King Richard III at York in Late

Summer 1483

A. COMPTON REEVES

The spring and summer of 1483 were times of high drama in the political life of
England. King Edward IV died at Westminster Palace on 9 April seemingly of
natural (but difficult to identify) causes following an illness of less than a fort-
I night.‘ He was a few days short of his forty-first birthday. It was presumed that
Edward, the older of his two sons, would become the next king as Edward V,
and that there would be a minority government for the immediate future. That
was not to be the case. The young Edward, Prince of Wales, aged twelve, was
at Ludlow, the administrative centre of the principality of Wales, when his
father died. There was insufficient time for Edward to be notified of his father’s
death and to make a speedy journey east for the elaborate funeral rites and the
final interment on 20 April of the remains of his father in the fine chapel of
St George that Edward IV had caused to be constructed at Windsor. Prince
Edward heard of his father’s death on or about 14 April,2 and he set off for
London some ten days later. King Edward’s sole living brother, Richard, Duke
of Gloucester, was at Middleham Castle in Yorkshire when Edward died, and
he began travelling towards London at about the same time as his nephew.
Richard, it is appropriate to believe, anticipated that he would be taking on the
duties of protector of England until his nephew should come of age and take up
the full responsibilities of kingship, as Edward IV is reported to have directed,
although no documentary proof of Edward’s wishes survives.
It is not necessary to engage here in careful analytical efforts to illuminate
the intense political manoeuvering that occupied assorted people as they
struggled for power in the weeks immediately following the death of Edward
IV,3 but certain facts need to be called to mind. One gxoup anticipating con-
tinuing political influence centred upon Elizabeth Woodville, the widowed
queen. Thomas Grey, Marquess of Dorset and the queen’s first son by her first
marriage, was constable of the Tower of London and in control of the modest
royal treasure left by Edward IV. The queen’s brother, Sir Edward Woodville,
went to sea in command of a fleet. Anthony Woodville, Earl Rivers and the
queen’s brother, was with Prince Edward at Ludlow as the boy’s governor,

542
 together with Sir Richard Grey, the queen’s son. The group also included the
late king’s chancellor, Archbishop Thomas Rotherham of York. It is generally
believed that it was the goal of this group to avoid a protectorate of the
kingdom by Gloucester, but rather to establish a regency council for a crowned
king in his minority, such as had ruled England during the minority of Richard
II, of which Richard of Gloucester would be the presiding member. The course
of events was to unfold in an altogether different fashion, and a major player
would be the hitherto politically uninvolved Henry Stafford, Duke of
Buckingham.
The entourage escourting the young Edward to London for his coronation
(already set by the Woodville-dominated council for 4 May) reached Stony
Stratford in Northamptonshire on 29 April, and Richard of Gloucester, who
had been joined by Buckingham, was near by at Northampton with a more sub-
stantial following than that of Edward. The following morning at Stony
Stratford, Gloucester and Buckingham took charge of young Edward, placed
Rivers in custody, and disbanded the royal escort. When word of the events at
Stony Stratford reached Elizabeth Woodville in London, she took her younger
son Richard of York and her daughters into sanctuary at Westminster Abbey,
joined also by her son Dorset and her brother Bishop Lionel Woodville of
Salisbury. Earl Rivers and Sir Richard Grey would later (on 25 June) suffer
beheading, but meanwhile on Sunday, 4 May, Richard of Gloucester, the
young king, and Buckingham were formally greeted by the murrey-clad mayor
and other dignitaries and guildsmen as they entered London, where Edward
was lodged in the palace of the bishop of London close to St Paul’s Cathedral.4
Over the next few days council meetings were held during which Richard of
' “ Gloucester was confirmed as protector for the minority of Edward V,
Buckingham was made chief justice of north and south Wales and was shown
other marks of favour, Bishop John Russell of Lincoln was put in the place of
Archbishop Rotherham as chancellor, men were appointed to attempt the
arrest at sea of Sir Edward Woodville, and the date of the coronation was
moved ahead to 22 June, with a parliament being called for 25 June. Neither the
coronation nor the parliament would take place as scheduled. It would resolve
many long-standing and heated debates about Richard of Gloucester if it were
known whether at this time he was determined to avoid the coronation of
Edward V and thus preserve his place as protector, or was plotting that the next
coronation should be his own.
As the days passed, the military strength in London of Buckingham and
Gloucester increased, and Anne Neville, Gloucester’s wife, arrived in London
on 5 June. At some point in these days Gloucester heard the story of his dead
brother and the late Eleanor Talbot, Lady Boteler (d. 1468).5 The story was that

