The Norman Conquest

by Marc Morris

  25 OV, ii, 184–5, 258–61.

  26 WP, 6–9.

  27 Ibid., 8–9; Douglas, Conqueror, 44; Bates, Normandy, 176, 198.

  28 WP, 8–9.

  29 Ibid., 8–11; Douglas, Conqueror, 47–8; Bates, ‘Conqueror’s Adolescence’, 5–6, 13–15.

  30 Wace, 131–3; WP, 10–11; GND, ii, 120–1; Douglas, Conqueror, 48–9; Bates, Normandy, 61–2.

  31 Wace, 133–7; WP, 10–11.

  32 Wace, 133, 138; E. Zadora-Rio, ‘L’enceinte fortifiée du Plessis-Grimoult, résidence seigneuriale du XIe siècle’, Chateau Gaillard, 5 (1972), 227–39; WP, 10–11; GND, ii, 122–3.

  33 Bates, Normandy, 179.

  CHAPTER 4

  1 ASC C and E, 1043. Cf. Barlow, Confessor, 54–7.

  2 ASC C, D and E, 1043.

  3 EER, [lxxii].

  4 F. Barlow, ‘Two Notes: Cnut’s Second Pilgrimage and Queen Emma’s Disgrace in 1043’, EHR, 73 (1958), 653–4; P. Stafford, Queen Emma and Queen Edith (Oxford, 1997), 248–51.

  5 A phrase used by Barlow, Confessor, 59 (but cf. ibid., 79).

  6 Lawson, Battle of Hastings, 38.

  7 EER, 20–1; ASC E, 1009, 1040; C, D and E, 1044–5.

  8 Freeman, Norman Conquest, ii, 92; Snorri, 76–7.

  9 ASC D, 1048.

  10 ASC D, 1044; C, D and E, 1046.

  11 Above, 36, 41; VER, 14–15; WM, Gesta Regum, 351–3.

  12 For the complete text of the poem, see H. Summerson, ‘Tudor Antiquaries and the Vita Æwardi regis’, Anglo-Saxon England, 38 (2009), 170–2. For comment, see Keynes and Love, ‘Earl Godwine’s Ship’, passim.

  13 S. Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor and the Succession Question’, Edward the Confessor, ed. Mortimer, 83–4.

  14 VER, xxiii, 22–5.

  15 Ibid., 24–5.

  16 E. John, ‘Edward the Confessor and the Norman Succession’, EHR, 94 (1979), 248–9. Barlow, in his introduction to VER, lxxiii–lxxviii, takes a contrary view, as do P. Stafford, ‘Edith, Edward’s Wife and Queen’, Edward the Confessor, ed. Mortimer, 135–8, and Baxter ‘Edward the Confessor’, 82–5, where the case for celibacy is said to turn on VER, 14–15. However, the lines ‘He preserved with holy chastity … in true innocence’ (VER, 92–3), previously suspected of being a later addition, were evidently part of the original text: Summerson, ‘Tudor Antiquaries’, 164, 176. The fact adduced by Barlow and repeated by Baxter that Bishop Leofric of Exeter prayed for the marriage to produce an heir proves only that people hoped for one—as well they might.

  17 Stafford, ‘Edith, Edward’s Wife’, 121–4.

  18 ASC C, 1045; D, 1047; JW, ii, 544–5.

  19 ASC C, 1046; E, 1047; C, D and E, 1049.

  20 ASC C and E, 1050.

  21 ASC E, 1048; C, 1049.

  22 WP, 10–13; Historians have doubted the suggestion in OV, iv, 210–11, that the siege lasted three years. But note William’s decision to hold a church council at Brionne in 1050, which may parallel the proclamation of the Peace of God at Caen soon after Val-és-Dunes. See S. N. Vaughn, ‘Lanfranc at Bec:A Reinterpretation’, Albion, 17 (1985) 12–13.

  23 GND, ii, 128–9; WP, 30–1.

  24 Her parents’ marriage was apparently not consummated until 1031. Douglas, Conqueror, 392.

  25 Cf. Crouch, Normans, 125. The scanty remains of Matilda’s skeleton were measured in 1959, and from this it was concluded that her height was 5’ (152 cm). But since the tombs at Caen were destroyed during the sixteenth century and their contents scattered, the value of this conclusion is, to say the least, questionable. See J. Dewhurst, ‘A Historical Obstetric Enigma: How Tall Was Matilda?’, Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, 1 (1981), 271–2.

