LONDON – The discovery of King Richard III under a parking lot in the English city of Leicester thrilled history buffs around the world. But the news meant a winter of discontent for the rival city of York, and now the two are doing battle over the royal bones.
Officials in Leicester say the monarch, who was unceremoniously buried without a coffin 528 years ago, will be re-interred with kingly dignity in the city’s cathedral.
“The decision has already been made,” said Leicester Mayor Peter Soulsby. “All the permissions have been granted and the various authorities involved have agreed that the interment will take place in Leicester.”
Not so fast, says York, a city 150 km to the north that claims the late monarch as its own.
“Every taxi driver I talk to, every shopkeeper I talk to, they are very excited about it — they want Richard back in York,” said Michael Ormrod, professor of medieval history at the University of York. “There is a view that he is a king for York.”
York City Council said Wednesday it is petitioning the government and Queen Elizabeth II, arguing that “one of the city’s most famous and cherished sons” — who grew up in the region and was once known as Richard of York — should be buried in the northern city.
Leicester has launched a rival petition to the government. As of Wednesday, York had the edge, with more than 5,700 signatures on a petition calling for Richard to be re-interred in the city. Leicester’s petition had more than 2,000 names.
York residents hope the queen will intervene on behalf of her 15th-century predecessor, though Buckingham Palace says it is not getting involved.
Richard had few links to Leicester, apart from dying in battle nearby in 1485. Historians agree he had strong ties to York. He belonged to the House of York, one of two branches of the ruling Plantagenet dynasty. William Shakespeare’s play “Richard III” opens with the lines: “Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of York” — a punning reference to the monarch’s brother, King Edward IV.
Richard spent much of his childhood in the county of Yorkshire. As an adult, he ran northern England during his brother’s reign, and he is sometimes called the country’s last northern king. Ormrod says there is evidence Richard wanted to be buried in York Minster, the city’s medieval cathedral. “Leicester was a very big stronghold of the house of Lancaster, Richard’s rivals for the throne. He was buried almost in enemy territory in Leicester.”
York has not always made a noise about its ties to a king who for centuries was Britain’s most reviled monarch. Richard was defeated at the Battle of Bosworth Field by the forces of Henry Tudor, who took the throne as King Henry VII, ending a bloody tussle over the crown known as the Wars of the Roses.
Tudor historians painted Richard as a villainous usurper and accused him of multiple crimes — most famously, the murder of his two nephews, the “Princes in the Tower.” The monarch’s supporters hope the discovery of his remains will lead to a reappraisal of his reputation.
For those in York who have been keeping Richard’s flame alive, this is a bittersweet time.
Mike Bennett, who runs York’s small Richard III Museum, said he had been circulating a petition for months — since the reports of the skeleton’s identity emerged — “but it’s only since the bones have been declared to be him that others have jumped on the bandwagon.”
Still, Bennett will be delighted if Richard’s remains come home to York. It would give a boost to his museum, tucked into a gatehouse in the city walls where visitors are invited to act as jury in an imaginary trial of the king for the murder of the Princes in the Tower.
The location of Richard’s body was unknown for centuries. Records say he was buried by the Franciscan monks of Grey Friars at their church in Leicester. The church was closed and dismantled after King Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries in 1538, and its location eventually was forgotten by most local residents.
But last year a team led by University of Leicester archaeologist Richard Buckley identified a possible location of the grave.
The team began excavating in a parking lot last August. They found human remains — the skeleton of an adult male who appeared to have died in battle.
He had been buried in disgrace without a coffin or a shroud, bearing 10 injuries from his final battle.
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