The final moments of Richard IIIs burial revealed: King was squashed into tiny grave with his hands still tied by gravediggers '

Richard III was squashed into a tiny, badly prepared ‘lozenge’ shaped pit with his hands tied as gravediggers rushed to bury him, a new paper reveals.

The last Plantagent king’s remains were unearthed under a car park in Leicester in August 2012 - 527 years after his death at the Battle of Bosworth.

And an academic paper on the archaeology of the three week search for his grave reveals for the first time the details of the grave dug for the King.

The University of Leicester researchers found Richard was casually placed in a badly prepared grave, which suggests the gravediggers were in a hurry to bury him.

The grave was too short for him and was 'lozenge' shaped, with the bottom of the much smaller than opening at ground level.
His head was propped up against one corner of the grave - suggesting the gravediggers had made no attempt to rearrange the body once it had been lowered in - and there were no signs of a shroud or coffin.

There is also evidence to suggest Richard’s hands may have been tied when he was buried.
The paper - by a team from the University of Leicester Archaeological Services, School of Archaeology and Ancient History, and Department of Genetics - follows the dig at what was once the medieval Grey Friars church in Leicester.

The burial was in stark contrast to the other medieval graves found in the town, which were a correct length and dug neatly with vertical sides.

The findings suggest the gravediggers may have been in a hurry - or had little respect for the dead, which matches accounts from medieval historian Polydore Vergil, who said the king was buried 'without any pomp or solemn funeral'.

The paper, published in journal Antiquity, includes analysis of Richard III’s grave and explains the conclusions about the friary’s layout based on the remains of the church and cloisters, as well as initial observations of the King’s skeleton.
It was written by key members of the University’s Search for Richard III - including lead archaeologist Richard Buckley and Grey Friars site director Mathew Morris - and is the first academic paper to be published on the recent search for Richard’s last resting place.

The researchers said: 'The Grey Friars Project has been unusual in the nature of the collaboration between professional and academic archaeologists, an amateur group (the Richard III Society) and the City of Leicester.

'However, this also means that the project has addressed two different but overlapping sets of research questions, not all of which specialists would routinely ask.

'Projects developed in this way may become more common in future as non-specialists increasingly become users, stakeholders and participants in academic research.

'What is somewhat different from the ways in which archaeological professionals and amateurs have generally worked together is that in this case the non-specialists played a role in shaping the intellectual frameworks of the project, although the final project design (including how questions could appropriately be asked of the evidence), and the execution of the project in practical terms remained in the hands of the archaeologists.

'Grey Friars offers a case study for addressing the issues of how to formulate multiple sets of research questions and aims, and how different kinds of partners can accommodate each other’s questions.

'The paper highlights the fact that this was a public archaeology project initiated by Philippa Langley, a member of the Richard III Society, and executed by a team of archaeologists and other specialists from the University of Leicester.

'At this stage we have discovered enough of the plan of the Grey Friars precinct to feel confident that we have identified parts of the eastern range, the chapter house and the eastern end of the church, including the transition between the choir and the presbytery.