History of Greyfriars
Shortly after the battle of Bosworth, Richard III’s body was buried with little ceremony in the church of the Greyfriars.
Ten years later Henry VII paid for a modest tombstone to be placed over the grave.
The Grey Friars represented a radical religious reform movement of the 13th Century with a lifestyle of absolute poverty.
They did however establish permanent bases – friaries.
Franciscan friars first arrived in Leicester between 1224 and 1230 and Greyfriars was an early 13th Century Franciscan friary, a post-conquest monastic site which played an important role in the social and economic evolution of Leicester in medieval times.
In 1538 the friary was dissolved and the church demolished.
The friary appears to have been demol- ished during the following decade and, although built on in part over the following centuries, much of the area was occupied by gardens.
Historic maps dating from the early 18th Century show the Greyfriars site as open land surrounded by buildings on its outer edges, with the central areas being occupied by formal gardens.
These gardens became car parks by the mid-20th century serving the council offices.
Often, religious sites in urban areas have been subsumed by later development, making assessment and protection of remains difficult.
As there has been little disturbance to Greyfriars from buildings and foundations, the area has great potential for surviving archaeological remains and presents a rare opportunity to protect this important monument.