543
Edward IV had contracted a marriage valid in canon law with Lady Eleanor
before his marriage to Elizabeth Woodville, and that his marriage to Elizabeth
Woodville was therefore invalid and their children illegitimate and ineligible to
inherit the throne.“ The cautiously plausible but unprovable story added to the
tension and rumour present at the seat of power. At a council meeting in the
Tower of London on Friday, 13 June, Gloucester charged William, Lord
Hastings, the late king’s Chamberlain, with treason, and Hastings was immedi-
ately beheaded. Archbishop Rotherham of York was arrested, as were Bishop
John Morton of Ely and Edward V’s secretary, Oliver King.7 Hastings had been
a moderate, and the accepted leader among the surviving core of Edward IV’s
household. It is a much debated subject as to what actions and assumptions led
to -Hastings’ hurried execution, but the event made it utterly clear that
Gloucester was bent upon wearing the royal crown. On 16 June a group of
Gloucester’s retainers went to Westminster Abbey where they persuaded Queen
Elizabeth to hand over her son, Richard, Duke of York, who was taken to be
with his brother, Edward V, whose residence had become the Tower of
London.“ Edward, Earl of Warwick, the son of Gloucestcr’s attainted and dead
brother, George, Duke of Clarence, was in Gloucester’s household where he
could be monitored should he become the focus of opposition to Gloucester’s
plan of action. Various Sunday sermons in London on 22 June informed the
public of the bastardy of the sons of Edward IV, the exclusion of Edward of
Warwick from the succession by virtue of his father’s treason, and the worthi;
ness of the duke of Gloucester to become king.9 A group of notables and men
who had arrived to sit in the parliament which had been called (but then can-
celled on 17 June), acting under the chairmanship of Buckingham, petitioned
Richard of Gloucester on 25 June to assume the crown.lo The following day at
Baynard’s Castle, his mother’s London residence where Richard was staying,
an assembly of notables formally presented Richard with a bill of petition ask-
ing that Richard assume the throne. Richard accepted, and was ritually con-
ducted to Westminster Hall where he put on royal robes and, with a sceptre in
his hand, sat in the marble chair of the court of King’s Bench.” Richard pro-
claimed the date of 26 June as the beginning of his reign, and announced his
coronation as King Richard III for 6 July. He was then taken in procession to
Westminster Abbey for further ceremonial events, and then to St Paul’s
Cathedral before retiring to Baynard’s Castle.12
The magnificent coronation of Richard III took placg in Westminster
Abbey on Sunday, 6 July, with various celebratory events contim'fing through
to the following Sunday." In less than three months English folk had been
faced with digesting the news that King Edward IV had died, that Edward his
son would not be nominally presiding over a minority government, but that the

