40. The Battle of Hastings: the English and the Normans
The Northmen, under the leadership of the renowned Rollo, got their first permanent foothold in that important part of France since known as Normandy in the year 911 [see [p. 171]]. Almost from the beginning the new county (later duchy) increased rapidly both in territorial extent and in political influence. The Northmen, or Normans, were a vigorous, ambitious, and on the whole very capable people, and they needed only the polishing which peaceful contact with the French could give to make them one of the most virile elements in the population of western Europe. They gave up their old gods and accepted Christianity, ceased to speak their own language and began the use of French, and to a considerable extent became ordinary soldiers and traders instead of the wild pirates their forefathers had been. The spirit of unrest, however, and the love of adventure so deeply ingrained in their natures did not die out, and we need not be surprised to learn that they continued still to enjoy nothing quite so much as war, especially if it involved hazardous expeditions across seas. Some went to help the Christians of Spain against the Saracens; some went to aid the Eastern emperors against the Turks; others went to Sicily and southern Italy, where they conquered weak rulers and set up principalities of their own; and finally, under the leadership of Duke William the Bastard, in 1066, they entered upon the greatest undertaking of all, i.e., the conquest of England and the establishment of a Norman chieftain upon the throne of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom.
Duke William was one of the greatest and most ambitious feudal lords of France—more powerful really than the French king himself. He had overcome practically all opposition among his unruly vassals in Normandy, and by 1066, when the death of King Edward the Confessor occurred in England, he was ready to engage in great enterprises which gave promise of enhanced power and renown. He had long cherished a claim to the English throne, and when he learned that in utter disregard of this claim the English witan had chosen Harold, son of the West Saxon Earl Godwin, to be Edward's successor, he prepared to invade the island kingdom and force an acknowledgment of what he pretended at least to believe were his rights. Briefly stated, William claimed the English throne on the ground (1) that through his wife Matilda, a descendant of Emma, Edward the Confessor's mother, he was a nearer heir than was Harold, who was only the late king's brother-in-law; (2) that on the occasion of a visit to England in 1051 Edward had promised him the inheritance; and (3) that Harold himself, when some years before he had been shipwrecked on the coast of Normandy, had sworn on sacred relics to help him gain the crown. There is some doubt as to the actual facts in connection with both of these last two points, but the truth is that all of William's claims taken together were not worth much, since the recognized principle of the English government was that the king should be chosen by the wisemen, or witan. Harold had been so chosen and hence was in every way the legitimate sovereign.
William, however, was determined to press his claims and, after obtaining the blessing of the Pope (Alexander II.), he gathered an army of perhaps 65,000 Normans and adventurers from all parts of France and prepared a fleet of some 1,500 transports at the mouth of the Dive to carry his troops across the Channel. September 28, 1066, the start was made and the following day the host landed at Pevensey in Sussex. Friday, the 29th, Hastings was selected and fortified to serve as headquarters. The English were taken at great disadvantage. Only two days before the Normans crossed the Channel Harold with all the troops he could muster had been engaged in a great battle at Stamford Bridge, in Northumberland, with Harold Hardrada, king of Norway, who was making an independent invasion. The English had won the fight, but they were not in a position to meet the Normans as they might otherwise have been. With admirable energy, however, Harold marched his weary army southward to Senlac, a hill near the town of Hastings, and there took up his position to await an attack by the duke's army. The battle came on Saturday, October 14, and after a very stubborn contest, in which Harold was slain, it resulted in a decisive victory for the Normans. Thereafter the conquest of the entire kingdom, while by no means easy, was inevitable.
William of Malmesbury, from whose Chronicle of the Kings of England our account of the battle and of the two contending peoples is taken, was a Benedictine monk, born of a Norman father and an English mother. He lived about 1095-1150 and hence wrote somewhat over half a century after the Conquest. While thus not strictly a contemporary, he was a man of learning and discretion and there is every reason to believe that he made his history as accurate as he was able, with the materials at his command. His parentage must have enabled him to understand both combatants in an unusual degree and, though his sympathies were with the conquerors, we may take his characterizations of Saxon and Norman alike to be at least fairly reliable. His Chronicle covers the period 449-1135, and for the years after 1066 it is the fullest, most carefully written, and most readable account of English affairs that we have.
Source—Guilielmus Monachi Malmesburiensis, De gestis regum Anglorum [William of Malmesbury, "Chronicle of the Kings of England">[, Bk. III. Adapted from translation by John Sharpe (London, 1815), pp. 317-323.
The courageous leaders mutually prepared for battle, each according to his national custom. The English passed the night[338] without sleep, in drinking and singing, and in the morning proceeded without delay against the enemy. All on foot, armed with battle-axes, and covering themselves in front by joining How the English prepared for battle their shields, they formed an impenetrable body which would assuredly have secured their safety that day had not the Normans, by a pretended flight, induced them to open their ranks, which until that time, according to their custom, had been closely knit together. King Harold himself, on foot, stood with his brothers near the standard in order that, so long as all shared equal danger, none could think of retreating. This same standard William sent, after his victory, to the Pope. It was richly embroidered with gold and precious stones, and represented the figure of a man fighting.
On the other hand, the Normans passed the whole night in confessing their sins, and received the communion of the Lord's body in the morning. Their infantry, with bows and arrows, formed the vanguard, while their cavalry, divided into wings, How the Normans prepared was placed in the rear. The duke, with serene countenance, declaring aloud that God would favor his as being the righteous side, called for his arms; and when, through the haste of his attendants, he had put on his hauberk[339] the rear part before, he corrected the mistake with a laugh, saying, "The power of my dukedom shall be turned into a kingdom." Then starting the song of Roland,[340] in order that the warlike example of that hero might stimulate the soldiers, and calling on God for assistance, the battle commenced on both sides, and was fought with great ardor, neither side yielding ground during the greater part of the day.
Observing this, William gave a signal to his troops, that, pretending flight, they should withdraw from the field.[341] By means of this device the solid phalanx of the English opened for the purpose of cutting down the fleeing enemy and thus brought upon itself swift destruction; for the Normans, facing about, William's strategem attacked them, thus disordered, and compelled them to fly. In this manner, deceived by stratagem, they met an honorable death in avenging their country; nor indeed were they at all without their own revenge, for, by frequently making a stand, they slaughtered their pursuers in heaps. Getting possession of a higher bit of ground, they drove back the Normans, who in the heat of pursuit were struggling up the slope, into the valley beneath, where, by hurling their javelins and rolling down stones on them as they stood below, the English easily destroyed them to a man. Besides, by a short passage with which they were acquainted, they avoided a deep ditch and trod underfoot such a multitude of their enemies in that place that the heaps of bodies made the hollow level with the plain. This alternating victory, first of one side and then of the other, continued as long as Harold lived to check the retreat; but when he fell, his brain pierced by an arrow, the flight of the English ceased not until night.[342]
In the battle both leaders distinguished themselves by their bravery. Harold, not content with the duties of a general and with exhorting others, eagerly assumed himself the work of a common soldier. He was constantly striking down the enemy The valor of Harold at close quarters, so that no one could approach him with impunity, for straightway both horse and rider would be felled by a single blow. So it was at long range, as I have said, that the enemy's deadly arrow brought him to his death. One of the Norman soldiers gashed his thigh with a sword, as he lay prostrate; for which shameful and cowardly action he was branded with ignominy by William and expelled from the army.