WARS OF THE ROSES, a name given to a series of civil wars in England during the reigns of Henry VI and Richard III. They were marked by a ferocity and brutality which are practically unknown in the history of English wars before and since. The War of the Roses began in 1455, when many barons resented the way that the Lancaster family had seized the throne in 1399 and felt that Henry V, IV or VI were not the rightful kings. (Henry IV, the first Lancastrian King, came to the English throne by force. He made his cousin Richard ll, abdicate, and then seized the crown himself.) According to the barons, the York family, cousins of the Lancasters, were truly entitled to reign.