544
late king’s brother Richard, initially protector, was in fact to be their king.
Questions about the legitimacy of Richard’s accession, the fate and well-being
of the late king’s sons, widow, and daughters, and of his nephew Edward of
Warwick had to be faced or glossed over and given time to abate. A glorious
coronation accompanied by feasting and pageantry might have helped those
present in and around London to reconcile themselves to the new political
reality, but it was important for the new king, who necessarily desired the loy-
alty of his subjects, to be seen in other parts of the kingdom. Richard took the
obvious decision to make a journey, an imposing progress, around his king-
dom." On Sunday, 13 July, King Richard made his way to Greenwich, where
he stayed until the following Saturday before moving on to Windsor, where the
exequies of his royal brother had recently been carried to completion, and he
remained until Monday, 21 July, when he moved on to Reading.ls The next
stop was Oxford, where the founder of Magdalen College, Bishop William
Waynflete of Winchester, was joined by scholars of the college and officials of
the University in offering a formal greeting to the king. For two days he was
entertained with academic disputations and visits to Oxford colleges, and then,
perhaps weary with intellectual fatigue, he went to the royal hunting-lodge at
Woodstock." His progress carried Richard westward through Minster Lovell
to Gloucester, which he reached by 2 August, and on 4 August was at
Tewkesbury where his brother Clarence was buried and where he himself had
been a commander in the battle of 1471 which helped regain Edward IV his
throne.l7 By 5 August the progress had reached Worcester, and was directed
toward Warwick Castle, where Queen Anne arrived to join her husband, and
there was a pause of several days. Then it was on to Coventry, then Leicester,
and then Nottingham, where Edward IV had begun a programs of remodel-
ling the castle." Richard in time had the work on Nottingham Castle carried to
completion, and it became one of his preferred places of residence. While at
Nottingham, on 24 August, Richard issued a charter creating his only legiti-
mate son, Edward, who had been born at Middleham Castle in 1475 or 1476,
prince of Wales and earl of Chester.I9 Curiously, Edward of Middleham was
never formally granted the third title normally given to the heir to the throne,
that of duke of Cornwall, although he was named as such in assorted official
documents. Previously, while at Leicester on 19 August, Richard had named
his son to be lord lieutenant of Ireland,20 with the powerful earl of Kildare
swiftly being appointed as acting deputy.
At Nottingham, Richard and his entourage were poised to enter Yorkshire.
Richard’s secretary, John Kendall, wrote on 23 August to the mayor, recorder,
aldermen, and sheriffs of the city of York complimenting the city of York, say-
ing how fond Richard was of the city, and hinting broadly that a splendid

545
reception for the king and queen would be in order upon their arrival in York.2l
The civic leadership in York was ahead of Kendall, and was discussing an
expected visit by King Richard as early as the end of July.22Richard himself had
already, on 18 August, summoned no fewer than seventy-one northern knights
and gentry to meet him on 27 August at Pontcfract Castle, some twenty miles
from York.23 These men and their attendants would add to the impressiveness
of the royal entourage, and Richard appears to have been planning to dazzle,
and hoping to be dazzled by, his subjects when he reached York. Edward of
Middleham also joined his parents at Pontcfract?‘1 The leading citizens of York
had already been ingratiating themselves with the new king, having decided on
12 July to send a delegation led by the mayor, John Newton, to Middleham
Castle with a present for Edward of Middleham of bread, a barrel each of red
and white wine, six cygnets, six herons, and two dozen rabbits.25
It was an impressive royal retinue that left Pontefract for York.26 Along
with the king, queen, and their son were the two bishops of the northern
province: Durham and Carlisle, and also the bishops of Worcester, St Asaph,
and St David’s. Archbishop Rotherham of York, it will be remembered, was
persona non grata because of his association with the Woodville power block
after the death of Edward IV, although he had by this time been released from
confinement in the Tower of London. Prominent secular lords in Richard’s
train were the earls of Northumberland, Lincoln, and Surrey, together with
lords Stanley, Strange (the eldest son of Lord Stanley), FitzHugh, Lisle, Lovell,
and Graystoke (a cousin of Richard). These prominent figures and many
others, all accompanied by their attendants, would have made 29 August a day
to remember. One sheriff of the city of York, Miles Greynbank, and William
White, a deputy for the unwell second sheriff, Thomas Pierson, carrying their
rods of office,” met the royal party at Tadcaster and led it towards the city. At
Breckles Mills, outside the city, the procession was met by the mayor and alder-
men, dressed in scarlet and, in red gowns, by other civic officers and leading
citizens. The citizenry of York were on hand to greet the procession as it passed
by St James’ Chapel and into the city through Micklegate Bar, the gateway into
the city upon which the head of Richard’s father, Duke Richard of York, had
been Spiked following his defeat at Wakefield in 1460.” Just within the walls
was staged the first of three pageants for the entertainment of the royal party,
with the next being staged at the bridge crossing of the Ouse, and the third in
Stayngate. We may suppose the streets were hung with tapestries and arras as
Kendall had suggested they be. The entry on 29 August was almost certainly
carefully timed.29 It was the feast of the Decollation of St John the Baptist. The
staging of the mystery plays on the springtime feast of Corpus Christi30 was a
major event in York, and the responsibility of the Corpus Christi Guild, of

