The Battle of Hastings (14 October 1066)
Departure of the Romans,
Settlement of the various English tribes,
449 The Jutes,
477 The Saxons,
520 The Angles,
But
with Eadgar’s death, and the accession of his son Eadward, this
prosperous state of things ended. For a time Dunstan held his own, but
not without strong opposition. Again and again he had to plead his cause
before the Witan. And at one synod, at Calne, it was intended to bring
the matter to a crisis. Beornhelm, a Bishop of the Scottish Church, was
brought forward as a champion by his enemies. His eloquence was carrying
the assembly with him, and Dunstan could only appeal to heaven for
assistance. Nor was that assistance denied; by accident or design, the
floor of the upper chamber where the meeting was held gave way in that
part where Beornhelm and his friends were seated, and they were hurried
to swift destruction, while Dunstan’s triumphant party remained
uninjured on the floor above. But even miraculous interferences did not
suppress the enemies of the Prelate. A conspiracy, in which Aelfthryth
[Elfrida], the mother of Ethelred, seems to have been chiefly engaged,
was formed; and Eadward, returning from the chase, was killed at her
castle at Corfe.
Eadward
the Martyr, as his monkish chroniclers call him, being thus disposed
of, his brother, Aethelred the Unready, ascended the throne. Dunstan,
compelled to assist at the coronation, did so only to denounce curses on
the new king He had to withdraw from Court. His policy was at an end.
Mercia and the North fell away from Wessex. The King’s own character, at
once weak and cruel, was not such as to inspire confidence; and we
accordingly enter upon a period of almost inexplicable treasons,
weakness, and disorder. The Danes reappear on the coast, and what has
been spoken of as the third period of Danish invasion begins. The fleets
were no longer merely piratical expeditions, but were commanded by
kings of whole countries, and towards the end of the period the object
was no longer plunder, or even settlement, but national conquest. The
change was closely connected with the gradual consolidation of the three
Northern kingdoms of Europe: Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, in each of
which, as in England, one sovereign had now become paramount. The chief
personage in these invasions is Swegen or Swend, son of the King of
Denmark. In the year 982 he made his appearance on the English coasts,
and Southampton, Chester, and London were either taken or destroyed. The
kingdom was in no condition to offer a firm resistance. Internal
dissensions had already begun. The King was at enmity with the whole of
Dunstan’s party. We hear of a fierce quarrel with the Bishop of
Rochester. The allegiance of Mercia and Northumbria was more than
doubtful. East Anglia, where resistance to a kindred people might have
been least expected, alone succeeded in checking the Danes. There, under
Brihtnoth, the great battle of Maldon was fought, which forms the
subject of one of the greatest of the Anglo-Saxon poems. Such single
instances of resistance were of no real avail. Sigeric of Canterbury,
who had succeeded to Dunstan’s position and policy, and was therefore by
no means unfriendly to the Danes as the opponents of Wessex, induced
the King to entertain a fatal plan of buying off the invaders. With the
consent of his Witan, he raised £10,000, with which he bribed the Danish
hosts. This was the origin of the tax known as Danegelt, which became
permanent, and lasted till the reign of Henry II. The effect of such a
bribe was naturally only to excite the Northern robbers to further
efforts. Accordingly, in 994, Swegen and Olaf of Norway made their
appearance, and England was assaulted by the national fleets of Denmark
and Norway. Divided by faction, undermined by treason, and without a
leader, the English knew no expedient but the repetition of bribes.
