ABSTRACT
ON 22 August 1485 Henry, earl of Richmond, won one ofthe successive battles of the wars of the Roses near theLeicestershire township of Market Bosworth. His opponent, who commanded a stronger army halved by treason, was killed, and the throne thus left vacant by Richard III fell to the earl who became Henry VII. With this event, somewhat fortuitous in itself, there began the years of Tudor rule which were in the end to produce an England changed in many essentialswealthier, more firmly unified, more fully national, more modem in her outlook, and properly equipped to play her part in the wider world which had also emerged in the course of the sixteenth century.