546
which Richard III and Anne had been members since 1477. Religious images of
the decapitated head of the Baptist on a charger were very popular in northern
England in the fifteenth century, where devotion to John the Baptist was
strong, and the Head of the Baptist was taken as a representation of the Body
of Christ, the Corpus Christi, and thus many layers of symbolism would have
been appreciated with King Richard’s entry into the city and his journey on the
route of the mystery plays to the cathedral church on the feast of the
Decollation of the Baptist.
At some point as the royal cavalcade moved through the city the mayor,
John Newton, delivered a speech of welcome and offered a gift to the king of
one hundred marks contained in a gold cup and to the queen £100 in gold in
a precious piece of plate. Newton himself had contributed £20 to the royal
presents, and spent additional sumson entertainment during the royal visit."
There is no record of it, but we must suppose that a gift for Prince Edward was
not neglected.32 The royal procession carried on through the city to the
precincts of the cathedral church for an ecclesiastical reception. The cathedral
church of St Peter of York, as the largest single architectural structure of
English Gothic, made an impressive backdrop for the royal reception. The
great tower had been rebuilt early in the century, and the south-western tower
was almost new. It was at the west door of York Minster that the king was
formally received by a delegation of ecclesiastics headed by the dean. The dean
was Dr Robert Booth, a Cambridge-educated legist and a member of a highly
accomplished Lancashire family.33 Dean Booth’s father, Sir William Booth,
had been sheriff of Cheshire, and an uncle, John, had been bishop of Exeter
when he died in 1478." Two great uncles of Dean Booth had died as arch-
bishops of York: William in 1464, and Lawrence in 1480.” Robert had become
dean in 1477 through the patronage of Archbishop Lawrence, who had been
keeper of the privy seal and chancellor of England in the reign of Edward IV.
Robert Booth was the only dean of a metropolitan church in England, for
the other metropolitan church, Canterbury, was served by a community of
Benedictine monks headed by a prior. Booth was a distinguished man, and
hardly lost in a crowd of canons on 29 August. Although a full complement of
secular clergy called canons, who formed the most exalted circle of ecclesiastics
in the service of York Minster, was thirty-six, very few were residentiary
canons, only thirty-four in fact for the entire fifteenth century." Most of the
canons were occupied elsewhere, like the soon-to-be canon William Beverley
(died 1494 ,37who served Richard of Gloucester as a councillor, was rector of
Middleham while Richard was often resident at Middleham Castle, became
dean of St George’s, Windsor, in 1483, and was named to be the first dean of
the collegiate church Richard founded at Middleham.“ Over decades there had

547
been a gradual concentration of administrative authority and responsibility at
York Minster in the hands of a few residentiary canons, primarily because the
financial structure of the institution, dividing certain revenues amongst all
residentiaries, encouraged a few canons to carry the burden so that their
incomes would remain attractive.” At the time of King Richard’s visit there
were, in addition to Robert Booth, but two residentiary canons: the Yorkshire-
men William Poteman“o and Thomas Portyngton. William Poteman (died 1493)
held an Oxford doctorate in civil law and had become a residentiary canon in
1468, while the Cambridge-educated Thomas Portyngton (died 1485), who as
apparently the last male of his family was secular lord of Portington in the East
Riding of Yorkshire, became a residentiary in 1481."I
An apparent eye witness recorded the events as the royal procession reached
the west door of York Minster where the dean and his two fellow residentiaries,
supported by other of the cathedral clergy, including some canons who were
not residentiaries, all strikingly vested in copes of violet silk, received the
visitors.“2 The king was sprinkled with holy water and censed as he made his
way into the cathedral church. Richard was not a passive actor in the cere-
monies taking place. He made his way to a prie-dieu beside the baptismal font,
and there he said a Paternoster. The succentor of the vicars choral (that is, the
vicar representing the absent canon who was precentor of the cathedral and
who was nominally responsible for the music in the cathedral, but who was rep-
resented by his succentor, just as the vicars choral as a group represented the
absent cathedral canons in choir) began the liturgical response De Trinitate
with the words Honor, virtus, and it was finished by the choir standing before
the steps of the high altar. Then there was a pause long enough for a
Paternoster and an Ave Maria. Then Dean Booth began the prayer Et ne nos
inducas for the benefit of the king. Following the prayer, the dean and canons
processed to their stalls in the cathedral choir, together with the other clergy, as
the organ intoned the Amen. We are told that the officiating prelate (prelato
executore ofl‘icii), most likely Dean Booth, began the psalm Te, Deum,
laudamus, which was concluded by the choir and organ. Immediately thereafter
the succentor chanted the antiphon of the Trinity beginning with the words
Gracias tibi, Deus, with a versicle and prayer to the Trinity. The service now
being concluded, the royal party left York Minster for the short walk north-
west to the palace of the archbishop of York where Richard stayed during his
visit.
Two days later, on the last day of August, Richard, having taken the
decision to have his son formally invested as Prince of Wales in York, sent an
urgent message to Peter Courteys, keeper of the king’s Great Wardrobe in
London, outlining goods he wished transported to York.“3 The items demanded

