Battle of Bosworth Field
The Battle of Bosworth Field was the last significant battle of the Wars of the Roses, the civil war between the Houses of Lancaster and York that extended across England in the latter half of the 15th century. Fought on 22 August 1485, the battle was won by the Lancastrians. In reality, The House of Lancaster had no members left eligible for the royal succession and Henry VII invaded England—in which he had never lived—under the flimsiest of pretexts. While true that he had fourth-generation, maternal Lancastrian descendancy, Henry seized the crown by right of conquest.
Henry VII of England
Henry VII was the King of England and Lord of Ireland from his seizure of the crown on 22 August 1485 to his death on 21 April 1509. He was the first monarch of the House of Tudor.
Roger Bacon
Roger Bacon, also known by the scholastic accolade Doctor Mirabilis, was a medieval English philosopher and Franciscan friar who placed considerable emphasis on the study of nature through empiricism. In the early modern era, he was regarded as a wizard and particularly famed for the story of his mechanical or necromantic brazen head. He is sometimes credited as one of the earliest European advocates of the modern scientific method inspired by Aristotle and by Alhazen.
House of Tudor
The House of Tudor was an English royal house of Welsh origin, descended in the female line from the Tudors of Penmynydd. Tudor monarchs ruled the Kingdom of England and its realms, including their ancestral Wales and the Lordship of Ireland from 1485 until 1603, with five monarchs in that period: Henry VII, Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I. The Tudors succeeded the House of Plantagenet as rulers of the Kingdom of England, and were succeeded by the House of Stuart. The first Tudor monarch, Henry VII of England, descended through his mother from a legitimised branch of the English royal House of Lancaster. The Tudor family rose to power in the wake of the Wars of the Roses (1455-1487), which left the House of Lancaster, to which the Tudors were aligned, extinct in the male line.
Catherine of Valois
Catherine of Valois was the queen consort of England from 1420 until 1422. A daughter of Charles VI of France, she married Henry V of England, and gave birth to his heir Henry VI of England. Her liaison with Owen Tudor proved the springboard of that family's fortunes, eventually leading to their grandson's elevation as Henry VII of England. Catherine's older sister Isabella was queen of England from 1396 until 1399, as the child bride of Richard II.
Richard Foxe
Richard Foxe was an English churchman, successively Bishop of Exeter, Bath and Wells, Durham, and Winchester, Lord Privy Seal, and founder of Corpus Christi College, Oxford.
Francis II, Duke of Brittany
Francis II of Brittany was Duke of Brittany from 1458 to his death. He was the grandson of John IV, Duke of Brittany. A recurring theme in Francis' life would be his quest to maintain the quasi-independence of Brittany from France. As such, his reign was characterized by conflicts with King Louis XI of France and with his daughter, Anne of France, who served as regent during the minority of her brother, King Charles VIII. The armed and unarmed conflicts between 1484–1488 have been called the Mad War and also the "War of the Public Weal".
Richard Empson
Sir Richard Empson, minister of Henry VII, was a son of Peter Empson. Educated as a lawyer, he soon attained considerable success in his profession, and in 1491 was a Knight of the shire for Northamptonshire in Parliament, and Speaker of the House of Commons.
Pipe rolls
The Pipe rolls, sometimes called the Great rolls, or the Great Rolls of the Pipe, are a collection of financial records maintained by the English Exchequer, or Treasury, and its successors. The earliest date from the 12th century, and the series extends, mostly complete, from then until 1833. They form the oldest continuous series of records concerning English governance kept by the English, British and United Kingdom governments, covering a span of about 700 years. The early medieval ones are especially useful for historical study, as they are some of the earliest financial records available from the Middle Ages. A similar set of records was developed for Normandy, which was ruled by the English kings from 1066 to 1205, but the Norman Pipe rolls have not survived in a continuous series like the English.
John Fenn (antiquarian)
Sir John Fenn (1739–1794) was an English antiquary. He is best remembered for collecting, editing, and publishing the Paston Letters, describing the life and political scheming of the gentry in Medieval England. He was also a justice of the peace who served as High Sheriff of Norfolk for 1791/2.
John Dynham, 1st Baron Dynham
John Dynham, 1st Baron Dynham of Nutwell in the parish of Woodbury and of Hartland, both in Devon, was an English peer and politician. He served as Lord High Treasurer of England and Lord Chancellor of Ireland. He was one of the few men to have served as councillor to Kings Edward IV, Richard III and Henry VII and was trusted by all of them.
James Hobart
Sir James Hobart, also known as James Hoberd and James Hubbard, of Norfolk became a member of Lincoln's Inn during Edward IV of England's reign and was appointed attorney-general and knighted during the reign of Henry VII.