Olaf, as a Christian, was indeed induced to return to his own country,
but Swegen’s invasions were continuous. Supported by the disloyal chiefs
of the North, he ravaged in turn Dorsetshire, Hampshire, Sussex, and
Kent. And when, in the year 1000, a temporary lull occurred, Aethelred,
with a madness which seems almost inconceivable, insisted on
quarrelling, first with the King of Cumberland, who is said to have
refused the disgraceful tribute demanded of him, though willing to serve
with his forces against the Danes, and afterwards with the Normans in
France. An expedition undertaken against this people with ridiculous
ostentation was easily defeated. A peace was made, and hostility changed
into alliance, cemented by the marriage of the King with Emma, a Norman
Princess. In her train came certain followers, who obtained high office
and military commands, and added a fresh element of weakness to already
weakened England. But though contemptible in the field, with the craft
and cruelty of a weak mind Aethelred planned the massacre of all the
Danes in Wessex. Many of these were settled quietly in different parts
of the country, or billeted and living on friendly terms with their
landlords. On the 13th of November 1002, on the festival of St. Brice,
the cruel plan was carried out. Among other victims was a sister of
Swegen’s who had become a Christian; she was put to death with
circumstances of unusual barbarity, it is said, at the instigation of
Eadric Streona, or the Gainer. This man henceforward plays a prominent
part in the history. Though of low birth, he had contrived to make
himself the favourite of the King, whose daughter he subsequently
married. Selfish, unscrupulous, and treacherous, his influence as the
King’s adviser was most pernicious; while, if it suited his own ends, he
never hesitated to betray his master. So completely is he identified
with the disasters of England, that there is scarcely any criminal act
of the reign that is not traced to him. But his repeated treasons do not
seem to have destroyed the trust which Aethelred and his nobler son
Edmund placed in him. After the massacre of St. Brice the Danes
naturally sought revenge. Exeter was taken by the treachery of Hugh the
Frenchman, one of Emma’s followers. Wiltshire and Salisbury were
deserted by the traitor Aelfric.
Again Eadric is
visible, ruining rival Thegns, and advising still further use of bribes.
In 1006, he had succeeded in getting made Ealdorman of the Mercians.
His family rose with him, and in 1008, when at last a great national
fleet was collected, the quarrels of his brother Brihtric and his nephew
Wulfnoth destroyed its utility.
In the same year, a
fresh host, one division of which was commanded by Thurkill or
Thurcytel, one of the most formidable of the Danish sea kings, made its
appearance In 1010, the English were again defeated at the battle of
Ipswich, and the country was in a condition of absolute collapse. Mercia
and Wessex itself were overrun. The cause of Aethelred looked so
hopeless, that Eadric the Gainer thought it time to change sides, and
after the capture of Canterbury and the death of the Archbishop St.
Alphege, the Witan was collected under Eadric, without the participation
of the King, and a further large tribute paid, while by some
arrangement, probably the cession of East Anglia, Thurkill was drawn to
the English side. This step of Thurkill seems to have opened Swegen’s
eyes at once to the inutility of single invasions, and to the
possibility of himself effecting some similar arrangement. He felt
confident of the support of Northumbria and Mercia against Wessex. He
therefore moved his fleet to the Humber, and advanced to York. He had
not miscalculated. The whole of the Danelagu joined him, and with this
assistance, leaving his son Cnut behind him in command of the fleet in
the Humber, he advanced into Wessex. His success was constant. Oxford
was taken, and the royal town of Winchester. At Bath the Danish
conqueror received the submission of the Thegns of the West. London,
which we find constantly rising in importance, alone held out, nor was
it till Aethelred deserted the city that it surrendered. But then, there
being no longer any opposition, Swegen was, in fact, King of England.
Aethelred sought and obtained an asylum in Normandy, till recalled by
Swegen’s death the following year.
The Danes
acknowledged Cnut as King, but the bulk of the English wished to retain
the House of Cerdic, if Aethelred would pledge himself to rule better.
This he promised to do, and his cause for a time was successful. Cnut
had to retreat to his ships. Nevertheless, we hear of another large
tribute, but it was paid probably to a fleet of Danish auxiliaries
serving upon the English side. Eadric had of course again joined the
victorious party; but again his persistent treachery was the destruction
of the country. He enticed Sigeferth and Morkere, Thegns of the Five
Danish Burghs, to Oxford, and there murdered them. Sigeferth’s widow was
kept a prisoner, and taken in marriage by Edmund Ironside, Aethelred’s
son. This prince thus acquired possession of the Five Burghs, and
secured an influence which enabled him to take up a position in
opposition to Eadric. On the renewal of the invasion by Cnut both Eadric
and Edmund collected their forces; but, angry at the new rivalry he was
experiencing, Eadric led his troops to join Cnut. Wessex was thus
thrown open, and by a strange inversion of affairs, Edmund, with Utred
of Northumberland, occupied the northern part of England, while the
Danes, under Cnut and Eadric, held Wessex and the South. In 1016,
Aethelred died.
