Given a few hundred years, every battlefield ends up simply a field, but the site of the Battle of Bosworth – where Richard III met his maker in 1485 – is enlivened by an entertaining heritage centre full of skeletons and musket balls; guided walks around the site last 90 minutes. Enthusiasts in period costume reenact the battle each August.
The battlefield is 16 miles southwest of Leicester at Sutton Cheney, off the A447. A taxi from Leicester costs around £40.
Although it lasted just a few hours, the Battle of Bosworth marked the end of the Plantagenet dynasty and the start of the Tudor era. This was where the mortally wounded Richard III famously proclaimed: 'A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse'. (Actually, he didn't: the quote was invented by that great Tudor propagandist William Shakespeare.)