Was Richard III a Failure?

Was Richard III a Failure?

From This is History: History’s Greatest Fails by Sony Music Entertainment

April 7, 2026 · 34 min · Season 9 · Episode 14

About this episode

This episode explores the life and legacy of Richard III, examining his perceived failures and contributions to English law and society.

He died at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485. And we haven’t been able to stop talking about him since. Yes, it’s time to consider the story of England’s last Plantagenet king, Richard III — a centuries-old tangle involving alleged murder, Shakespeare, vanquish and one mighty rediscovery. In this debut episode of History’s Greatest Fails, Dan Jones and Elizabeth Day argue that the story of Richard’s rise and fall (and rise again) is much more modern that you’d first believe. Not least because of the reality-TV-style discovery of his remains under a Leicester council car park in 2022. In many ways, Richard’s alleged ‘failures’ — which include allegedly killing the Princes in the Tower and overseeing the demise of Plantagenet rule — overshadow Richard III as the reformer that also existed. He introduced trial by jury and translated many laws into English. But those facts are not often what’s associated with him. He’s more likely to be seen as the villainous caricature of Shakespeare’s Richard III. So in this episode, we’ll discover: What Richard's story tells us about failure in the present. How Tudor propaganda codified his ‘failure’, and how How those failures have been revised over…

People in this episode

Host: Dan Jones

Guest: Elizabeth Day

Topics covered

  • Richard III
  • historical failures
  • Tudor propaganda
  • trial by jury
  • historical revisionism
  • royalty
  • discovery of remains

Keywords

  • Richard III
  • historical failures
  • Tudor propaganda
  • Plantagenet
  • trial by jury
  • Shakespeare
  • discovery
  • Battle of Bosworth
  • royalty
  • history

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Shakespeare, Plantagenet

Places: Leicester

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