Tyranny added to usurpation

The last chapter analyzes three adaptations of the story of Richard III’s usurpation and trace a trajectory of the development of the usurpation plot from neo-Latin University plays to the commercial theatre of late-Elizabethan London in an attempt to delineate the politico-historical and ideological reasons for the gradual conflation of the notions of tyranny and usurpation. The usurpation plot and the tyrant-usurper protagonist, pushes against the ideological bulwark of divinely ordained sovereignty to foreground a cosmetic, manufactured notion of legitimacy. This movement can be read in conjunction with the Tudors’ concerted efforts of legally consolidating their questionable dynastic claims to the throne. Within the plays this conflictual intermeshing is complemented by the increasing importance accorded to the consent of the governed in matters of governance, both in drama and in contemporary political theory, marking a proto-liberal turn in humanist political thought.