The Witan of the
South immediately, under the influence of the conquerors, elected Cnut
as his successor, but London and the rest of the Witan chose Edmund. It
was plain that Wessex could acknowledge Cnut only through fear, and
thither Edmund betook himself, and collected troops. As if to prove what
the English could do if well commanded, in a few weeks he fought, on
the whole successfully, five great battles. At Pen Selwood in Somerset;
at Sherstone, where the English were only prevented from winning by a
trick of Eadric’s, who, raising the head of another man, declared it was
the head of the slain English king; at Brentford; and afterwards, when
Eadric had again changed sides, at Otford in Kent; and Assandun in
Essex. In this last battle the whole forces of England were arrayed. The
sudden withdrawal of Eadric, who was commanding the Magesætas, or men
of Hereford, secured a victory for the Danes, and Edmund had to retreat
across England into the country of the Hwiccas, or Gloucestershire. Not
yet wholly beaten, he was preparing for a sixth battle, when he was
persuaded to make an arrangement similar, though not identical, with
that which Alfred had made with Guthrum. He surrendered to Cnut
Northumberland and Mercia, retaining for himself Wessex, Essex, East
Anglia, and London. On St. Andrew’s Day of the same year, Edmund
Ironside died, a misfortune, like most other acts of villainy of the
time, attributed to Eadric. With him fell the hope of the English. The
treachery of Eadric, the folly of Aethelred, met with their reward, and
Cnut was acknowledged King of England.
Indeed,
Edmund’s sons were so young that it was not probable that the Witan
would elect them. The only other claimant was Edwy, Edmund’s brother. To
secure himself against him, Cnut is said to have employed Eadric to put
him to death; and though he escaped on that occasion, he was certainly
outlawed, and all the old members of the royal family were kept abroad.
The children of Aethelred and Emma, Edward and Alfred, were in Normandy
with their mother. The children of Edmund Ironside, Edward and Edmund,
were sent first to Sweden, and then to Hungary, where Edward married
Agatha, niece of the Emperor Henry II. Cnut’s object, on finding himself
King of England, appears to have been to obliterate, as far as
possible, the idea of conquest, to rule England as an English king, and
making that country the centre of his government, to form a great
Scandinavian Empire. To this end, pursuing the policy of Dunstan, he
divided England into four great earldoms, representing the old kingdoms.
