Table Of Content“Mr. Howarth is a brilliant writer, full
of grace and wit and solid common
sense!’ The New Yorker
Everyone knows 1066 as the date of the
Norman invasion and conquest of England.
But how many of us can place that event in
the context of the entire dramatic year in
which it took place? From the death of
Edward the Confessor in early January to
the Christmas coronation of Duke William
of Normandy, there is an almost uncanny
symmetry, as well as a relentlessly
exciting surge, of events leading to and
from Hastings.
There could be no finer chronicler of that
year than David Howarth, one of today's
masters of historical narrative. He brings
alive the struggle for the English succession,
won by the able and fated Harold, the
separate invasion from Norway by raucous
King Harald Hardrada and Tostig, the
deposed Earl of Northumbria, brilliantly
foiled by Harold at Stamford Bridge only
days before William's landing, and vividly
re-creates the invasion and battle them
selves.
Drawing brilliantly on the wealth of
contemporary sources, Howarth gives us
memorable portraits of the leading char
acters and their motivations. At the same
time, in what may be this book's most
shining achievement, he makes us see the
story from the common Englishman's point
of view, telling us how he lived, worked,
fought, and died—and how he perceived
from his isolated shire the overthrow of
his world.
Jacket design by Neil Stuart
io66
The Year of the Conquest
DAVID HOWARTH
Illustrations to chapter headings by
GARETH FLOYD
B a r n es
{LNoble
B O O K S
NEW YORK
Copyright © 1977 by David Howarth
All rights reserved.
This edition published by Barnes & Noble, Inc.,
by arrangement with Viking-Penguin, U.S.
1993 Barnes & Noble Books
ISBN 0-88029-014-5
Printed and bound in the United States of America
M 19 18 17 16
Contents
INTRODUCTION page 7
England - New Year s Day ii
Death of a King - January 4 27
Coronation - January 3 49
Rouen - January 10 60
The Comet - April 18 77
Normandy - Spring 91
Norway - Summer 104
North Wind - August 10 - September 12 117
York - September 20-23 130
The English Channel - September 28 142
The Challenge - October 3-13 156
Hastings - October 14 166
London - October 13 - December 23 185
England - New Year s Eve 197
SOURCES AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 202
INDEX 203
Maps and Diagrams
Genealogy of the early Kings of England
and Denmark, and the Dukes of Normandy page 30
The earldoms of England in 1066 and the
invasion routes 46
Stamford Bridge 137
The Sussex coast 146
The Battle of Hastings 168
Introduction
A few years ago I wrote a book about Waterloo and one about
Trafalgar, and tried to describe those battles from the points of view
of men who fought in them. Here I have tried to do the same thing
with the year 1066: not only its battles, but also the peaceful life
that the battles disrupted, and not only its kings and dukes and earls,
but also its humble people.
1066 is the date that English people remember from history
lessons at school long after they have forgotten all the others. But
this book is not about the historical importance of the year, it is
simply about the tremendous drama that began on January 6 with
the burial of King Edward in Westminster Abbey, and ended on
Christmas Day in the same place with the coronation of King
William. The people who witnessed the drama could not foresee
its historical results, so the results have no proper place in the telling
of it, except as a postscript.
Like those other books, this is not meant to be read as a work of
scholarship, only as an evocation of the excitement, pleasures and
miseries of that year; but I hope it is accurate enough to satisfy
scholars. There is an obvious difference in going so much farther
back in history: there are not so many contemporary sources. But
there are more than one might expect. This account of the year is
based on twenty others, of which twelve were written within living
memory of 1066, and all except two within a hundred years. Many
of them are mentioned in the story, and there is a list of them all with
their dates on page 202.
A less obvious difference is that all the early accounts are more or
less prejudiced. Immediately after 1066, there were naturally three
different versions of what had happened, Norman, English and
Scandinavian. The rather later writers added new stories, either
from earlier versions which are lost or from oral traditions, and these
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io66: The Year of the Conquest
already had the quality of legends when they were written. More
over, most of the writers were monks who felt bound to draw moral
conclusions, and some were writing for patrons who expected their
own opinions to be confirmed.
So any modern historian has to use his own judgement pretty
freely.When he finds contradictory stories, he has to decide which
is most probable, which writer had the best reason to know the
truth - or which, on the other hand, had reason to distort it; and if
he cannot decide, he has to tell all the versions. On the whole, all
the early writers were more likely to be right about things in their
own country, and were sometimes obviously wrong about things
in other countries; so one tends to accept Norman stories about
Normandy, English ones about England and Norse ones about
Norway. Apart from that, I think it is fair to say that Normans were
the least reliable, because they felt they had to make excuses for
their invasion, and their writers were sometimes deceived by their
own propaganda.
Strictly speaking, every sentence in a story nine centuries old
should include the word perhaps: nothing is perfectly certain. But
that would be boring, and I have left out the qualification whenever
things seem reasonably certain, either from the early sources or from
deduction and inference. After all, factual truth is not the only thing
that matters. It can be just as illuminating to know what people
thought or pretended was true, if one can discover why they thought
it, or why they had to pretend it. I do not despise a plausible legend,
or totally disbelieve a miracle that everyone believed in. Sometimes
I have made guesses, but not without saying so.
Better scholars might say I have gone too far in trying to draw
the characters of the people of 1066; but I think this is the most
enjoyable part of history. To understand the things these people
did, one has to do one’s best to understand the psychological
reasons why they did them.Why, for one example, did William of
Normandy ever contemplate the invasion of England ? It seems far
too risky an action for any intelligent military man to take through
greed, or lust for power, or revenge. I have suggested a more
compelling reason which I think rings true. And why did King
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