  26 GND, ii, 128–9.

  27 Bates, Normandy, 199–201.

  28 ASC C and D, 1049.

  29 GND, ii, 128–31; WP, 32–3.

  30 P. Grierson, ‘The Relations Between England and Flanders Before the Norman Conquest’, TRHS, 4th ser., 23 (1941), 97–9.

  31 VER, 28–31; ASC C, D and E, 1051.

  32 E.g. Garnett, Short Introduction, 26–39. Garnett does admit (at 35) that his argument ‘has not found much favour’.

  33 GND, ii, 158–9; WP, 18–21; ASC C and E, 1051; F. Barlow, The English Church, 1000–1066 (2nd edn, 1979) 298–300.

  34 ASC E, 1051; VER, 30–3.

  35 Barlow, Confessor, 307–8; ASC D and E, 1051.

  36 Ibid.; VER, 34–7.

  37 Ibid., 36–7; ASC E, 1051.

  38 E.g. Stafford, ‘Edith, Edward’s Wife’, 133–5.

  39 D. C. Douglas, ‘Edward the Confessor, Duke William of Normandy, and the English Succession’, EHR, 68 (1953), 526–34. Cf. Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 90–5

  40 Ibid.; John, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 253–5.

  41 Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 86, and Maps 4 and 5; ASC D, 1056.

  42 ASC D, 1051; Mortimer, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 27–8; Maddicott, ‘Edward the Confessor’s Return’, 653–6.

  43 Barlow, Confessor, 102; ASC C and E, 1050; C, 1051.

  44 ASC E, 1008; EHD, ii, 866; Lawson, Battle of Hastings, 154.

  45 ASC C, D and E, 1052; VER, 42–5.

  CHAPTER 5

  1 WM, Gesta Regum, 430–1; WP, 20–1, 50–1.

  2 WP, 14–17, 20–3; Bates, Normandy, 255; Douglas, Conqueror, 58.

  3 Ibid., 58–9, 386–7.

  4 The events have proved notoriously difficult to date: see Douglas, Conqueror, 383–90; Bates, Normandy, 255–7; Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 90–1.

  5 GND, ii, 122–5; WP, 22–9.

  6 Bates, Conqueror, 35; WP, 18–19.

  7 Douglas, Conqueror, 40–1; WP, 32–5.

  8 Ibid., 34–9.

  9 GND, ii, 102–5; WP, 39–43.

  10 Ibid., 43–7.

  11 Ibid., 46–9.

  12 Ibid.; J. Gillingham, ‘William the Bastard at War’, The Battle of Hastings: Sources and Interpretations, ed. S. Morillo (Woodbridge, 1996), 99–107.

  13 Ibid., 107; GND, ii, 142–5; WP, 48–51.

  14 Ibid., 50–1.

  15 GND, ii, 104–5 (cf. WP, 42–3); Douglas, Conqueror, 69, 83–104 (esp. 92, 99–100, 103).

  16 OV, iv, 84–5; GND, ii, 130-1, 142–3.

  17 Douglas, Conqueror, 69; WP, 86–9; Bates, Normandy, 209.

  18 Douglas, Conqueror, 105–6; J. Le Patourel, ‘Geoffrey of Montbray, Bishop of Coutances, 1049―93’, 59 (1944), 134―5.

  19 Douglas, Conqueror, 108–9; Bates, Normandy, 193–4.

  20 Ibid., 196–7, 221; Potts, Monastic Revival, 32–3, 106–11, 121.

  21 Douglas, Conqueror, 115–16; Sources and Documents, 41–4.

  22 DNB Lanfranc; Vaughn, ‘Lanfranc at Bec’, 136–9.

  23 Ibid., 139–43; Sources and Documents, 25 (cf. WP, 84–5).

  24 GND, ii, 130–43; OV, ii, 10–11; Potts, Monastic Revival, 105, 112–13.

  25 Bates, Normandy, 115–16, 222; OV, ii, 10–11; GND, ii, 130–1.

  26 In general, see R. Stalley, Early Medieval Architecture (Oxford, 1999), esp. Ch. 9; Fernie, Architecture, 3–14.

  27 Little remains of these buildings apart from the crypts of Rouen and Bayeux. Brown, Normans and the Norman Conquest, 25–6.