Northumberland and East Anglia were intrusted to Danes; Mercia was
given to Eadric; Wessex he kept in his own hands. Eadric’s influence had
compelled Cnut thus to promote him, but he so mistrusted him, that
within a year he caused him to be put to death. In the same year he sent
for Queen Emma from Normandy, and married her, though she must have
been much older than himself, with the object apparently either of
connecting himself with the late dynasty, or of securing the friendship
of the Normans. The next year the Danish fleet was sent home. Englishmen
were again put in high office. Thus Leofric was made Earl of the
Mercians, and Godwine, of whom we now first hear, and whose origin and
rise is variously related, was made Earl of Wessex, presumably the
second man in the country. Thus, too, Cnut flattered the feelings of the
English by moving the body of St. Alphege, who had been killed by the
Danes twelve years before, with all honour to his own Church at
Canterbury; and thus, too, he did not scruple to fill the English
bishoprics with Englishmen, and even to promote them to high office in
Denmark. During his reign England was at peace within its own borders,
while Scotland was brought to submission. In 1031, Malcolm, King of the
Scotch, and two under kings, did homage to the English King. A strong,
well-ordered government was established, supported for the first time by
a standing body of troops, known as the House-carls. Early in the reign
Eadgar’s law had been renewed with the advice of the Witan, and, in
1028, Cnut promulgated a code of his own, which is little else than
repetition of former laws and customs. But the proof of his good
government is this, that just as the law of the great Eadgar was looked
on as typical, and demanded by Cnut’s Witan, and as after the Conquest
the Confessor’s law was demanded, so we find the people of the North
demanding Cnut’s law, in each case law meaning system of government. His
importance as a king is marked by the respect shown him on his
pilgrimage to Rome in the year 1027. There, as he tells his people in a
letter which he sent them, he negotiated with the Pope, the Emperor, and
King Rudolph of Burgundy, for the free passage of English pilgrims and
merchants; he received large gifts from the Emperor, and made the Pope
promise to lessen his extortions upon granting the Pallium or
Archiepiscopal cloak. His daughter by Queen Emma, Gunhild, was,
moreover, thought a fitting wife for Henry, afterwards the Emperor Henry
III. Cnut died still young in 1035.
With
him fell his plans, both of the Scandinavian Empire and of good
government in England. His sons, Harold and Harthacnut, in no way
inherited his greatness; they appear to have been little better than
savage barbarians. The succession was disputed between them. Godwine and
the West Saxons obtained the South of England for Harthacnut, while
Harold reigned in the North. But as Harthacnut did not come to England,
but remained in his kingdom of Denmark, Godwine was the practical ruler.
This great Earl, whose sympathies were wholly national, was accused of
putting to death Alfred, the son of Aethelred and Emma, who seems to
have taken advantage of the absence of Harthacnut to aim at
re-establishing himself in Wessex. But as the actual murderers were the
men of Harold whom Godwine had opposed, it would seem that the charge
was a false one. The continued absence of Harthacnut enabled Harold to
secure the whole of the kingdom, over which he reigned for two years. On
his death, in 1040, Harthacnut stepped unopposed into his position. His
short reign was marked by no great events. Godwine, having cleared
himself by oath and by compurgation (in which a large number of Earls
and Thegns joined) of the charge of murdering Alfred, remained in power.
A tyrannical use of the King’s House-carls in collecting a tax produced
an outbreak in Worcester, which was punished with brutal severity. And
when the King fell dead, while drinking at a bridal feast, the English
were glad to be rid of a line of such barbarous sovereigns, and to
restore the House of Cerdic in the person of the late king’s
half-brother Edward, who, in the absence of direct descendants of the
Danish house, entered almost unopposed on the kingdom.
It
was the eloquence of Godwine which overcame the slight opposition
offered to Edward’s election, and secured him the throne. This nobleman
thus reached the summit of his power, and two years afterwards his
daughter Edith became the King’s wife. Edward’s education and training
had rendered his tastes and policy as decidedly French as those of
Godwine were national. There thence arose, and continued throughout the
reign, a constant enmity between the two parties - the Frenchmen, whom
Edward brought over in great numbers and employed particularly as
bishops, and the national party, headed by Godwine and his sons. It is
the progress of this quarrel which forms the history of the reign, side
by side with the efforts of Godwine to push his family prominently
forward in opposition to the family of Leofric, Earl of Mercia. On the
one hand, the King lavished favours upon his foreign followers. A
Frenchman, Robert of Jumièges, became Bishop of London, and afterwards
Archbishop of Canterbury; Ulf, another Norman, became Bishop of
Dorchester in Oxfordshire; Ralph, the son of Edward’s sister and the
Count of Mantes, was made an Earl; and Eustace of Boulogne, her second
husband, was loaded with honours. On the other hand, Godwine succeeded