548
 included such costly clothing as two short gowns of crimson cloth of gold, a
cloak with a cape of violet lined in black velvet, a stomacher of purple satin and
another of tawny satin, enough white cloth of gold for the trappings of a horse,
‘ other gowns, spurs, and five coats of arms for heralds, together with forty
trumpet banners and 13,000 badges of Richard’s white boar emblem. Proces-
sional banners were requested of the Virgin Mary, the Trinity, St George, St
Edward, St Cuthbert, and one of Richard’s arms, as well as three coats of arms
beaten with fine gold for Richard himself. The investiture of Prince Edward was
set for Monday, 8 September, and the week leading up to it was occupied with
banquets and hospitality. Bishop Thomas Langton of St David’s wrote to the
prior of Christ Church, Canterbury, expressing great enthusiasm over the pop-
ularity King Richard was engendering, noting the money he had been offered
by cities and towns for his good will on his progress but had diplomatically
refused to take, and offering his opinion that God had been gracious to send
such a prince to govern England. ‘4
On 2 September John Newton, the mayor, Miles Metcalfe, the city recorder
who was a loyal supporter of King Richard, and ten other councillors met in
the Common Hall where it was decided to stage a special performance of the
Creed Play on Sunday, 7 September, for the pleasure of the king.“ The Creed
Play text does not survive, but it has been conjectured that it was an abbrevi-
ated version of the cycle of mystery plays performed annually in York.“ Nearly
forty years earlier, a chaplain named William Revetour had given the St
Christopher’s Guild in York a play about the Creed with a book for each of the
parts in the play.“7 The day before the play was performed, the city leaders
decided that the mayor, the twelve aldermen, and the Council of Twenty Four,
who were junior councillors to the mayor and aldermen, would all attend upon
the king at the performance and share the cost thereof.“
The day after the performance of the Creed Play was the festival of the
Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, the day appointed for the investiture of Edward
of Middleham as the eighth prince of Wales to be recognized by an English
king,.the first having been Llywelyn ap Gruffudd in 1267, and the most recent
Edward V in 1471.” The same eye witness account that records the king’s
arrival in‘York on 29 August provides the account of events on 8 September.50
A procession led by the king and queen, both wearing crowns, entered York
Minster for mass. The procession included Prince Edward, temporal and spiri-
tual lords, and other dignitaries. The officiating prelate was Bishop William
Dudley of Durham, and the focal point of the high altar of the cathedral was
enhanced by silver figures of the twelve apostles, as well as other ornaments of
gilt and numerous relics, all provided by the king. The assemblage remained at
mass until the sixth hour of evening. Then, following mass, all returned to the

