Public opinion, 1483

England, 1483 of course was not a democracy. But did public opinion
count? Was Richard's occupation of the throne seen as legal &
ethical? Richard is recorded as popular before Hasting's
execution & not so after it... by the Londoners. Friends
can become enemies very suddenly. Buckingham's speech for Richard
went down like a lead balloon, as I recall. Did this lack of popular
support count against him in battle? Vergil reckons that Richard's
troops didn't have the will to win! Shades of Bush & Blair over Iraq
maybe…?

--- In , "David"
<willison2001@y...> wrote:
> England, 1483 of course was not a democracy. But did public
opinion
> count? Was Richard's occupation of the throne seen as legal &
> ethical? Richard is recorded as popular before Hasting's
> execution & not so after it... by the Londoners. Friends
> can become enemies very suddenly. Buckingham's speech for Richard
> went down like a lead balloon, as I recall. Did this lack of
popular
> support count against him in battle? Vergil reckons that Richard's
> troops didn't have the will to win! Shades of Bush & Blair over
Iraq
> maybe…?

Personally I'd rather steer clear of analogies to modern situations,
or imposing modern ideas of political correctness (ie worrying
about 'democracy' - the Middle Ages had its own criteria for judging
good government against tyranny). We can't really know how much
support Richard had at the time. There is not enough truly
contemporary evidence surviving (ie written before Bosworth), and
there were no opinion pollsters. I suspect if there were no polls
today most people would be going round assuming their own viewpoint
was the general consensus! What evidence we have suggests regional
divisions.
Michael Jones' new book argues against a lack of support, that
Bosworth was lost for other reasons. Perhaps if you can get hold of a
copy it would make a good starting point for discussion.
Marie