in securing for members of his own family the earldoms of Somersetshire
and Herefordshire, and of the East and Middle Angles. The crisis of the
rivalry at length arrived. It arose from an outrage committed by the
followers of Eustace on the citizens of Dover. The townsmen rose against
the insolent Normans and drove them from the city; and when Godwine, as
Earl, was called upon to punish the citizens, he positively refused
unless they were fairly tried before the Witan. Both sides took up arms,
Godwine and his sons on one side; the King, with Siward of
Northumberland, Leofric of Mercia, and his own French partisans on the
other. The armies faced each other in Gloucestershire; but Godwine,
unwilling to press matters to extremity, accepted the proposal of
Leofric that the question should be referred to the Witan. When the
Witan assembled, the King was there with a great army. Overawed by this
force, the Witan, recurring to the old charge against Godwine and to a
late act of violence on the part of his son Swend, ordered Godwine and
his sons to appear before them as criminals. This they refused to do
unless hostages were given, and as this demand was refused, they would
not appear, and were outlawed. Godwine and three sons retired to Baldwin
of Bruges, Leofwine and Harold to Ireland. The French party were
triumphant. Robert, as we have seen, was made Archbishop, William,
another Frenchman, succeeded him as Bishop of London, and Odda, probably
an Englishman in the French interest, was given the western part of
Godwine’s earldom. Harold’s earldom was given to Aelfgar, son of
Leofric. At the same time, to complete the French influence, William of
Normandy came over to England, and, as he always declared, received a
promise of the succession from his cousin Edward.
The
administration of foreigners was so unpopular and so unsuccessful, that
Godwine and his family thought that an opportunity had arisen for their
return. Unable to procure their restoration by peaceful means, they
determined upon using force; and after various expeditions, but feebly
opposed by the English, who at heart wished them well, Godwine found
himself strong enough to sail up the Thames; and so preponderating was
the feeling of the country in his favour, that, as the King refused
justice, it was agreed that the matter should be referred to the Witan.
What their decision would be was not doubtful, so the French prelates
and earls and knights, who had been building feudal castles, at once
fled, and Godwine and his sons came back in triumph. Stigand, a priest,
who had been originally appointed by Cnut to an abbey raised at Assandun
in memory of the Danish victory over Edmund Ironside, and who had acted
as principal mediator, was elected to the Archbishopric of Canterbury,
left vacant by the flight of Robert. The next year Earl Godwine died
suddenly, while at dinner with the King. His death restored the balance
between the two great families. While Harold succeeded to the earldom of
the West Saxons, and the vacant earldom of Northumbria was given to his
brother Tostig, East Anglia was restored to Leofric’s son Aelfgar. Earl
Siward of Northumbria had died in 1055.
The
succeeding years are marked by the gradual increase of the power of
Harold and his family. In 1055 Earl Aelfgar was outlawed, and his
earldom given to Gurth, Harold’s brother. The exiled Earl, making common
cause with Griffith [Gryffydd] of Wales, defeated Ralph, the French
Earl of Herefordshire. To repair this disaster the war was intrusted to
Harold; he prosecuted it with success, and Herefordshire, which he had
thus rescued, was added to his earldom. The death of Leofric still
further increased the power of the House of Godwine, although Aelfgar,
the late Earl, was allowed to succeed him; and finally, Essex and Kent
were formed into an earldom for Leofwine, the remaining brother of
Harold. Godwine’s sons now possessed all England, with the exception of
Mercia. The last probable heir to the throne, the Aetheling Edward, the
son of Edmund Ironside had been brought over from Hungary, but had died
almost immediately after reaching England. And when, in 1063, Harold, by
employing his men as light troops, succeeded in the final subjugation
of Wales, his greatness was such that he must almost certainly have been
regarded as the next king. Three years afterwards, in January 1066,
King Edward, the last male descendant of Cerdic who reigned in England,
died. His last year had been troubled by a great insurrection of the
Northern counties against the rule of Tostig. The house of Leofric had
had a stronghold in the North, and Tostig’s injudicious vigour in
attempting to reduce the barbarous population to order had excited great
discontent. His energy seems more than once to have led him into
murder. The Northumbrian therefore deposed him, and elected Morcar
[Morkere], the grandson of Leofric, in his place. His brother, Edwin of
Mercia, who had succeeded his father Aelfgar, made common cause with
him; and Harold, whose policy was always conciliatory, found it
necessary to persuade the King to confirm Edwin and Morkere in their
possessions. Tostig retired as an exile to Bruges. While England was
thus troubled, the King died, a good man, devoted to the Church and the
monks, and therefore afterwards canonized, but as a king unfitted by his
pliant character, and more especially by his love of foreign
favourites, to rule over England at such a difficult crisis.
