Seated on his throne, Richard observed the depleted ranks of barons and bishops ranged around the bright walls of the Painted Chamber, with the commons crowded in on benches in the center of the room. His family’s war with Lancaster had certainly taken its toll on the nobility, he realized. He was not naive enough, however, to guess the failure of some to attend was a lack of support for his claiming the throne. As well, some of the dead nobles’ heirs were still in swaddling clothes, but it was a poor showing of the lords indeed. No matter, he was determined to enact the reforms that he and his council had labored over for weeks.

But first there was old business.

In a move guaranteed to please the new king, William Catesby had been appointed speaker of the house by the commons. He began by reading a document entitled Titulus Regius, an act of settlement or formal ratification of Richard’s right to rule by the three estates of the realm: the lords spiritual, temporal, and the commons. With Richard’s insistence that any one of his subjects should be able understand the document, it set out in English many of the justifications for Richard’s crowning that Buckingham’s proclamation had made the previous June at Baynard’s.

As Catesby’s somewhat nasal reading went on, Richard, anxious to get beyond this part of the proceedings, wondered what the many members staring motionless at the floor were thinking. He knew many men had questions as to his own motives and actions and what had happened to the two boys, and he had heard the malicious monikers. He looked calm, but he felt far from it. Every day he feared that the tide could turn on the shifting sands of men’s loyalties and at any time someone might leap up and shout “usurper” or “murderer.” He knew rumors abounded about another possible Tudor attempt to invade and claim the crown; such unease haunted him day and night. Richard had to consolidate control, and he hoped to God this Parliament would ratify his right to rule.

However, all was proceeding smoothly, and he breathed more easily as he heard the final statement of the important document read:

And over this, that, at the request, and by the assent and authority abovesaid be it ordained, enacted and established that the said crown and royal dignity of this realm, and the inheritance of the same, and other things thereunto within the same realm or without it, united, annexed, and now appertaining, rest and abide in the person of our said sovereign lord the King, during his life, and, after his decease, in his heirs of his body begotten.”

Catesby then moved on to the bills of attainder for the autumn rebellion. Buckingham, Dorset, John Morton and more than ninety others were attainted, and all of Margaret Beaufort’s estates were confiscated and, rashly Richard thought, put in the hands of her husband, Lord Stanley.