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The Norman Invasion

In 1066 William the Duke of Normandy, began to gather the army to invade Britain. The pretext for the invade was William’s claims English throne. But the Whitenagemot chose another relative of the decease King, the Anglo-Saxon Earl, Harold. William of Normandy claimed that England belonged to him and he began preparations for a war to fight the Crown.

William sent messages for and wide to invite the fighting men of Western Europe to join his forces. He called upon the Christian warriors of Europe to help him gain his rights to the English throne. No pay was offered, but William promised land to all who would support him, William also asked the Roman Pope for his support. He promised to strengthen the Pope’s power over the English Church. And the Church with the Roman Pope at the head blessed his campaign and called it a holly war. There were many fighting men who were ready to join the William’s army since it was understood that English lands would be given to the victors. William mustered a numerous army which consisted not only of the Norman barons and knights but of the knights from other parts of France. Many big sailing boats were built to carry the army across the channel.

William landed in the south of England and the battle between the Normans and Anglo-Saxons took place on the 14th October 1066 at a little village in the neighbourhood of town now called Hastings.

The Battle of Hastings

The Normans outnumbered. The Anglo-Saxon forces were greatly superior in quality. They were all men for whom fighting was the main occupation in life. They were well armed and the chance to be killed was not so great. The superior military tactics of the well-trained Normans were unknown in England. They used a skilful combination of heavy-armed cavalry and archers. First the archers would break up the ranks of their enemy and then followed a changing cavalry which decided the victory.

The Anglo-Saxons had a small cavalry, it was mainly Harold’s bodyguard. The hastily gathered levies of free peasants who fought on foot made up the main body of the Anglo-Saxon army. Not all the foot man were properly armed, many were armed with the pitchforks, axes or only thick oak-poles. The Anglo-Saxon footmen usually fought in a mass standing close together, so as to form a wall of shields to protect themselves. It must also be remembered that while William had firm power over the vassals who came with him from Normandy and France, King Harold’s power over the Anglo-Saxon earls of North-Eastern and Middle England in time of need. The earls moved slowly towards battle and then joined with the victor, either Harold or William. As a result when Harold met William at Hastings, he had under his command only the men of Wessex. Harold drew up his men inside a palisade on a hill-top awaiting the attack. His bodyguard was drawn up in he centre and other troops on the flanks. Standing shoulder to shoulder they made a wall in front. Stakes were driven into the ground so that the Norman horsemen could not break the ranks of the infantry. This was a good defensive position. As the Normans had to ride up the hill to fight and it was actually impossible to break through the shield wall of the Anglo-Saxons.

While the Anglo-Saxons were in this enclosure they saw the Normans coming forward. The Norman army was drawn up in different formation in front were the footmen followed by the horsemen. In the front of the cavalry rode a singer, who sang songs of battle and victory, the rowing his sward up into the air and catching it again as he rode. The Normans began to attack with flight of arrows and the Anglo-Saxon light-armed footmen suffered greatly of them. Then followed the charging attacks of the Norman cavalry upon which William chiefly relieved. But the Anglo-Saxon stood firm, side by side, shield to shield. They fought with such energy that both the Norman infantry and cavalry had to turn back and retreat down the hill. The battle went on all day. As long as the Anglo-Saxons stayed inside the palisade the Normans could not reach them successfully, so they thought of a battle-plan for drawing them out. Three times they went up the hill and then pretended to run away. When the Anglo-Saxons saw their enemies retreated a large number of them came out from behind the palisade to pursue the Normans and to complete, as they thought, the defeat of their enemy. As soon as the Anglo-Saxons had descended to the plain and were a good way from their palisade the Normans turned around and attacked them fiercely. Their trick served its purpose. In the open the mounted Normans had a great advantage over the men fighting on foot. The Anglo-Saxons were encircled, a great many of them were killed, and horses trampled down their dead bodies. Those who remained inside with Harold formed a ring round him and continued to fight bravely until the Normans thought of another plan. They shot their arrows high in the air, so that they fell inside the palisade. One of these arrows struck Harold in the eye and killed him. The Anglo-Saxons went on fight hard around the standard of the English King but gradually the shield-wall thinned and at last the Normans succeeded in breaking the line and the battle was at an end.