The
Witan at once assembled, and used its power of election. This power was
usually exercised within the limits of the royal family; but on this
occasion, as there was no claimant of the royal house but Edmund
Ironside’s grandson, the child Eadgar, the Witan looked beyond their
usual limit, and elected almost unanimously the great Earl Harold.
Though thus King of England by the most perfect title, he found himself
opposed by two enemies. On the one hand was his brother Tostig, the
exiled Earl of Northumberland, who had been a favourite of the late
king, and had perhaps himself hoped to be elected; and upon the other
Duke William, who, out of a variety of small and insufficient pretexts,
had constructed a very formidable claim to the crown of England. He
asserted that the Confessor had promised him the kingdom, that he was
the nearest of kin, and that Harold had himself sworn to him to be his
man, to marry his daughter, and to own him allegiance. The circumstances
under which this last event had taken place are not very certain; but
it seems to be true that Harold, on some occasion, had been shipwrecked
on the coast of France and taken prisoner, and held to ransom, according
to the barbarous custom of that day, by Guy, Count of Ponthieu, lord of
the country. The intervention of William as superior lord rescued him
from his disgraceful position. He spent some time in friendly
intercourse at William’s court, and there probably, as was not unusual,
made himself the Duke’s man, and did homage. Such an act could be only
personal, and could have nothing to do with the kingdom of England, and
even as a personal tie was not very binding. It was his knowledge of
this which induced William to play the well-known trick upon Harold.
When the Earl had taken what he believed to be only a common oath of
homage, the cover of the table on which his hands had been placed was
withdrawn, and he found he had been swearing upon most sacred relics.
With regard to the other claims, it may be said that Edward the
Confessor, in accordance with the constitution of England, could not
promise the crown to any one, and, moreover, had nominated Harold on his
deathbed; while, although William was the cousin of the late king, it
was only through Edward’s Norman mother, Emma, that he was so. But when
put forward artfully, and mingled with coloured accounts of the injuries
suffered by the French in England at the return of Godwine, these
claims seemed very plausible to the French, especially when backed by
the influence of the Papal See wielded by Archdeacon Hildebrand,
afterwards Pope Gregory VII. The Papal support was won partly by
representing Harold as a perjured man, partly because the Normans in
Italy were regarded as the great champions of the Papal See, but chiefly
because Godwine and Harold had throughout sided rather with the party
of the secular clergy in England than with that of the monks, and had
been national in their views with regard to the Church as well as in
other matters. The Pope, Alexander II., was led by Hildebrand to see the
opportunity offered, and expressed his approbation of the expedition by
sending a consecrated ring and banner.
William,
immediately after the death of the Confessor, sent to demand the crown,
which was of course refused. He then proceeded to collect troops, not
only his own Norman feudatories, but also large bodies of adventurers
from other parts of France. Aware of the intended invasion, Harold
collected his forces, and occupied the Southern coast. But William was
so long in coming, that Harold’s militia army, anxious to return to
their agricultural works, and straitened for food, could not be kept
together. He was left with his immediate followers, his House-carls and
Thegns. Just then, when his great host had disappeared, news was brought
to him that Tostig had invaded the North of England. Foiled in a weak
attempt upon the South near Sandwich, and refused aid by William of
Normandy, Tostig had fallen in with the fleet of Harold Hardrada, King
of Norway. This king was a great warrior, who had served in the armies
of the Byzantine Empire, and fought in Africa and Sicily. He was easily
persuaded to join Tostig, and reinforced by the Earls of Orkney, they
together sailed up the Ouse, and reached Fulford on the way to York.
