The Templars, the Hospitallers, the Tuetonic Knights and the Knights of the Spanish and Portuguese orders were 'noblemen vowed to poverty, chastity and obedience, living a monastic life in convents which were at the same time barracks, waging war on the enemies of the Cross'. These military religiou[...]

With the victory of Henry Tudor, the usurping dynasty made an effort to besmirch the last Plantagenet s reputation, and some historians claim that Richard s "black legend" is nothing more than political propaganda. Yet such an interpretation, as Desmond Seward shows in this powerfully-argued book, s[...]

For over a hundred years England repeatedly invaded France on the pretext that her kings had a right to the French throne. Seward's account traces the changes that led to France's final victory and brings to life all the intrigue of the last chivalric combats as they gave way modern warfare.[...]

This is a brilliant new interpretation of one of the most dramatic periods of British history. "The Wars of the Roses" didn't end at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485. Despite the death of Richard III and Henry VII's victory, it continued underground into the following century with plots, pretenders an[...]