549
 archbishop’s palace, and there in the hall before dinner the king invested his son
as prince of Wales by arming or girding Edward with a sword, presenting him
with a gold rod and ring, and placing a coronet on his head.5l A four-hour
dinner, during which the royal family sat crowned, continued into the evening.
Dean Robert Booth was present, as were the residentiaries William Poteman
and Thomas Portyngton. We are informed by the anonymous clerical reporter
that the sub-dean was present as well as four other canons (none of whom are
named), together with ten chantry priests (personae) from the Minster, twelve
vicars choral, and other cathedral clergy.
At some time during the busy day of the investiture, the king bestowed
knighthood upon his son, and did likewise with his nephew Earl Edward of
Warwick, his illegitimate son John of Gloucester, and the ambassador from
Queen Isabella of Castile, Gaufrid de Sasiola, who had joined the royal
progress at Warwick in the company of Queen Anne and who had come to
England expecting to find Edward V on the throne, but who has happy to seek
. friendly relations between his sovereign and Richard III, a prospect appealing
as well to the English king.52 It is difficult to imagine that King Richard would
not have been pleased with the course of events during his stay in York thus far,
but for the civic authorities another great day awaited.
On Wednesday, 17 September, King Richard summoned to meet with him
in the Chapter House of York Minster the mayor of the city and his fellow
aldermen, and many other citizens.” It soon became apparent that Richard had
been dazzled by his reception in York. The king, without any petition on their
part (so the record states), thanked the assembly for their good service to him
before he came to the throne and at his recent coronation. Richard cited the
decay and poverty of the city, which was indeed experiencing an economic
slump, although it was still likely second in size only to London in the king-
dom.S4 He then went on to promise that the city would have a substantial reduc-
tion in the annual fee farm due to the crown, from a sum on the order of £160
to about £100, and Mayor Newton was appointed Richard’s chief serjeant-
at—arms with an annual fee of £18 Ss. The financial arrangements were also
meant to encourage trade in York by allowing any lawful non-resident to sell
in the market of York without paying tolls.55 Other royal business was trans-
acted as a matter of course while Richard was in the city, but the arrival recep-
tion, the Creed Play performance, the investiture of Prince Edward, and the
mitigating of royal taxes likely mattered most to the citizenry.
The royal party did not leave York until 20 or 21 September," having stayed
for more than three weeks, longer than at any other stop on Richard’s progress.
The long stay, the events which took place at York during that stay, Richard’s
generally happy relations with the city,57 and Richard’s bold but never com-

550
 u—n—
FOOOOQ

pleted plan to found a chantry in York Minster served by a college of one

hundred priests, have aroused the suspicions of historians that Richard was
planning to be buried in York Minster.58 From York the king went back to
Pontefract where he remained more than a fortnight, and then he passed
through Gainsborough to Lincoln.59 It was at Lincoln on 11 October that
Richard learned of the rebellion against him led by Henry Stafford, Duke of
Buckingham.“ The royal progress abruptly ended, and Richard turned his
attention to overcoming the revolt of his erstwhile staunch supporter."
As we reflect upon the episode in his brief reign of King Richard III at York
in the late summer of 1483, there are some noteworthy aspects of the event to
consider. This portion of the royal progress throws into relief the king’s aware-
ness of the importance of public display as part of the art of kingship, and
Richard’s mastery of the art. Sufficient detail of Richard’s sojourn at York
survives to demonstrate the techniques used by a king to cultivate the good will
of his subjects: being available to his subjects, appearing regal, easing financial
burdens, and the like. We also witness Richard dealing effectively with public
officers in the city of York and with the ecclesiastical community of the
cathedral church of York. The investiture of Edward of Middleham informs us
of the keen interest Richard had in confirming his line of descent upon the
English throne, and that the investiture ceremony was conducted in York
speaks to the nearness to Richard’s heart of the city of York. Richard would
visit York five more times during his reign,62 but none of these visits would be
so dramatic as that of 1483 and, in spite of the high favour in which he held the
city, York would not be the final resting place of King Richard III.63

NOTES AND REFERENCES

l. C. D. Ross, Edward IV, London & Berkeley 1974, pp. 414—17.
2. C. D. Ross, Richard III, London & Berkeley 1982, p. 69.
3. See Ross, Richard III, ch. 4.
4. A. F. Sutton and P. W. Hammond, eds., The Coronation of Richard III: The Extant
Documents, Gloucester 1983, pp. 16—18. Sutton and Hammond provide a very useful
chronology of the events from 9 April to 8 July on pp. 13—46.
5. John Ashdown-Hill, ‘Edward IV’s Uncrowned Queen: The Lady Eleanor Talbot, Lady
Butler’, The Ricardian, vol. 11 (1997—99), pp. 166—90; Pauline Routh, ‘In Search of Lady
Eleanor Butler’, The Ricardian, no. 32 (March 1971), pp. 4-7; Muriel Smith, ‘Reflections
on Lady Eleanor‘, The Ricardian, vol. 11 (1997—99). pp. 336—39, 463—67.
6. See R. H. Helmholz, ‘The Sons of Edward IV: A Canonical Assessment of the Claim that
They were Illegitimate’, in Richard III: Loyalty, Lordship and Law, ed. P. W. Hammond,
London 1986, pp. 91—103.
. Ross, Richard II], pp. 80-86.
. Sutton and Hammond, Coronation of Richard III, p. 22.
. Ibid., p. 24.
. Ross, Richard III, p. 93.
. Sutton and Hammond, Coronation of Richard III, p. 25.

