Matthew Lewis > Quotes

“Yes, that’s right. More claims that John Dighton confessed to the act of killing Edward V and Richard, Duke of York alongside Tyrell and that, although Tyrell was executed, Dighton walked free and was still at liberty a decade later when More began writing.”
― Matthew Lewis, The Survival of the Princes in the Tower: Murder, Mystery and Myth

“The novel situation faced by Stephen, and Matilda, and those around them, was the potential of a viable alternative. Nobels rebelled - that was nothing new - but they would generally find themselves reconciled, excuted of exiled. … The exeptional situation in 1136 was that ...From this moment on, anyone who fell out with Stephen could seek out Empress Matilda and promote her cause. There was no imperative to seek a reconciliation with stephen and exile was not the end of the matter either. How could he enforce order amongst his barons when they could simply transfer their support at any moment? Many of the traditional levers available to a king to maintain law and unity were removed from Stephen by the existence of this rival claimant to his throne!”
― Matthew Lewis, Stephen and Matilda's Civil War: Cousins of Anarchy

“The first written reference to the Plantagenet name which is used now for the dynasty that ruled England from 1154 until 1485 appears in the Parliament Rolls in 1460, when Richard III’s father, Richard, Duke of York used it as part of his claim to the throne. It must have meant something to people then, but it had never been used in writing to describe the dynasty before.”
― Matthew Lewis, Richard III