#but its 10x more applicable and accurate for Richard III

[wonder-worker]

"In reality Richard III invented a Woodville scare as a screen for his own conspiracy"

-A.J Pollard, "Richard III and the Princes in the Tower"

#lmao #r*chard iii #my post #I think that's true for all usurpations and coups to an extent #but its 10x more applicable and accurate for Richard III #Not only because of the compressed length of time (a mere 3 months as opposed to years of back-and-forth tensions) #but also because ultimately one of the key reasons Richard could do what he did was because he did it from the heart of the political #institution (ie he was an internal threat rather than an external one) #and he was someone who was trusted and loved rather than mistrusted and hated. His betrayal was political but it also had far more personal #ramifications for everyone involved - most people simply did not expect it from him and cooperated with him precisely because of that #which enabled him to seize power before most people even realized what he was doing #And there's the fact that he actually did stage a conspiracy by accusing the Woodvilles of plotting to attack and ambush him #and produced weapons from his own war in Scotland as fake 'proof' - when in fact we know that HE deceived and ambushed THEM #there's also the (propagandic) lie that they usurped him from the position as Lord Protector when they certainly didn't #either Edward IV didn't appoint Richard Lord Protector meaning the Woodvilles denied him nothing #OR the council collectively chose to have a council rule during Edward V's minority rather than a Protector (something they were entirely #within their rights to do both socially and legally) #so claims that they wrongly defied Edward IV's last wishes or broke the law (which Mancini repeats in his account) must be seen as exactly #that - propagandic lies to vilify EW and her family #when in fact Richard was the one plotting a seizure of power - whether it was as Lord Protector or as King #(of course these are just two things - there's a whole laundry list of others) #so this is definitely applicable to him