551
12. Rhoda Edwards, The Itinerary of King Richard 111, 1483—1485, London 1983, p. 3.
l3. Sutton and Hammond, Coronation of Richard 111, pp. 35—46.
14. P. M. Kendall, Richard the Third, New York 1955, pp. 299—311. Kendall’s chapter,
encompassed by the pages indicated, is entitled ‘The King’s Progress’.
15. Edwards, Itinerary, pp. 4—5.
l6. Ross, Richard III, p. 149.
17. For Clarence, see M. A. Hicks, False, Fleeting, Perjur'd Clarence: George, Duke of
Clarence, Gloucester 1980, and for Tewkesbury, see P. W. Hammond, The Battles of
Barnet and Tewkesbury, Gloucester 1990.
18. Edwards, Itinerary, p. 6; Ross, Richard III, p. 150.
19. Rosemary Horrox and P. W. Hammond, eds., British Library Harleian Manuscript 433,
4 vols., Gloucester 1979—83, vol. 1, pp. 81—82; P. W. Hammond, Edward of Middleham,
Prince of Wales, 2nd ed., Cliftonville 1973, pp. 14—15; P. W. Hammond and A. F. Sutton,
Richard III: The Road to Bosworth Field, London 1985, pp. 137—38.
20. Horrox and Hammond, Harleian 433, vol. 1, p. 75; Hammond and Sutton, Richard III:
The Road to Bosworth, pp. 130—34.
21. Angelo Raine, ed., York Civic Records, 8 vols., Wakefield, 1939—53, vol. 1, pp. 78—79.
22. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 77.
23. Hon-ox and Hammond, Harleian 433, vol. 2, pp. 10—11.
24. Hammond, Edward of Middleham, p. 15.
24. L. C. Attreed, ed., York House Books, 1461—1490, 2 vols., Stroud 1991, vol. 1, pp. 286—87;
Raine, York Civic Records, vol. 1, p. 76.
26. Hammond, Edward of Middleham, pp. 16, 31-32.
27. Attreed, York Home Books, vol. 1, p. 290.
28. C. L. Scofleld, The Life and Reign of Edward the Fourth, 2 vols., London, 1923, vol. 1,
p. 122.
29. Pamela Tudor-Craig, ‘Richatd III’s Triumphant Entry into York, August 29th, 1483’, in
Richard III and the North, ed. Rosemary Horrox, Hull 1986, pp. 110—13.
30. The feast of Corpus Christi is a moveable feast. It is celebrated on the Thursday after
Trinity Sunday, which is the Sunday next after Whitsunday, which falls on the seventh
Sunday and thus the fiftieth day after Easter, which is a moveable feast.
31. David Palliser, ‘Richard III and York’, in Richard III and the North, p. 67. The list of
donors is given in Attreed, York House Books, vol. 1, pp. 291—92, and in Raine, York
Civic Records, vol. 1, p. 80. Miles Metcalfe, the city recorder and firm friend of Richard
III, donated £100 towards the gifts. For Metcalfe, see Palliser, ‘Richard III and York’,
p. 63.
32. Hammond, Edward of Middleham, p. 17.
33. Ernest Axon, ‘The Family of Bothe (Booth) and the Church in the 15th and 16th
Centuries’, Transactions of the Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Society, vol. 53
(1943), pp. 32—82; A. B. Emden, A Biographical Register of the University of Cambridge
to 1500, Cambridge 1963, pp. 79—80.
34. For John Booth, see A. C. Reeves, ‘Bishop John Booth of Exeter (1465—78)’, in
Traditions and Transformation: in Late Medieval England, ed. D. L. Biggs, A. C. Reeves
and S. D. Michalove, Leiden 2002, pp. 125—44.
35. The career of William Booth will be found in A. C. Reeves, Lancastrian Englishmen,
Washington, D. C. 1981, pp. 265—362; and for Lawrence see A. C. Reeves, ‘Bishop
Lawrence Booth of Durham (1465—76) and York (1476—80)’, in Estrangement, Enterprise
and Education in Fifteenth-Century England, ed. S. D. Michalove and A. C. Reeves,
Stroud 1998, pp. 63—88.
36. R. B. Dobson, ‘The Residentiary Canons of York in the Fifteenth Century’, Journal of
Ecclesiastical History, vol. 30 (1979), pp. 146—47.
37. Emden, Register of Cambridge, p. 60. Beverley became precentor of York Minster late in
1483.