  28 Bates, Normandy, 202, 210.

  29 OV, iii, 120–3.

  30 Holland, Millennium, 264–7.

  31 GND, ii, 113–19; Le Patourel, ‘Geoffrey of Montbray’, 133–4; D. Bates, ‘The Character and Career of Odo, Bishop of Bayeux (1049/50–1097)’, Speculum, 50 (1975), 2–3.

  32 GND, ii, 118–19; Le Patourel, ‘Geoffrey of Montbray’, 135–7; Vaughn, ‘Lanfranc at Bec’, 145–7; below, 112

  33 WP, 82–3; Bates, Normandy, 201.

  34 Douglas, Conqueror, 121; WP, 88–9.

  35 Ibid., 50–5.

  36 Douglas, Conqueror, 72; GND, ii, 126–9.

  37 WP, 54–5; Douglas, Conqueror, 72–3 (cf. Bates, Conqueror, 38); Gillingham, ‘William the Bastard’, 108–9.

  38 Ibid., 107; WP, 54
–7; GND, ii, 150–3.

  CHAPTER 6

  1 VER, 44–5; JW, ii, 570–3; ASC D, 1052; Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, Map 6.

  2 VER, 62–3, 92–127; above, 64

  3 Ibid., 66–71; Fernie, Architecture, 96–8; idem, ‘Edward the Confessor’s Westminster Abbey’, Edward the Confessor, ed. Mortimer, 139–50, and also the articles there by Gem and Rodwell. For the state of the abbey in 1066, see Summerson, ‘Tudor Antiquaries’, 164, 177.

  4 VER, 66–9. The current occupants of the Palace of Westminster seem certain that it was established by Cnut (see www.parliament.uk, Factsheet GII), a conclusion tentatively endorsed by E. Mason, Westminster Abbey and its People, c. 1050 to c. 1216 (Woodbridge, 1996), 11–12. The evidence discussed there, however, seems scanty, amounting to a line of dubious worth in the Carmen and some speculation about the significance of the earlier burial at Westminster of Harold Harefoot. Most academics adhere to the traditional belief that the palace, like the abbey, was the work of the Confessor. See, for instance, The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England, ed. M. Lapidge et al. (Oxford, 1999), 471; Carmen, 40.

  5 E.g. Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 95. For debate about the date of the Life, see Stafford, Queen Emma, 40–8; VER, xxviii–xxxiii.

  6 Above, 64; Mortimer, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 31–2.

  7 Ibid., 31–4; above, 21; ASC D, 1065; van Houts, ‘Edward and Normandy’, 71–5; Barlow, Confessor, 50.

  8 Cf. Barlow, English Church, 1000–1066, 85–6, who cautions against assuming Robert was a reformer, and then assumes precisely the opposite.

  9 S. Keynes, ‘Giso, Bishop of Wells (1061–88)’, ANS, 19 (1996), 205–13; Hare, ‘Cnut and Lotharingia’, passim. Although Cnut also had links with Lorraine and appointed one Lotharingian bishop, it does not follow that Edward was merely continuing earlier policy: William of Normandy, after all, appointed a Lotharingian, Mauritius, to be archbishop of Rouen. Moreover, since both Hermann and Leofric are known to have crossed with Edward in 1041, it is difficult to see how their appointment can be construed as a native attempt, spearheaded by the Godwines, to thwart the promotion of Normans.

  10 Barlow, English Church, 1000–1066, 82–4, 301–2; DNB Leofric; DNB Hermann.

  11 Barlow, English Church, 1000–1066, 86. VER, 30–1; WM, Gesta Pontificum, 286–9.

  12 DNB Stigand; VER, 36–7.

  13 DNB Stigand; WM, Gesta Pontificum, 46–7.

  14 ASC C, 1053; WM, Gesta Regum, 354–5.

  15 DNB Harold II; VER, 46–9.

  16 Baxter, Earls of Mercia, 43–5.

  17 Barlow, Confessor, 188–213, and Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 96, argue that it did. Cf. Mortimer, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 28–31.

  18 JW, ii, 502–3; cf. ASC D 1057. See also DNB Edward the Exile; S. Keynes, ‘The Crowland Psalter and the Sons of King Edmund Ironside’, Bodleian Library Record, 6 (1985), 359–70.

  19 JW, ii, 574–5. JW also implies Ealdred went on the king’s orders, but this seems to have been his default assumption: see Barlow, Confessor, 189.