Edwin and Morkere, the sons of Aelfgar, whose sister Harold had lately
married, honestly opposed them, but after a severe battle they were
beaten. Arrangements by which the North was to join Harold Hardrada were
being made at Stamford Bridge upon the Derwent, when Harold, who had
hastened with extreme rapidity from the South, fell upon the invaders.
They were taken by surprise, and some, but slightly armed, were
overcome; but the bridge over the Derwent was held with determination,
and a fierce battle was fought on the other side. The English were
entirely triumphant, both Tostig and Harold Hardrada being slain. The
Norwegian fleet was forced to withdraw. This was on the 25th of
September.
On the 28th King
William landed at Pevensey. Harold was still at York when the news
reached him. He hastily gathered what troops he could round the nucleus
of his own immediate followers who had been with him at Stamford Bridge.
All the South of England joined him gladly, both from Wessex and East
Anglia. But Edwin and Morkere, in their jealousy of the rival house,
forgot their patriotism and Harold’s good deeds to themselves, and
deserted him. With such an army as he had, Harold took up his position
upon the hill of Senlac, where Battle Abbey now stands. This hill runs
out from the North Sussex hills southward like a peninsula. There Harold
erected palisades, and arranged his men with a view to defensive action
only. This step was rendered necessary by the difference of the armies;
the English fought all on foot, a large proportion were irregularly
armed militia, and the hand javelin, not the bow and arrowk, was their
national missile. The Normans, on the other hand, fought as chivalry on
horseback, and had many archers. Once in the plain Harold’s army might
have been crushed by the charge of the mailed cavalry. But repeated
charges uphill against an entrenched foe, stubborn and heavily armed,
could not but wear out the mounted knight. Our descriptions are all from
Norman sources, and the contrast between the religious Norman and the
jovial Englishman is fully brought out. On the one side, the night is
said to have been passed in prayer, and on the other in revelry. There
were certainly, however, priests and monks upon the side of the English,
and probably this story is a monkish exaggeration. Harold drew up his
forces with his own picked troops upon the front of the hill, between
the dragon banner of Wessex and his own banner adorned with a fighting
man. The backward curves of the hill were occupied by his worse armed
troops. He himself, with his brothers Gyrth and Leofwine, took their
place beside the standard. The French advanced in three divisions, the
Bretons, under Alan, on the left; the Normans, under their Duke and his
two brothers, Robert and Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, in the centre; the
adventurers, under Roger of Montgomery, on the right. They galloped
forward, preceded by Taillefer, a minstrel, tossing his sword aloft and
singing songs of Charlemagne. But their efforts were vain. The heavy axe
of the English hewed down man and horse if any reached the barricade,
and the French had to draw back. The Bretons began the flight, and the
Normans soon followed, but the English militia were not steady enough to
withstand the excitement of victory. The veteran centre stood firm, but
the troops opposed to the Bretons broke from their position in pursuit.
William saw his advantage, rallied his troops, drove back the pursuers,
and made a second vehement assault upon the barricade. The Earls Gyrth
and Leofwine were killed, the barricade in part removed, but still
Harold held his ground, and William had to have recourse to stratagem
before he could secure a victory. His present comparative success had
been caused by the accidental over-eagerness of the English. He
determined to try whether he could not again induce them to break their
line. The Normans turned in apparent flight, the English, heated by the
long fight, rushed forward in pursuit. The Norman cavalry turned round
and rode down their pursuers, and, driving them before them, again
charged up the hill; while the archers, whose skill had been somewhat
foiled by the shields of the English, were ordered to drop a flight of
arrows upon the heads of Harold and his men. The plan was fatally
successful; the battle was still stubbornly contested, though no longer
in serried ranks, when Harold fell, pierced in the eye by an arrow. With
him disappeared all hope of English success. His body was found, and
buried under a cairn by the sea, till afterwards removed to his minster
of Waltham.
Harold Godwinson’s death.
