The Wars of the Roses

This scholarly account sets out to shatter the image of the Wars of the Roses as the bloody, turbulent period Shakespeare and subsequent tradition have depicted. It suggests that this state of affairs was due far less to civil war than to habits of violence among all levels of society.

J.R. Lander is Professor Emeritus at the University of Western Ontario, Canada, and one of the foremost authorities on fifteenth-century English political history. Among his other publications are Conflict and Stability in Fifteenth Century England, The Limitation of English Monarchy in the Later Middle Ages, Crown and Nobility 1450-1509, Power and Politics 1450-1509 and Government and Community in England 1450-1509.