia, LXXXIV (1934), p. i et seq.

* The rumor that Tyrell committed the murders reached the city of London. Fabyan does not use it, but the Great Chronicle does, doubtingly: "Sir James Tyrell was reported to be the doer, but others put that weight upon

an old servant of King Richard's named " (name omitted from the

Chronicle). What King Henry "gave out" was evidently so doubtful that many people preferred other versions of the murders. Concerning the circumstances of the deed, the Chronicle gives only a catalogue of possible murder methods—smothering, drowning, slaying by a poisoned dagger. As for Bernard Andre, Henry VIFs official biographer and poet laureate, who was apparently completing his Life about 1503 when the news about Tyrell should have been very fresh, he says nothing on the subject of who lolled the Princes, merely remarking that Richard ordered them to be put to death secretly by the sword. Where, again T is More's fine circumstantial tale?

5 Tanner and Wright, "Recent Investigations . . . ," p. i et seq.

6 Since the conclusions of science are not static, it seemed to me wise to submit the anatomical and dental evidence set forth in Tanner and Wright's article (see note 3, above) to authoritative scrutiny. I am deeply indebted to Dr. W. M. Krogman, professor of physical anthropology in the Graduate School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania, and to Dr. Arthur Lewis, orthodontist, of Dayton, Ohio, for their kindness in patiently discussing this evidence with me; to Dr. Richard Lyne-Pirkis, of Godalming, Surrey; and to Professor Bertram S. Kraus, of the Department of Anthropology, the University of Arizona.

Dr. Krogman summarizes his conclusions regarding the evidence as follows: "The ages as given are, in my opinion, a little too precisely stated. The dental evidence for age is, I think, the soundest. The evidence of age from the bones is limited because of the absence of most of the centers of ossification of the long bones. All things considered, the total age range of all

the material is such that both children could have met their death as historically stated [i.e., in August of 1483].

"The so-called staining of the facial bones, attributable to the suffusion of suffocation, is not borne out by experience. Unless there -were a rupturing of vessels, the suffusion would be limited to facial tissue and would not register itself upon the bones."

On the basis of the dental evidence, Dr. Arthur Lewis gave his opinion that the elder child might be anywhere from eleven to thirteen years of age but that he most probably appeared to be about eleven and a half, according to the description of the dentition set forth by the article, the terminology of which was not altogether clear.

Professor Bertram Kraus writes, in part: ". . . the conclusion that the two skeletons were those of male sex was not substantiated (indeed it would be difficult to establish sex on pre-pubertal skeletons), and the terminology with regard to the dentition is somewhat questionable.

"Two points lead me to the conclusion that the individual [the elder child] is not over nine years of age. First, assuming that there is correspondence between skeletal age and chronological age, the status of eruption of the permanent dentition would place the individual at nine years of age and definitely under twelve. Secondly, it is stated that there were no signs of epiphyseal union at the proximal end of the humerus. Complete union at this point generally occurs at the age of eighteen and if union has not occurred there is no accurate way of assessing age by degree of incompleteness of union. I notice that the apex of the odontoid processes of the axis was not fused, which . . . 'makes it possible to say with confidence that it belonged to a child who had not yet attained the age of thirteen.' This, unfortunately, is not a correct statement. Fusion of the apex to the odontoid process takes place between four and six years of age. This would merely indicate that the child is under four years of age."

Dr. Lyne-Pirkis, of Godalming, Surrey, who kindly discussed with me the anatomical evidence relating to the elder skeleton, likewise declared that the inference drawn from the state of the odontoid processes of the axis was incorrect; and like Dr. Krogman, he was of the opinion that the so-called stain upon the facial bones of the skeleton was not a bloodstain resulting from the suffusion of suffocation.

While it appears, then, that a major conclusion of Tanner and Wright's article is correct—that if the bones are indeed the skeletons of the Princes, the boys were certainly dead by the end of the year 1483 and therefore could not have been dispatched by Henry VII—it also appears that other conclusions drawn in the article are not substantiated by certain present-day scientific authorities. The anatomical evidence for the age of the elder child is not sustained, and the conclusion that the stain on the facial bones upholds the story that the children were smothered is likewise not borne out. Most disturbing of all is the possibility that the elder child was too young to have been Edward V.

