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frequent quotations and footnote citations in English is no doubt a difficult task, but we are spared the mangling often meted out by compositors. It is to be hoped that Dr. Lopez's work will encourage other Spanish scholars to devote their efforts, for the first time, to the study of a legal history so different from their own. M. G. A. VALE The Queen's College, Oxford THE END OF THE HOUSE OF LANCASTER. By R. L. Storey. Barrie and Rockliff, London, 1966. Pp. x, 278. 50s. BOSWORTH FIELD AND THE WARS OF THE ROSES. By A. L. Rowse. Macmillan, 1966. Pp. x, 317. 45s. In seeking the causes of the outbreak of civil war in Lancastrian England, Dr. Storey takes as his main theme the relations between Henry VI's government and Richard, duke of York. The greater part (pp. 60-175) of this short and expensive book deals with events from Cade's rebellion in 1450 to the first battle of St. Alban's, fought on 22 May 1455. The remainder of Henry VI's reign is cursorily disposed of in only thirteen pages, and a brief epilogue (pp. 190-98) glances at English political upheavals down to the extinction of the male line of the house of Lancaster in May 1471. Although Dr. Storey considers that the civil war 'cannot be said to have begun at any particular moment' (p. 186), he regards it as having become inevitable by November 1458. The struggle for possession of the English Crown did not start until the autumn of 1459, and we are given no explana- tion of why the resumption of fighting was so long delayed. Dr. Storey sees the Wars of the Roses as 'the outcome of an escalation of private feuds' (p. 27) among the English nobility, but that interpretation had already been rejected by K. B. McFarlane before this book was published. The best chapters describe the conflicts in the west country between William, Lord Bonville (d. 1461) and Thomas Courtenay, earl of Devon (d. 1458), and the troubles in Yorkshire resulting from clashes between the younger sons of Henry Percy, earl of Northumberland (d. 1455) and some of their Nevill cousins. There is also a new and valuable account of that obscure episode, the futile rebellion in 1454 of Henry Holland, duke of Exeter (d. 1475). Much of the information about these disorders comes from Ancient Indictments in the Public Record Office, but unfor- tunately little attempt is made to assess the value of this type of evidence. History cannot safely be written on the basis of the allegations put forward by one of the parties in such disputes, especially if counter-accusations made by the other side have not survived.