Last of the Plantagenet's

After 500 or so years, we now know that the last English king to die in battle, on the losing side, having been betrayed by his allies in a nondescript Leicestershire field, has been found. Under a social services car park in a city in the east midlands. Richard, seemingly tossed unceremoniously into an ill-fitting grave, one fit for a man who didn't win, as is the way of history, lay for 500 years the last Plantagenet monarch; Richard the Third, the usurper, depending on who you believe. And if you thought that political spin and counter-spin was a 21st Century innovation then please familiarise yourself with the politics and in fighting of the war of the roses and see that the English are past masters of the art. One of Shakespeare's greatest royal villains lay undisturbed under 4 foot of concrete and earth, the last in the line of a dynasty that spawned some of England's most celebrated monarch's; Edward I, Henry V, Richard the Lionheart, Edward III. Just some of the names of monarchs whose rule has in some ways shaped and defined English character and history where from the Plantagenet's. Richard III proved to be the end of the dynastic monarchy. The last male Plantagenet, Edward, Earl of Warwick (King Richard's nephew), held on until he was executed in 1499 and the Tudor dynasty founded by Henry VII began to secure their supremacy. Finding long lost royals is a pretty rare event, as most of the our sovereigns are accounted for. They either reside in Westminster abbey, St George's Chapel or Frogmore and the royal burial grounds. They tend to get looked after in death. Not so Richard who led, dead, beaten and naked into Leicester to be displayed as a cadaver trophy was then passed to a monastery for disposal. The find therefore is an important one and should be welcomed as a boon to the field of archaeology. With so many counties cutting this resource the find in Leicester has come at an opportune time. Finding kings, is sexy archaeology and in the majority of other projects it doesn't remotely appear at all sexy and involves painstakingly and mundane excavations. For every Richard there must be a 1000 flint heads or clay pipes. For every Sutton Hoo there are 1000's of post holes with no context. So finding anything that helps encourage people to look at archaeology as an interesting subject area has to be good. Finding, what we believe the evidence tells us, the last English king killed in combat, has to help promote this process, as did the sudden emergence and popularity of 'Time Team' in the early 90's when they managed to make a subject based on the periphery of peoples knowledge into a programme that the whole family could watch and enjoy and I am sure that it inspired some younger children to choose archaeology courses at University. Which, ultimately is the purpose of making subjects more accessible to the wider public and more appealing. All opportunities must be used to help achieve this. In so far as Richard the Third is concerned, I may have personal doubts as to how the evidence is presented (no, prior peer evaluation, before news conference, etc). Leicester will no doubt benefit from this royal death, and some of the hooplah may be excessive and unseemly, but would any other city behave differently, should they have found a king under the car park?