Page:Henry VI Part 3 (1923) Yale.djvu/126



 Here and elsewhere the old editions read 'Sixt' for sixth. So 'fift' for modern 'fifth.'

 Enter Plantagenet. This is the name under which York is known in 1 Henry VI. See that play, III. i. 163-165, and the note in this edition. It is perhaps remarkable that the Second Part never uses the name.

 I wonder how the king escap'd our hands. This first line, which is identical in the True Tragedy version, contains a violation of historic fact. The king did not escape, or attempt to escape, the Yorkists. He was found by them after the battle with a slight arrow-wound in the neck, and was treated with great outward respect.

 Lord Clifford, and Lord Stafford, all abreast, Charg'd our main battle's front, and breaking in Were by the swords of common soldiers slain. This account of Clifford's death is inconsistent with that given in 2 Henry VI, V. ii., where Clifford is slain by York. Compare also line 162 of the present scene and line 47 of I. iii. The inconsistency is in all these cases carried over from the earlier plays of the Contention and True Tragedy.

 brother. The Marquis of Montague, Warwick's brother, who fell at Barnet (cf. V. ii.), was not created Lord Montague till after the battle of Towton (1461), which is dramatized in Act II of the present play. He was not York's brother, but his nephew. Has the historical Montague been merged with Faulconbridge, his uncle, who was Salisbury's brother and York's brother-in-law, and who does not appear in 3 Henry VI? In the True Tragedy version Montague