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38. Dobson, ‘Residentiary Canons’, p. 162.
39. Ibid, p. 154.
40. A. B. Emden, A Biographical Register of the University of Oxford to A.D. 1500, 3 vols.,
Oxford 1957—59, vol. 3, pp. 1506-07.
41. Dobson, ‘Residentiary Canons’, pp. 155, 16], 174.
42. Hammond, Edward of Middleham, pp. 31—32. Peter Hammond was very kind to supply
me with a copy of his study of Edward of Middleham in which he made holograph
corrections of his translation of the document regarding Richard’s reception at the
Minster. A translation is also printed in Hammond and Sutton, Richard III: The Road to
Bosworth, pp. 140—41. See also P. W. Hammond, ‘Richard III at York’, The Ricardian,
no. 41 (June 1973), pp. 3—4. Another English translation is in Frederick Harrison, Life
in a Medieval College, London 1952, pp. 111—12.The Latin text will be found printed
in James Raine, ed., The Fabric Rolls of York Minster, Surtees Society, vol. 35 (1859),
pp. 212—12.
43. Horrox and Hammond, Harleian 433, vol. 2, p. 42. See also A. F. Sutton, ‘Order and
Fashion in Clothes: The King, His Household, and the City of London’, Textile History,
vol. 22 (1991), pp. 253—55,257.
. Quoted in Ross, Richard III, p. 151.
45. Attreed, York House Books, vol. 1, pp. 292—93; Raine, York Civic Records, vol. 1, p. 81.
46. Tudor-Craig, ‘Richard III’s Triumphant Entry’, p. 111.
47. Angelo Raine, Mediaeval York, London 1955, p. 134.
48. Raine, York Civic Records, vol. 1, p. 81.
49. J. G. Edwards, The Principality of Wales, 1267—1967: A Study in Constitutional History,
Denbigh 1969, p. 29.
50. See note 42.
51. Hammond, Edward of Middleham, p. 18.
52. Horrox and Hammond, Harleian 433, vol. 1, pp. 1-2; Hammond, Edward of Middleham,
p. 18.
53. Raine, York Civic Records, vol. 1, p. 82.
54. Palliser, ‘Richard III and York’, pp. 52—54. For further details, see L. C. Attreed, ‘The
King’s Interest: York’s Fee Farm and the Central Government, 1482—92’, Northern
History, vol. 17 (1981), pp. 24—25, 30—36; and Idem, ‘Medieval Bureaucracy and York’s
Fee Farm during the Fifteenth Century’, York Historian, vol. 6 (1985), pp. 24-26, 30.
_55.Hammond, Edward of Middleham, p. 18; Ross, Richard III, p. 15].
56. Edwards, Itinerary, p. 7.
57. E. Miller, ‘Medieval York’, in Victoria County History: Yorkshire, The City of York,
ed. P. M. Tillott, London 1961, pp. 61-63.
58. Palliser, ‘Richard III and York’, p. 60. Palliser was remarking on ‘the very plausible
suggestion’ of Professor R. B. Dobson.
59. Edwards, Itinerary, pp. 7—8.
60. Hammond and Sutton, Richard III: The Road to Bosworth, p. 141.
61. See Louise Gill, Richard III and Buckingham’s Rebellion, Stroud 1999.
62. Edwards, Itinerary, pp. 18—22.
63. This essay was presented as the Keynote Address before the Annual General Meeting of
the Richard III Society (American Branch) on Michaelmas Day 2001 in Fort Worth,
Texas. I am indebted for the invitation to speak to Roxane Murph, known affectionately
to the American Branch for her long service to the Society as ‘The Putative Dean of
Middleham’.

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