Subjugation of the Country

The victory at Hastings was only the beginning of the conquest. It took several years for William and his barons to subdue the whole of England. Soon after the victory at Hastings the Normans encircled London and the Witenagemot had to acknowledge William as the lawful King of England. Thus the Norman Duke became King of England – William I or as he was generally known, William the Conqueror. He ruled England for 21 years (1066 – 1087). During the first five years of his reign the Normans had to put down many rebellions in different parts fought fiercely for their freedom against the invaders. The peasant communities in Kent offered the most stubborn resistance to the invaders. Only in the early part of the 1068 did Normans conquered the West and in the latter part of that year they subdued central the northern England as far as Yorkshire. But rebellions against Norman rule rose again and again, in one part of the country and then in another. The largest rebellions took place in 1069 and in 1071 in the North-East where the free peasantry was more numerous than in other regions of the country.

In 1071 the subjugation of the country was completed. All the uprisings were put down and rebels were punished severely. William’s knights raided the village burning and slaying far and wide. After several uprisings in the North, William who was a fierce and ruthless man, determined to give the Anglo-Saxons a terrible lesson. The lands of the Northumbria were laid waste. Whole villages between York and Durham were ruined – every cottage was burnt to the ground, people were killed, cattle were driven off, all the crops and orchards were destroyed. Hardly a house was left standing or human being alive and land became a desert for many years. Only the great castle of Durham which was built by William’s order rose a river, above the burnt villages and untilled fields.

With lessons of such severe punishment the conquerors meant to keep the people in obedience, to intimidate them, so that they should not dare to rise against Norman rule.

The Bayeux Tapestry

In the Norman town of Bayeux, in the museum, one can see a strip of canvas about 10 metres long and half a metre wide embroidered with very well-defined pictures which tell the whole story of the Norman Conquest. That is the famous Bayeux Tapestry. It is said that William wife and the ladies of a court made it to hang round the walls of the cathedral.

The Bayeux Tapestry shows the preparation made for the invasion of England – men felling trees or hawing and shaping the rough timber into ship, scenes depicting the subjugation of the country and other details pertaining to the Battle of Hastings, the armour and weapons used, are all very well represented.

The tapestry is of great interest to specialists in history and art. It gives up very valuable information about the life of the people at that time.

The Norman Conquerors and How Life Changed in England Under Their Rule

The Norman Conquest brought about very important changes in the life of the Anglo-Saxons. We have seen what little power King Harold had over the great lords. The Anglo-Saxon earls didn’t even join their King at Hastings. After the Conquest the royal power in England strengthened greatly. The conquerors turned into serfs many Anglo-Saxon peasants who had been free before. They brought with them their language, laws and customs. Under their rule the English language changed greatly.

Now we shall learn more about the way of life of the Normans and the changes they brought to England.

The Strengthening of the Royal Power

William was now not only the Duke of Normandy but the King of England as well and he received great incomes from both Normandy and his rich domain in England. As King of England, William the Conqueror was determined that his nobles should not be able to make them selves independent to him as he had made himself independent of his overlord, the King of France.

The conqueror declared that all the lands of England belonged to him by right of conquest. The estates of all the Anglo-Saxon lords who had supposed Harold or acknowledged him as King were confiscated. The Anglo-Saxon landowners, great and small, and the Anglo-Saxon clergy were turned out of their houses, and estates and churches.

One-seventh of the country was made the royal domain. The other lands the King granted to the Normans and French men who had take part in the conquest and to the Anglo-Saxon landlords who supported him.

The Conqueror claimed that the forest lands which made up one-third of the country belonged to him too. Large forests were turned into reserves for the royal hunting were issued. Anyone who dared to hunt in the royal forests without the King’s permission who threatened with severe punishment. Thus the King of England became the richest feudal lord of all. The royal domain consisted of 1420 estates. The more powerful barons were granted from 100 to 400 estates and some of them still more. The monasteries were granted 1700 estates. These were the chief owners of the English lands. Many Normans were given only two or three estates, some even one. But both great and small landowners held their land from the King. The English lands that were given to the Church were also held from the King by the bishops and abbots. Each Norman noble on getting his estate, swore an oath allegiance to the King and became the King’s vassal. Bare – headed and without arms a baron approached the King knelt down and placed his hands between those of the King and promised to be his man. “I become your man from this day forward “, he said, “and to you I shall be true and faithful and shall hold faith for the lands I hold from you”. The great barons granted some part of their land to lesser feudal lords and the baron’s vassals frequently granted land to still lesser vassals. Each baron received with the grant of land to promise to the King’s protection, but in return he had to mender military service to his overlord bringing a number of fully armed Knights with him in time of war. When the King went to the war he called upon his chief vassals, they in their turn called upon theirs and as a result, all the landowners, were in arms. William demanded the military service should he rendered for all the lords – even for those in the possession of the Church, and the abbot or bishop was obliged to grant some of the estates to men who would do this for them. Besides, when an estate was inherited by the heir on the death of the holder, a certain payment was to be made to the King. These conditions of holding land by the land lords were known as the feudal tenure of land, only on these terms could the landlord keep the land.