  20 VER, 34–5; Barlow, Confessor, 201–3.

  21 VER, 48–51.

  22 S. Baxter, ‘MS C of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and the Politics of Mid-Eleventh-Century England’, EHR, 122 (2007), 1189–1227.

  23 K. L. Maund, ‘The Welsh Alliances of Earl Ælfgar of Mercia and his Family in the Mid-Eleventh Century’, ANS, 11 (1988), 181–90.

  24 VER, 36–7, 52–3, 82–3; P. Grierson, ‘A Visit of Earl Harold to Flanders in 1056’, EHR, 51 (1936), 90–7, but cf. Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 97.

  25 Ibid., 97–8. For conspiracy theories, see e.g. E. Mason, The House of Godwine: The History of a Dynasty (2004), 92; John, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 257.

  26 DNB Edgar Ætheling; Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 98–101.

  27 Ibid., 103–4; VER, 50–1.

  28 Baxter, Earls of Mercia, 128–38, revises Fleming, Kings and Lords, 53–71; DNB Harold.

  29 Barlow, English Church, 1000–1066, 86–93, 304–5; DNB Stigand.

  30 VER, 54–5, 60–3.

  31 Baxter, Earls of Mercia, 48; idem, ‘Edward the Confessor’, Map 11.

  32 ASC D and E, 1063; JW, ii, 592–3; R. R. Davies, The Age of Conquest: Wales, 1063–1415 (Oxford, 2000), 24, 26.

  33 ASC E, 1063; Gerald of Wales, The Journey through Wales and the Description of Wales, transl. L.Thorpe (1978), 266.

  CHAPTER 7

  1 Douglas, Conqueror, 74; GND, ii, 152–3; OV, ii, 88–9; VER, 106–7.

  2 Chroniques des Comtes d’Anjou et des Seigneurs d’Amboise, ed. L. Halphen and R. Poupardin (Paris, 1913), 62.

  3 Bates, Conqueror, 38.

  4 Ibid., 39–41; Douglas, Conqueror, 59, 73, 173–4; WP, 58–61.

  5 Ibid., 60–9; OV, ii, 118–19, 312–13. For sceptical comment, see Douglas, Conqueror, 408–15.

  6 Bates, Conqueror, 54–6; idem, Normandy, 114, 247; WP, 84–5; Fernie, Architecture, 14, 98–102, accepts the suggestion of Maylis Baylé that St Stephen’s was begun after 1066, but this rests largely on an unconvincing argument from silence and ignores Torigni’s statement that Lanfranc was made abbot in 1063. See M. Baylé, ‘Les Ateliers de Sculpture de Saint-Etienne de Caen au II° et au 12° Sècles’, ANS, 10 (1988), 1–2. Cf. Chronicles of the Reigns of Stephen, Henry II and Richard I, ed. R. Howlett (4 vols., Rolls Series, 1884–9), iv, 34.

  7 Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 106, n143.

  8 WP, 68–9; WM, Gesta Regum, 416–17; Eadmer, 6–7.

  9 Ibid.; GND, ii, 160–1; OV, iv, 88–9; WP, 68–71.

  10 Ibid., 70–7. For the Brittany campaign, see K. S. B. Keats-Rohan, ‘William the Conqueror and the Breton Contingent in the Non-Norman Conquest, 1066–1086’, ANS, 13 (1991), 157–72.

  11 The notion that Harold was tricked into swearing on concealed relics was a later improvement: Wace, 154–5.

  12 OV, ii, 134–5, says the oath was sworn at Rouen before the Breton campaign. The Tapestry has it happen afterwards at Bayeux.

  13 GND, ii, 158–61.

  14 WP, 68–9; OV, ii, 134–5.

  15 VER, 50–3; 80–1; WM, Gesta Regum, 416–17.

  16 Eadmer, 6–7; WP, 68–9, 76–7; Barlow, Confessor, 301–6; K. E. Cutler, ‘The Godwinist Hostages: The Case for 1051’, Annuale Mediaevale, 12 (1972), 70–7.

  17 WP, 70–1.

  18 Eadmer 6–7; Orderic Vitalis also believed that Harold agreed to marry William’s sister: GND, ii, 160–1.

  19 WP, 70–1; Eadmer, 7–8.

  20 Ibid., 5–7. For Eadmer’s outlook, see J. Rubenstein, ‘Liturgy Against History: The Competing Visions of Lanfranc and Eadmer of Canterbury’, Speculum, 74 (1999), 299–307.

