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Chapter 5 The Norman Conquest For the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, at least, we do have a considerable record of the role of propaganda in medieval warfare, left to us by William of Poitiers. William the Conqueror portrayed his invasion as a holy war under a papal banner. Having informed the Pope of his intentions, Poitiers described how he had ‘received of his benevolence a standard as a sign of the approval of St Peter, behind which he might advance more confidently and securely against his enemy’ (my italics). In fact William, Duke of Normandy, had
As noted in the Introduction, the Norman Conquest was Freeman’s magnum-opus – a work which absorbed his interest for over thirty years, and on which his contemporary and posthumous reputation has rested. While scholarly interest in the Norman Conquest is intensifying, the tendency is still to dissect, rather than to thoroughly examine, these volumes. What is needed is a more holistic approach. As Bratchel observed, fifty years ago, ‘Freeman’s five volume History … might almost be regarded as being as instructive for the student of the nineteenth as for
Evidence is provided by place names and personal names of Nordic origin for Danish settlement in England and Scotland in the Viking period and later. The names show that Danish settlement was densest in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Leicestershire but can also be traced outside the Danelaw. In the North, Danish settlers or their descendants moved across the Pennines to the Carlisle Plain, and from there along the coast of Cumberland and on across the sea to the Isle of Man, and perhaps back again to southern Lancashire and Cheshire before the middle of the tenth century. There,was also a spread of Danes around south-western England in the early eleventh century, reflecting the activities of Cnut the Great and his followers. After the Norman Conquest, Nordic influence spread into Dumfriesshire and the Central Lowlands of Scotland. It was in the more isolated, northern communities that Nordic linguistic influence continued to thrive.
The Welsh borderlands were a distinctive territory where two peoples came together throughout the Anglo-Saxon period. It was here that men skilled at law drew up the Dunsate Agreement, to solve the impending problems with cattle theft. This book explores what sets the Dunsate Agreement apart from other Anglo-Saxon law codes grappling with cattle theft, highlighting that creators of this document, and the community that it concerns, included both Anglo-Saxons and Welsh. It argues that the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle represents the military culture of the Welsh borderlands in a distinctive way which aligns its inhabitants with outlaws. The book articulates a discernible culture in the Welsh borderlands prior to 1066. Bede's The Historia Ecclesiastica has long been interpreted as a narrative of Anglo/British strife. His rancour towards the pagan Mercians provides substantial information about the life of Penda of Mercia, whose entire reign over this borderlands kingdom was defined by consistent political and military unity with Welsh rulers. Expanding on the mixed culture, the book examines the various Latin and Old English Lives of the popular Anglo-Saxon saint, Guthlac of Crowland. Vernacular literary tradition reveals a group of Old English riddles that link the 'dark Welsh' to agricultural labour through the cattle they herd, and who have long been understood to show the Welsh as slaves. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is frequently cited as a paradigm of Anglo/Welsh antagonism. The book reveals that the impact of the Norman Conquest on the Anglo-Welsh border region was much greater than previously realised.
Introduction The story of the relations between Normandy and England which culminated in the Norman Conquest of 1066 begins with the pact negotiated between Duke Richard I and King Aethelred II of England (978–1016) in 991, whereby both parties bound themselves to friendship and non-aggression. Although the text does not refer explicitly to each ruler’s dealings with the
integrate native administrative mechanisms into their style of government. The Norman Conquest of England in 1066 brought these traditions face to face with those of another people, the Anglo-Saxons. They too were familiar with the governance, by medieval standards, of a powerful polity, in this case a monarchy. For centuries, the impact of the arrival of the Normans has provided fertile ground for discussion and debate among academics. The certainty given by the date, 1066, offered a firm point from which to measure change before and after. The controversy of the
AngloSaxon period, depicts the Welsh borderlands acting as an independent political force throughout the eleventh century. Moreover, a pattern of sustained political alliance between Mercia and northern Wales is evident in the tenth century within a corpus of mostly Welsh historical sources. This pattern of alliance continues in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle throughout the eleventh century, across the Norman Conquest. At the moment of the Norman arrival in England, the Welsh borderlands were a significant political force in Anglo-Saxon England. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is
The question of how the Italo-Greek communities of southern Italy and Sicily perceived and responded to the cultural changes introduced by the Norman conquests is important for a deeper understanding of the society of Norman Italy. The Vitae of the Italo-Greek saints of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries can contribute to this avenue of research, since, for the Italo-Greeks, hagiography, alongside secular poetry, was the literary genre par excellence for communicating the hopes, fears and expectations engendered by their encounter with the Normans. In
unique and yet absolutely characteristic, were the Jews [ 41 ], [ 42 ]. Following the Norman Conquest, Jewish settlers scattered themselves through sixty English towns. 7 The fiscal interest of the crown led to these being formed into official communities, but these were not ghettos, and Jewish families lived in the same streets as Christians. In the twelfth century the area of London known as ‘the
Significance Robert Guiscard’s blockade of Bari, begun in the summer of 1068 and enduring for two years, eight months, was a watershed in the Norman conquest of southern Italy and Sicily. For compelling reasons, the city was essential to Norman dreams of dominating the central Mediterranean. First, it was the principal and most prosperous port in Apulia and commanded the southern Adriatic and the strategically vital Strait of Otranto. As capital of the Byzantine theme of Longobardia and seat of Constantinople’s catepan (governor) for the region, Bari was also