The Norman conquest
*******************

The Norman conquest of England began on 28 September 1066 with the invasion of England by William the 
Conqueror, Duke of Normandy and his victory at the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066 over King 
Harold II of England. Harold's army was badly depleted in the English victory at the Battle of Stamford 
Bridge in Northern England on 25 September 1066 over the army of King Harald III of Norway. By early 
1071, William had secured control of most of England, although rebellions and resistance continued to 
approximately 1088.

The Norman conquest was a pivotal event in English history. It largely removed the native English ruling 
class, replacing it with a foreign, French-speaking monarchy, aristocracy, and clerical hierarchy. This, 
in turn, brought about a transformation of the English language and the culture of England in a new 
era often referred to as Norman England.

By bringing England under the control of rulers originating in France, the Norman conquest linked the 
country more closely with continental Europe, lessened Scandinavian influence, and also set the stage 
for a rivalry with France that would continue intermittently for many centuries. It also had important 
consequences for the rest of the British Isles, paving the way for further Norman conquests in Wales 
and Ireland, and the extensive penetration of the aristocracy of Scotland by Norman and other French 
speaking families, with the accompanying spread of continental institutions and cultural influences.


The Invasions of England in 1066
********************************
 
Hardrada of Norway struck first in mid September 1066, when Hardrada's invasion force landed on the 
Northern English coast, sacked a few coastal villages and headed towards the city of York. Hardrada 
was joined in his effort by Tostig, King Harold's nere-do-well brother. The Viking army overwhelmed 
the English force. News of the invasion sent King Harold hurriedly north at the head of his army and 
they met Hardrada's army on September 25th, as it camped at Stamford Bridge outside York. A fierce 
battle followed. Hardrada quickly fell and then the King's brother, Tostig fell. What remained of the 
Viking army fled. Resting after his victory, Harold received word of William's landing near Hastings.

Construction of the Norman invasion fleet had been completed in July 1066, and on September 27th, the 
Normans made landfall on the English coast near Pevensey and marched to Hastings. Harold rushed his 
army south and during the early morning of October 14, Harold's army, atop a hill outside Hastings, 
watched as a long column of Norman warriors marched to the base of the hill and formed a battle line. 
The lines of the two armies traded taunts and insults. At a signal, the Norman archers took their 
position at the front of the line. The English at the top of the hill responded by raising their shields 
above their heads to protect them from the rain of arrows. The battle was joined.

The English fought defensively while the Norman infantry and cavalry repeatedly charged the shield-wall. 
As the combat slogged on for the better part of the day, the battle's outcome was in question. Finally, 
as evening approached, the English line gave way and the Normans rushed their enemy with a vengeance. 
King Harold fell as did the majority of the Saxon aristocracy. William's victory was complete. On 
Christmas day 1066, William was crowned King of England in Westminster Abbey.... 


England After the Norman Conquest
*********************************

The victorious William, now known as 'the Conqueror', brought a new aristocracy to England from Normandy 
and some other areas of France. He also strengthened aristocratic lordship and moved towards reform of 
the church. At the same time, William was careful to preserve the powerful administrative machinery 
that had distinguished the regime of the late Anglo-Saxon kings.

William became a monarch of law and order, and his methods were severe in the extreme. A quarter of 
England was retained by him for his personal needs. He was a avid hunter and the preservation of the 
fallow deer became an obsession. Anybody caught hunting on his land could expect blinding or mutilation, 
or if they were lucky, executed. These kangaroo courts were set up spontaneously to administer justice. 
a fair trial could depend on your status. Peace was not easily won by William. Many English had died 
in the initial battle but it dimmed into insignificance to those who would die in his quest to unify 
the country under his power. 

In Yorkshire, following a massacre of Norman knights, he undertook a scorched earth and murdering policy 
that took years to recover. Many of the nobility or landed Saxon gentry that existed only a few years 
earlier became penniless. This roll reversal led to uprisings which William dealt with. Some totally 
refused to accept the regime left their homes to become outlaws. Possibly the most famous was Hereward 
the Wake, A Lincolnshire landowner who , after the invasion, absconded to the marshes where he, until 
1071, fought against William and all he stood for.

An Anglo-Norman chronicler, Orderic Vitalis, who wrote in 1125, even applauded the continued resistance 
of the English to William the Bastard...


Feudalism
*********

The economy of England had been expanding for at least a century before the Norman conquest, and was 
characterised by growing markets and sprawling towns. By the 12th century, one of the ways in which 
English writers disparaged other peoples, notably the Welsh and Irish, was to depict their economies 
as primitive, as lacking markets, exchange and towns. At the same time, kings and lords outside England 
deliberately sought to stimulate the wealth of their countries, as can be most clearly seen by the 
introduction of coinage and the establishment of boroughs by David I of Scotland and his successors.

