2-620-579 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Queen of Richard II, interceeding for the Life of Simon Burley. Queen Anne intercedes with Gloucester and Arundel for Sir Simon de Burley, 1388 (1864). The Earls of Gloucester and Arundel were two of the five powerful nobles known as the Lords Appellant, who seized effective control of England from King Richard II (1367-1400) in a rebellion in 1387. Burley was Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports and Constable of Dover Castle. Together with other favourites of the King, he was impeached for treason and executed by the Merciless Parliament of 1388. Queen Anne (1366-1394) pleaded to Gloucester and Arundel to spare him but they remained deaf to every entreaty. Burley's was the first recorded execution at Tower Hill.