page_title: Edward V of England
section_title: Epitaph
hierarchical_section_title: Edward V of England / Epitaph
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Grabstätte von Edward V
context_page_description: Edward V was King of England and Lord of Ireland from 9 April to 26 June 1483. He succeeded his father, Edward IV, upon the latter's death. Edward V was never crowned, and his brief reign was dominated by the influence of his uncle and Lord Protector, the Duke of Gloucester, who deposed him to reign as King Richard III; this was confirmed by the Act entitled Titulus Regius, which denounced any further claims through his father's heirs.
  Edward V and his younger brother Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York, were the Princes in the Tower who disappeared after being sent to heavily guarded royal lodgings in the Tower of London. Responsibility for their deaths is widely attributed to Richard III, but the lack of any solid evidence and conflicting contemporary accounts allow for other possibilities.
context_section_description: As outlined above, on the orders of Charles II, the presumed bones of Edward V (and his brother) were interred in Westminster Abbey; he was thus buried in the place of his birth. The white marble sarcophagus was designed by Sir Christopher Wren and made by Joshua Marshall. The sarcophagus can be found in the north aisle of the Henry VII Chapel, near Elizabeth I's tomb.
  The Latin inscription on the urn can be translated as follows:
  Here lie the relics of Edward V, King of England, and Richard, Duke of York. These brothers being confined in the Tower of London, and there stifled with pillows, were privately and meanly buried, by the order of their perfidious uncle Richard the Usurper; their bones, long enquired after and wished for, after 191 years in the rubbish of the stairs (those lately leading to the Chapel of the White Tower) were on the 17th day of July AD 1674 by undoubted proofs discovered, being buried deep in that place. Charles II, a most compassionate king, pitying their severe fate, ordered these unhappy princes to be laid amongst the monuments of their predecessors, AD 1678, in the 30th year of his reign.
  The original Latin text is as follows (original all in capitals):
  H.SS Reliquiæ Edwardi Vᵗⁱ Regis Angliæ et Richardi Ducis Eboracensis
  Hos, fratres germanos, Turre Londinˢⁱ conclusos iniectisq culcitris suffocatos, abdite et inhoneste tumulari iussit patruus Richardus Perfidus Regni prædo ossa desideratorum, div et multum quæsita, post annos CXC&1~ scalarum in ruderibus (scala istæ ad Sacellum Turris Albæ nuper ducebant) alte defossa, indictis certissimis sunt reperta XVII die iulii Aº Dⁿⁱ MDCLXXIIII
  Carolus II Rex clementissimu sacerbam sortem miseratus inter avita monumena principibus infelicissimis. iusta persolvit. anno domⁱ 1678 annoq regni sui 30
caption: Sarcophagal urn of the presumed bones of Edward V and his brother, Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York
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