  21 Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 106–7.

  22 Eadmer, 6.

  23 Ibid., 7–8; WP, 76–7.

  24 E.g. Ashe, Fiction and History, 39–41.

  25 Eadmer, 8.

  CHAPTER 8

  1 ASC C and D, 1065.

  2 W E. Kapelle, The Norman Conquest of the North (1979), 9–13.

  3 N. J. Higham, The Kingdom of Northumbria, AD 350–1100 (Stroud, 993), 194–202, 211–12.

  4 Kapelle, Norman Conquest of the North, 13–19.

  5 Ibid., 7, 12–13; R. Fletcher, Bloodfeud: Murder and Revenge in Anglo-Saxon England (2002), 31–3.

  6 Ibid., 73–5, 149, 205–6.

  7 ASC C, 1065; VER, 50–1; SD, Libellus, 170–3, 174–7, 180–1.

  8 JW, ii, 598–9; Kapelle, Norman Conquest of the North, 96–7.

  9 VER, 48–9, 76–9; ASC C, 1065.

  10 VER, 50–1.

  11 Kapelle, Norman Conquest of the North, 33–9, 46–7.

  12 Ibid., 90–2; VER, 66–7; SD, History, 127; Gaimar, Estoire, 276–7.

  13 Kapelle, Norman Conquest of the North, 34–44, 92–4.

  14 Ibid., 17, 25–6, 29, 43–4.

  15 Ibid., 94–5, 98.

  16 JW, ii, 596–9; ASC D, 1065.

  17 VER, 76–7.

&nb
sp; 18 Ibid.; Baxter, Earls of Mercia, 48; ASC D, 1065.

  19 VER, 74–7; JW ii, 598–9.

  20 ASC D, 1065; VER, 78–9.

  21 Ibid., 78–81.

  22 ASC D, 1065.

  23 Ibid.; JW, ii, 598–9; VER, 80–3.

  24 Ibid., 110–13; Summerson, ‘Tudor Antiquaries’, 8–9, 21–2.

  CHAPTER 9

  1 Sources and Documents, 17–18 (cf. WP, 2–3). For general comment, see A. Williams, ‘Some Notes and Considerations on Problems Connected with the English Royal Succession, 860―1066’, ANS, 1 (1978), 144–67.

  2 EER, 6–7, 52–3. Cf. Garnett, Short Introduction, 32–3.

  3 Above, 31–4, 38, 41–2.

  4 ASC E, 1066; JW, ii, 600–1; Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 109–10.

  5 VER, 116–19.

  6 Ibid., 122–3.

  7 Ashe, Fiction and History, 44–5; Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 111–12.

  8 ASC C and D, 1065; WP, 118–19. Cf. Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 113.

  9 WP, 100–1; Barlow, Confessor, 244–5. In their present form the charters are twelfth-century forgeries, but their witness-lists look to have been copied from bona fide originals.

  10 DNB Ealdgyth; Baxter, Earls of Mercia, 52; above, 117.

  11 Cf. Barlow, Confessor, 227.

  12 VER, xxiii–xxiv, xxx–xxxi.

  13 E. van Houts, ‘The Norman Conquest Through European Eyes’, EHR, 110 (1995), 845–6.

  14 Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 101–3.

  15 G. Garnett, ‘Coronation and Propaganda: Some Implications of the Norman Claim to the Throne of England in 1066’, TRHS, 5th ser., 36 (1986), 92–3. Cf. Barlow, Confessor, 254–5.

  16 WM, Gesta Regum, 420–2.

  17 Baxter, ‘Edward the Confessor’, 114; WM, Saints’ Lives, 86–9; ASC C, 1065.

  18 Wace, 156.

  19 WP, 70–1; GND, ii, 160–1. See also Eadmer, 8–9.

  20 WP, 100–1; Gillingham, ‘William the Bastard’, 99–102.

  21 WP, 105. C. Morton, ‘Pope Alexander II and the Norman Conquest’, Latomus (1975), 362–82, argues that the papal banner was a fiction invented by William of Poitiers, and that Rome’s support for the Conquest was actually retrospective. But her argument founders on several important pieces of evidence—in particular, a letter of Pope Gregory VII to William which refers explicitly to his having supported the invasion. Cf. van Houts, ‘Norman Conquest Through European Eyes’, 850, n2; Garnett, ‘Coronation and Propaganda’, 99, n50.