The Battle of Bosworth:

Contemporary and Tudor Accounts

Richard III, from Holinshed's Chronicles

In The Battle of Bosworth (1985), Michael Bennett provides an appendix in which are reprinted the relevant extracts of contemporary accounts and Tudor histories including information on the Battle of Bosworth. Professor Bennett has kindly granted permission to the American Branch to publish these extracts on this Web site, including several that are his own translation. The following is an inventory of the contents of this Appendix with links to the text and serves as a comprehensive bibligraphy of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century sources in its own right.

Government Sources

Proclamation of Henry Tudor, 22-23 August, 1485. Tudor Royal Proclamations, Vol. I, The Early Tudors, Ed. P. L. Hughes and J. P. Larkin, 1964.
York Memoranda, 23 August 1483 A new edition has been published since Bennett's original inventory: Lorraine Attreed (ed.) York House Books, 1461-1490, 1991, published with the assistance of a grant from the Richard III and Yorkist History Trust.
Parliamentary record, Act of Attainder, November 1985. Rotuli Parliamentorum, ed. J. Strachey, 1767-83, Vol. VI.
Historical notes of a Londoner, probably 1485-86. In R.F. Green, "Historical notes of a London Citizen, 1483- 1488," English Historical Review 96 (1981).
Miscellaneous Town Chronicles. Probably compiled annually, but recopied and updated in early sixteenth century. Authors: Citizins of London and Calais. London 'Vitellius A XVI'; C.L. Kingsford (ed.), Chronicles of London (Oxford, 1905), p. 193; Calais Chronicle: The Chronicle of Calais in the Reigns of Henry VII and Henry VIII to the Year 1540, ed. J. G. Nichols (1846).

Independent English Reporters

Continuation of the Crowland Chronicle, 1486. Author possibly John Russell, or other ex-civil servant in his entourage. A new edition has been published since Bennett's inventory, edited by Pronay and Cox (1987) and published with the assistance of a grant from the Richard III and Yorkist History Trust. See also online edition
John Rous of Warwick 1490. Historia Johannis Rossi Warwicensis de Regibus Anglie, ed. T. Hearne, 1716.

Foreign Reporters and Chroniclers

A Castilian report, early 1486, Diego de Valera, Castilian courtier. Translation in E.M. Nokes and G. Wheeler, "A Spanish account of the battle of Bosworth", The Ricardian, 2, no. 36 (1972).
Memoirs of Philippe de Commines, a French-Burgundian chronicler, c. 1490.Memoires de Philippe de Commynes, ed. L. M. E. Dupont, 3 vols. (1840). Also available in translation: P. de Commynes, Memoirs. The Reign of Louix XI, 1461-1483, ed. M. Jones (1972).
Chronicles of Jean Molinet, historiographer to Burgundian court, c. 1490. Chroniques de Jean Molinet (1474-1506), ed. G. Doutrepont and O. Jodogne, 3 vol., 1935-37.
John Major's Latin History, before 1521. Major, A History of Greater Britain, ed. A. Constable, 1892.
Pittscotties Chronicles. 1570s, but drawing on oral traditions. The Historie and Cronicles of Scotland from the Slauchter of King James the First to the Ane Thousand Five Hundreith Thrie Scoir Fiftein Yeir, written and collected by Robert Lindesay of Pittscottie, ed. A.J.G. Mackay, 1899- 1911.

The Mainstream of Tudor Historiography

Bernard André, Court Historian, c. 1500. 'Vita Henrici Septimi' in Memorials of King Henry VII, ed. J. Gairdner (London, Roll Series, 1858).
Robert Fabian and the Great Chronicle, 1500-13. The Chronicle of Fabian, which he nameth the Concordaunce of Histories newly perused and continued from the beginnying of Kyng Henry the Seventh to th'Ende of Queene Mary (London, 1559); The Great Chronicle of London, ed. A. H. Thomas and I. D. Thornley, 1938.
Polydore Vergil, c. 1503-1513. Polydori Vergilii Urbinatis Anglicae Historiae Libri Vigintiseptem, 1555; Three Books of Polydore Vergil's 'English History', comprising the Reigns of Henry VI, Edward IV and Richard III, from an Early Translation, preserved among the Manuscripts of the Old Royal Library in the British Museum, ed. H. Ellis (1844). See also full text at the Society's online library.
Hall's Chronicle, c. 1540. The Union of the Two Noble Families of Lancaster and York, 1550. See also Online Facsimile at the University of Pennsylvania Library.

The Ballad Tradition

The Rose of England. Earliest of ballads on Bosworth. Bennett suggests it may have been composed in 1485, but is only extant in mid-17th century manuscript. B.L., Additional MS 27,879; The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, III ed. F.J. Child, 1957.
The Ballad of Bosworth Field. (Link leads to additional information and full text of poem.) Prose version late 16th century; earliest surviving copy mid-17th century. Bennett comments that "form and content indicate initial composition within living memory of the battle," and ascribes authorship to a member of the Stanley entourage who was probably an eyewitness. B.L. Additional MS 22,879, fos. 434-43; Bishop Percy's Folio Manuscript. Ballads and Romances, III, ed. J. W. Hales and F.J. Furnivall, 1868; Harleian MS 542, f.34 (prose summary).
The Song of Lady Bessy. Earliest text c. 1600. Bennett suggests the elements of the ballad could reach back to the early 16th century and suggests Humphrey Brereton of Cheshire, as possible author. B.L., Harleian MS 367, fos. 89-100; Bishop Percy's Folio Manuscript, III.