Battle Over Richard III's Remains Ends

He will be buried in Leicester, not York
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted May 23, 2014 5:04 PM CDT
Battle Over Richard III's Remains Ends
This photo made available by the University of Leicester, England, shows the remains of Richard III.   (AP Photo/University of Leicester, File)

Richard III's last battle is finally over: The former king of England will be reburied in the city of Leicester, not York, reports the Guardian. The site of his resting place had been the subject of a legal fight ever since archeologists discovered his remains underneath a parking lot in Leicester in 2012. Though initial plans called for him to be reburied in the nearby Leicester Cathedral, a group of far-flung relatives sought to have him reburied in York instead, where he grew up. Today, judges at the Royal Courts of Justice rejected the idea.

"We agree that it is time for Richard III to be given a dignified reburial, and finally laid to rest," they wrote. But they found no compelling reason to move him to York. Richard died on the battlefield in 1485, the last English king to do so, notes the Guardian. By the looks of it, he then got unceremoniously dumped into a too-small grave, where he remained for nearly 530 years. The LA Times notes that scholars remain divided over Richard himself: He's either the "bloodthirsty tyrant" as depicted by Shakespeare or "an enlightened ruler" whose reputation got maligned by the Tudor dynasty that succeeded him. Either way, he had a bad case of roundworms when he died. (More Richard III stories.)

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