Did she exploit her power to enrich her cronies?

Of all the charges levelled at Elizabeth down the centuries, the one that she unreasonably enriched her whole extensive family has arguably proved the most damaging.

The way the Woodvilles and their connections hoovered up positions and advantageous marriages was certainly remarkable. (One of Elizabeth’s brothers, aged around 20, was married to the Duchess of Norfolk, in her sixties.) A Milanese envoy reported that the Woodvilles “had the entire government of this realm”. But Elizabeth was only doing what any contemporary would have done, and it is debatable how much of the Woodville advancement was really implemented on the queen’s initiative. In an age when kin was key, Edward himself may have used these marriages and gifts of offices to strengthen his own power base.

And on a broader point, what can we say of Elizabeth’s role as queen consort? Clearly not everyone in the English court was enamoured of Edward’s choice of wife, but the king himself certainly thought highly of his queen’s abilities. So much so that, when he crossed the English Channel to lead an invasion of France in 1475, he left his small son, Edward, as ‘Keeper of the Realm’, and that son in Elizabeth’s charge. The will he made then names her the first of 10 executors: “Our said dearest wife in whom we have most singularly put our trust.”

Yet despite being loaded with such great responsibilities, Elizabeth was not a political animal. There is no evidence of her having exercised overt political influence – and, having witnessed the influential role that Margaret of Anjou played during her husband, Henry VI’s fraught reign, many of Elizabeth’s contemporaries would have regarded this as a good thing.

Away from the political arena, Elizabeth seems to have had a lot going for her as a queen. She was beautiful, a patroness of arts and industry, and a gracious presence at ceremonies. For example, in 1472, she entertained the visiting Flemish courtier Lord Gruuthuse to a great banquet with dancing in her own chamber, and was noted as having ordered the resplendent cloth of gold hangings for his bed.

Above all she was fruitful, presenting Edward with 10 children, most of whom survived the perils of infancy. In other words, for as long as her husband was alive, Elizabeth seemed the model of what a late-medieval queen was supposed to be.