Study: King Richard III suffered multiple blows

     Researchers evaluating the remains of the controversial monarch, who died at the Battle of Bosworth Field 530 years ago, painted a grim picture his final moments: Richard sustained 11 wounds —nine to the skull and two others to the postcranial skeleton. Researchers believe the king had removed or lost his helmet, according to The Lancet analysis published Sept. 17.
     Richard had been buried at the Greyfriars Monastery in Leicester. The monastery is long gone, but records were used to find the location of the former Greyfriars site under a parking lot in 2012.     
     Since then, scientists confirmed that the remains belonged to Richard III and used CT images to analyze the cause of death.
     “Three of the injuries—two to the inferior cranium and one to the pelvis—could have been fatal,” researchers wrote in The Lancet.
      The postcranial injuries, including the potentially fatal one to the pelvis, might have been inflicted after Richard’s death.
      Richard, who died at 32, was also known as Richard Plantagenet, duke of Gloucester. For centuries he has been viewed through the dark prism of William Shakespeare’s play, Richard III, in which the king is depicted as a savage killer. But in recent years, scholars have re-evaluated the charges against Richard.
      Professors at the University of Leicester’s School of Psychology have released a study of the monarch’s personality. Richard was, they conclude, a “complex human being and consideration of him as such, rather than as a monstrous caricature, takes us a few small steps closer to understanding the motivations behind the actions by which history remembers him.”

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       The Lancet: Perimortem trauma in King Richard III: a skeletal analysis