Showing Richard III: Return of the King by Patricia J. Collins

Richard III's reputation and appearance has dominated the media since the discovery of his skeleton was confirmed on 4 February 2013. Even before the discovery, the legacy of Richard III was a hotly debated issue with myths and misconceptions surrounding his person. In this book, we’re going to concentrate on busting or confirming the most popular myths surrounding Richard III:

•What did he really look like?
•Did he poison his wife so he could marry his niece?
•Did he murder his nephews, the Princes in the Tower?
•What led to his death and what happened to his body?

Richard III’s physical appearance has defined his reputation to this day: According to chroniclers writing under the reign of the Tudors, he was a misshapen monster whose villainy was reflected in his deformity. Richard’s supporters have refuted this claim. But Richard's skeleton has yielded a dramatic piece of evidence: the king really did have a severe spinal curvature which may have given him uneven shoulders. So it turns out not everything written by Tudor historians is mere propaganda . . .

Somewhere in between the hunchbacked, power-mad villain from Shakespeare’s play and the paragon of virtue some of his supporters portray him to be is a real man, and we will attempt to objectively uncover him in this book, presenting facts from primary sources rather than reflecting the author’s personal opinion of Richard III.