Bosworth: The Archaeology of the Battlefield

The Wars of the Roses came to a bloody climax at the Battle of Bosworth on 22 August 1485. In a few hours, on a stretch of otherwise unremarkable fields in Leicestershire, Richard III, Henry Tudor and their Yorkist and Lancastrian supporters clashed. This decisive moment in English history ought to be clearly recorded and understood, yet controversy has confused our understanding of where and how the battle was fought. That is why Richard Mackinder's highly illustrated and personal account of the search for evidence of the battle is such absorbing reading. He shows how archaeological evidence, discovered by painstaking work on the ground, has put this historic battle into the modern landscape.

Using the results of the latest research, he takes the reader through each phase of the battle, from the camp sites of the opposing armies on the night before, through the movements of thousands of men across the battlefield during the fight and the major individual episodes such as the death of the Duke of Norfolk, the intervention of Lord Stanley and the death of Richard III.

At each stage he recounts what happened, where it happened and what physical evidence has survived. A vivid impression of the battle emerges from his narrative which is closely linked to the landscape that was fought over on that fateful day.

Author: Richard Mackinder
Publisher: Pen & Sword Military
Published: 02/24/2022
Pages: 192
Binding Type: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781399010528

About the Author
Mackinder, Richard: - Richard Mackinder worked at Bosworth Battlefield between 1991 and 2015. In 2001 he set up a team of volunteers called the Ambion Historical & Archaeological Research Group which aimed to find evidence of the 1485 battle and to explore human impact on the local landscape. In 2005 he became the onsite co-ordinator for the Lottery-funded project led jointly by the Battlefield Trust and Leicestershire County Council which in 2010 proved where at least part of the battle was fought. He has been guiding visitors around the battlefield for thirty years.