3D model provides new insight into King Richard III

In August 1485 Henry Tudor defeated Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth Field and took the English crown. This radically changed the fate of Elizabeth Woodville's's daughter, Elizabeth of York, the White Princess, because Henry had promised to marry her if he won. The princess would become queen, as her mother, the White Queen, did before her, but she would face different challenges as the Tudor era began.



Elizabeth would have been too familiar with the workings of royal propaganda and was probably only too grateful to know her future would be in England where her experience at court would be invaluable to her husband, who had so long lived in exile. After they were married in Westminster Abbey in January 1486, Henry was still unsure of his position. Elizabeth would have to wait a further two years before she was crowned queen. She spent much of her time in the company of Henry's mother, Margaret Beaufort. Elizabeth had learnt from her mother's bitter experience the value of building a good relationship with her mother-in-law.



However, a few months later, in February 1487, Elizabeth Woodville removed herself from court life and retired to Bermondsey Abbey. There was not room at court for two royal matriarchs and Henry had suggested Elizabeth Woodville might marry the Scots king James III. Elizabeth was also deprived of her lands. Historians, beginning with Francis Bacon in the 16th century, have suggested it was a punishment for encouraging a rebellion against her son-in-law, Henry VII, by a boy named Lambert Simnel who claimed to be her missing son, Richard, and heir to the throne.



When Lambert Simnel landed in England, Elizabeth of York took refuge at Kenilworth Castle. Henry finally crushed the rebellion at the Battle of Stoke on 16 June 1487. This victory, together with the earlier birth of a son to secure the succession, gave him the confidence to arrange her coronation at last, two years after his own. It was on the feast of St Catherine, 25 November 1487, that she finally entered Westminster Abbey, barefoot and clothed in purple velvet, to be anointed queen.


Elizabeth of York, the White Princess, and her husband, Henry VII

The watching crowds were so great that several people were crushed to death as they tried to tear keepsakes from the carpet she had walked upon. When her mother, Elizabeth Woodville was married the family had been seen as ambitious upstarts. However, Elizabeth of York's kin were now among the new king's most valued men. This put Elizabeth of York in a far stronger position than her mother but she was wise enough never to flaunt that. Indeed, the Spanish ambassador believed that Elizabeth was "beloved because she is powerless". But others noted her quiet, informal influence. The Venetian ambassador believed that Elizabeth was a queen "of great ability" and the Annals of Ulster recorded that she was "a woman that was of the greatest charity and humanity from Italy to Ireland".



Elizabeth of York's financial independence as queen was significantly less than her mother's. Nevertheless, she was able to support her younger sisters and their families, much as her mother had. When her mother, Elizabeth Woodville, died in June 1492 her brief will singled out her "dearest daughter, the Queen's grace" for special blessing. She had asked for a funeral "without pomp or costly expense". The queen herself had to mourn away from the ceremonies at Windsor as she was already confined, about to give birth to her fourth child; she would name the new-born Elizabeth.

In June 1497 she and prince Henry took refuge together in the Tower of London at news of a new rebellion which must have brought back memories of her own childhood. Despite the cold reputation of her husband, Henry VII, he did come to value his "White Princess" for more than her Yorkist blood. She died in 1503 on her 37th birthday, just after giving birth to their eighth child, who also died, and less than a year after their son Arthur died of an unknown illness. The king gave orders for the most splendid and expensive funeral in living memory and then "privily departed to a solitary place to pass his sorrows".