The sum of these findings and the circumstances under which the bones were discovered (see note 3, above) indicate that the skeletons inurned in Westminster Abbey cannot be flatly and incontrovertibly identified as those

of the sons of Edward IV. Until or unless the urn is reopened in order to attempt an estimate of the age of the bones, it must be acknowledged that their identification with the Princes can only be expressed in terms of probability.

NOTES TO APPENDIX II

The testimony of More and Vergil is analyzed, for specific instances and assertions, in the notes—see particularly the notes to the section "Protector and Defensor"—and also, for the murder of the Princes, in Appendix L

For my sketch of the development of the Tudor tradition I am especially indebted to George B. Churchill's analysis, "Richard the Third up to Shakespeare/* Palaestra, X (1900), Berlin; to Denys Hay's authoritative Polydore Vergil, Oxford, 1952; and to E. M. W. Tillyard's Shakespeare's, History Plays, New York, 1946. My account of the tone and substance of the Tudor tradition is in general accord with the conclusions of these authorities.

1 Churchill, p. 51.

2 W. E. Campbell and A. W. Reed, The English Works of Sir Thomas More, London, 1931, pp. 24-41. Compare A. F. Pollard, "The Making of Sir Thomas More's Richard III," Historical Essays m Honour of James Tait, Manchester, 1933, pp. 223-38.

3 Mackie, p. 258.

4 P. viii and p. 9.

5 In a letter which Professor Hay was kind enough to write me concerning this issue, he considers it conceivable that Vergil burned records "which might have tended to prejudice Tudor origins," but he doubts very much whether Vergil and his English contemporaries would have felt the historical relevance of such documentation." This judgment clearly establishes the unlikelihood that Vergil deliberately destroyed documents relating to Richard's reign.

6 P. 48.

* HMC, 3rd rep., Ill, p. 43.

8 "Recent Investigations . . . ," Archaeologia, LXXXIV (1934), p. 2.

9 See "Bishop Russell and the Croyland Chronicle? by J. G. Edwards, George Lam, and Paul M. Kendall (as yet unpublished but shortly to appear in the English Historical Review).

10 See, for example, J. D. Mackie, The Earlier Tudors; Kenneth H. Vickers, England in the Later Middle Ages, fourth ed., London and New York, 1926 (vol. Ill of "A History of England," in 7 vols.); C. Oman, The History of England from the Accession of Richard 11 to the Death of Richard 111, London and New York, 1906 (vol. IV of the "Political History of England" series, in 12 vols.); and a representative general history recently produced in America, Walter P. Hall and Robert G. Albion, A History of England and the British Empire > second ed., London and New York, 1946.

11 Introduction to York Civic Records^ vol. I, ed. by Angelo Raine. Raine says (p. vi) that Richard was distrusted and disliked by many of the commons, and (p. vii) that there is no evidence that the city council loved Richard. He continues (p. vii), "The delay in sending soldiers from the

City to take part in Bosworth fight does not show love, but rather anxiety to keep out of it and to join the winning side." It is apparently the Tudor tradition which leads Raine into this indefensible position and also into an outright error. "The most unpopular thing Richard ever did in York," he says, *Svas to ask for and receive from a compliant council some common pasture near St. Nicholas* Hospital" (p. viii). Actually, the common pasture was to be enclosed for the benefit of the hospital, as York Records makes abundantly clear: "iyth March, 1484: At the which day the letter of our sovereign lord the King, by the which our said sovereign desired to have a close belonging to the hospital of Saint Nicholas, the which is common from the feast of St. Michael to Candelmas, to have it closed and several to the behove of the said hospital. , . ." (p. 186).

Bibliography

THIS list contains only those works and manuscript sources which I have cited most frequently and found most valuable. Books or manuscripts to which I have referred only once or twice are described in the notes in which they are mentioned.

