King Richard III was not a hunchback: study

Richard III may be the most famous hunchback in history but a new study suggests the English monarch's deformity was highly exaggerated by Shakespeare.
The research led by the University of Leicester has finally uncovered the truth about Richard III's spinal condition, finding that an adolescent growth spurt caused his physical deformity but it did not give him a hunchback.
Various historical and literary references refer to Richard III, who ruled England from 1483-1485, are well-known, as "crook-backed" or "hunch-backed", but until now, it was unknown whether these descriptions were based on the king's actual appearance, or were an invention of later writers to damage his reputation.

Early examinations of the remains of Richard III, discovered in 2012 by archaeologists, showed that the king had a condition called scoliosis, where the spine curves to side.
The latest analysis, published in The Lancet, shows that the king's condition would have had a noticeable, but small, effect on his appearance, and is unlikely to have affected his ability to exercise.
Professor Bruno Morgan, and forensic imaging team at Leicester, created both physical and computer-generated replicas of the king's spine by performing CT scans and using 3D prints of the bones created by the Loughborough University from the CT image data.

This allowed the authors to carefully analyse the remains of Richard III's skeleton to accurately determine the nature of his spinal condition and the extent to which it would have affected his appearance.

The results show that Richard's scoliosis was unlikely to have been inherited, and that it probably appeared sometime after he was 10 years old.
The condition would today be called "adolescent onset idiopathic scoliosis," and is one of the commonest forms of scoliosis, researchers said.
"The physical deformity produced by Richard's scoliosis was probably slight as he had a well-balanced curve of the spine," said study author Dr Piers Mitchell, of the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge.

"His trunk would have been short relative to the length of his limbs, and his right shoulder a little higher than the left. However, a good tailor to adjust his clothing and custom-made armour could have minimised the visual impact of this," said Mitchell.
"The moderate extent of Richard's scoliosis is unlikely to have resulted in any impaired tolerance to exercise from reduced lung capacity," said study co-author Dr Jo Appleby.
"Moreover, there is no evidence to suggest Richard would have walked with an overt limp, as his curve was well balanced and the bones of the lower limbs symmetric and well formed," said Appeleby.