William the Conqueror made not only the great landowners, to whom he granted land but also their vassals. In 1086 at a great gathering of knights in Sainsbury, William made all of them take a special oath to be true to him against all his enemies. Thus a knight who held a lend from a great baron became the King’s vassal. It is interesting to note that in France a vassal had to obey his immediate overlord only from whom he received the land and not the King. And it often happened that the smaller vassals joined their lord against the French King. In England the rule “My vassal’s vassal is not my vassal” was broken now and it became the duty of all the landowners, great and small, to support the King against all his enemies, both foreign and domestic. For greater security, when William the Conqueror rewarded his important supporters with a large number of estates, he didn’t give them large blocks of land but gave them a number of small estates scattered about the country. For example, he granted to one of his relatives 780 estates, which were scattered about in twenty countries. The King’s greatest vassal held 54 estates in the country of Sussex; 196 estates in Yorkshire; 248 in Cornwall; 5 estates in Cambridgeshire; an estate in Hampshire and an estate in Oxfordshire; 10 estates in Suffolk and many more in the other countries. The Conqueror granted for the great nobles to collect their forces and to offer resistance to the royal power. Any great lord who planned to rebel against the King would have to collect his vassals from all over England instead of having them ready in one place, and while he was doing this the King would march against him and defeat him.

Another change which William I introduced to reduce the power of the great lords was the abolition of the great earldoms- Northumbria, Mercia and Wessex, that had been established in the reign of the Danish King Canute. Now the country was divided into shires or countries as the Normans called them William I appointed a royal officials in each shire to be his “sheriff”. The royal sheriffs became of great importance. Through the sheriffs the King exercised control over all his vassals. The sheriff administered justice in the shire. He presided in the King’s name over the shire courts. Each landowner was allowed to hold his court on the estate, but the sheriff kept a check on him. The sheriff also collected taxes paid to the royal treasury and his duty was to see that all the royal dues were paid in full and in time. Besides, the sheriff was responded for the gathering of an army for the King. He was well acquainted with all the King’s vassals living in the shire and what military service they owned the King. It was his duty to see that they were ready to perform military service for the King when they were called up. If necessary the sheriff could call up the army for the King in two or three days. The great landlords, on the other hand, would require a much longer time to collect their vassals from all the scattered estates. To make himself stronger than any of his nobles, William the Conqueror ordered that many castles should be built in different parts of the country. They were nearly all royal castles. No other person was allowed to build a castle without the kings permission. The King’s castle were garrisoned by his own men-at-arms who were always ready to ride out and destroy anyone who disobeyed the King. William I replaced the Witenagemot by a Great Council made up of bishops and barons met together to talk over government problems and to give advice to the King. One of the functions of the Great Council was to act as the King’s Supreme Court and it presided over all serious trials. The right to belong to the Great Council depended on the holding of land granted by the King.

The King’s laws were in force everywhere. Only the King had the right to have money coined. Nobles were not allowed to make war on one another; all men had to keep “the King’s peace”.

The Domesday Book

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says “in 1096 William the Conqueror sent his men all over the England, into every shire to find out what property every inhabitant of England possessed in land or cattle and how much money this was worth … and all these writings were brought to him”. That was the first registration in England.

Before the arrival of the royal officials a special commission prepared the necessary information in each shire. The commission consisted of the sheriff, the lord of the estate, the priest, the hundred-elder and six peasants. They would measure the land, write down how much plough land was and how much meadow, pasture and woodland. They would visit everyone’s house to find out how many oxen were kept. They would have to know the number of mills and plough in the village and how many fishpond there were. Then the royal officials would arrive with a number of warriors. One of the officials knew both the English and Latin language, so that he could act as interpreter. The village would give their insurers in English but the officials would have to give them down the Latin. After the members of the commission had taken a solemn oath to tell “the whole truth and nothing but the truth” the royal official began to ask questions in English. Another official with a pen in his hand and an ink-horn hanging from his waist-belt stood by to write down the answer.