Those sources, books, and articles which were mainly useful for the Prologue and the section "Richard, Duke of Gloucester," dealing with Richard's earlier years, I have listed at the head of the notes on the Prologue; principal sources for the Epilogue (the reign of Henry VII) I have listed in the notes to that section; studies in Tudor historiography are indicated in the notes to Appendix II; and the works which make up the Tudor tradition of history from Rous to Shakespeare I have discussed in Appendix II.

MANUSCRIPT SOURCES

British Museum: Cotton MSS.

Harleian MS. 433.

Public Record Office: Chancery Records, Edward IV and Richard III. Exchequer Records, Edward IV and Richard III.

PRIMARY SOURCES, PRINTED

Calendar of the Close Rolls, 1461-68; 1468-76; 1476-85.

Calendar of the Patent Rolls, 1452-61; 1461-67; 1467-77; 1476-85.

Calendar of Milanese Papers: Calendar of State Papers and Manuscripts, relating to English affairs, existing in the Archives and Collections of Milan, vol. I, ed. by A. B. Hinds, London, 1912.

Calendar of Venetian Papers: Calendar of State Papers and Manuscripts, relating to English affairs, existing in the Archives and Collections of Venice and in other Libraries of Northern Italy, vol. I, ed. by Rawdon Brown, London, 1864.

Foedera . . . , vols. XI and XII, compiled by Thomas Rymer, London, 1727.

Rotuli Parliamentorum (Rolls of Parliament) , vols. V and VI.

Statutes of the Realm, vols. II and III, London, 1816.

Cely Papers, ed. by H. E. Maiden, Camden Society, 1900.

Chastellain, Georges, CEuvres, ed. by M. le Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove,

Brussels, 1863-65.

Chronicles of London, ed. by C. L. Kingsford, Oxford, 1905. Chronicle of the Rebellion in Lincolnshire (1470), ed. by J. G. Nichols,

Camden Society, 1847.

Chronicles of the White Rose of York, London, 1845. Chronique Scandaleuse. Journal de Jean de Roye connu sous le nom de

Chronique Scandaleuse (1460-83), ed. by B. de Mandrot, Paris, 1894-96. Collection of all the Wills now known to be extant of the Kings and Queens

of England . . . , Society of Antiquaries, London, 1780. Collection of Ordinances and Regulations for the Government of the Royal

Household, London, 1790.

Commynes, Philippe de, Memoires de Philippe de Commynes, 2 vols., ed. by

B. de Mandrot, Paris, 1901-03. Coventry Leet Book, ed. by Mary D. Harris, Early English Text Society,

1907-13.

Croyland Chronicle: "Historiae Croylandensis," Rerwn Anglicarum Scrip-torum, vol. I, ed. by W. Fulman, Oxford, 1684. English translation: In-gulph's Chronicle of the Abbey of Croyland, trans, and ed. by Henry T. Riley, Bonn's Antiquarian Library, London, 1854. Gust, Mrs. Henry, Gentlemen Errant . . . , London, 1909. Devon, F. Issues of the Exchequer, London, 1837.

Dignity of a Peer: Reports from the Lords' Committees touching the Dignity of a Peer of the Realm, 5 vols., 1829. Drake, F. Eboracum . . . , London, 1736. Excerpta Historica, London, 1831. Fabyan, Robert, The New Chronicles of England and France, ed. by

Henry Ellis, London, 1811. Fortescue, Sir John, The Governance of England . . . , ed. by C. Plummer,

Oxford, 1885. Grants of King Edward the Fifth, ed. by J. G. Nichols, Camden Society,

1854. The Great Chronicle of London, ed. by A. H. Thomas and I. D. Thornley,

London, 1938.

Halliwell, J. C., Letters of the Kings of England, ^ vols., London, 1846, Historie of the Arrivall of Edward IV in England . . . , ed. by John Bruce,

Camden Society, 1838.

HMC: Historical Manuscripts Commission, Reports of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts. Household Books of John, Duke of Norfolk, and Thomas, Earl of Surrey,