Within such an economy, there was clearly room for men to rise by increasing their wealth. At the same 
time, it remained a notably hierarchic society, and the process of conquest itself strengthened the 
role of lordship. 

William now introduced the position of sheriff. These were officials of the Crown who were responsible 
for the administration of the royal estates and shires and collected the taxes, which were draconian, 
on the kings behalf and was responsible for leading all the kings militia in times of unrest. The 
administration of the law and the jury system used throughout the world today and introduced by the 
Vikings was kept in place. 

William then embarked on a survey of his conquest, the like of which had never been attempted anywhere 
else in the world at that time. In 1085 William wanted to know exactly what he had in his possession. 
Not just the broad details but everything. He wanted to know the population and the status of them, 
who owned what land, what was on that land, how many animals were on that land, the type of land, how 
the land was cultivated and what was grown. All for the purposes of taxation. This eventually became 
known as the Domesday Book. The survey was stored in the treasury in Winchester. The calculation of 
tax due was passed to the tenants in chief. The affect of his savage taxes fell on all, even down as 
far as the lowest peasant. 

Everybody was affected. It shows that the 11 leading members of the aristocracy held about a quarter 
of the realm. Another quarter was in the hands of fewer than 200 other aristocrats. These nobles had 
received their lands by royal grant, and in turn gave some of their lands to their own followers. 

This form of landholding is often regarded as a key element of a 'feudal' system, or feudalism. This
was a brutal but reasonably successful new form of social organisation that was to change England.

The Feudal system had been used in France by the Normans from the time they first settled there in 
about 900AD. It was a simple, but effective system, where all land was owned by the King. One quarter 
was kept by the King as his personal property, some was given to the church and the rest was leased 
out under strict controls.

1. The King
The King was in complete control under the Feudal System. He owned all the land in the country and 
decided who he would lease land to. He therefore only allowed those men he could trust to lease land 
from him. However, before they were given any land they had to swear an oath to remain faithful to 
the King at all times. The men who leased land from the King were known as Barons, they were wealthy, 
powerful and had complete control of the land they leased from the King.

2. Barons
Barons leased land from the King which was known as a manor. They were known as the Lord of the Manor 
and were in complete control of this land. They established their own system of justice, minted their 
own money and set their own taxes. In return for the land they had been given by the King, the Barons 
had to serve on the royal council, pay rent and provide the King with Knights for military service when 
he demanded it. They also had to provide lodging and food for the King and his court when they travelled 
around the country. The Barons kept as much of their land as they wished for their own use, then divided 
the rest among their Knights. Barons were very rich.

3. Knights
Knights were given land by a Baron in return for military service when demanded by the King. They also 
had to protect the Baron and his family, as well as the Manor, from attack. The Knights kept as much 
of the land as they wished for their own personal use and distributed the rest to villeins (serfs or 
peasants). Although not as rich as the Barons, Knights were quite wealthy.

4. Villeins
Villeins, sometimes known as serfs, were given land by Knights. They had to provide the Knight with 
free labour, food and service whenever it was demanded. Villeins had no rights. They were not allowed 
to leave the Manor and had to ask their Lord's permission before they could marry. Villeins were poor.

After William
*************

At William's death, his lands were divided, with his eldest son Robert taking control of Normandy, and 
his second son, William Rufus, becoming king of England. Rufus successfully dealt with rebellions and 
with the threat of his elder brother (he defeated Robert during an invasion of Normandy), and maintained 
the powerful kingship of his father. Following the death of Archbishop Lanfranc of Canterbury, good 
relations between king and church broke down, and the new archbishop, Anselm, became involved in 
quarrels with both Rufus and his successor Henry I. Rufus died in a hunting 'accident' in the New Forest 
in 1100, and his younger brother, Henry swiftly and successfully made his move and seized the throne.

Henry further strengthened the ties of the Norman regime with the Anglo-Saxon past by marrying Edith 
(also known as Matilda), the great grand-daughter of Edmund Ironside, King of England. In 1106, Henry 
succeeded in wresting control of Normandy from his brother, Robert, whom he thereafter kept imprisoned. 
While there continued to be conflict in Normandy, England experienced a lengthy peace during Henry's 
reign. At the same time, royal government continued to develop, notably in the field of royal financial 
accounting with the emergence of the 'exchequer'.

Henry's only legitimate son drowned in a shipwreck in 1120, and when the king died in 1135 the succession 
was again uncertain. Henry's nephew, Stephen, count of Boulogne, seized the crown. Matilda, Henry's 
daughter, challenged Stephen's position. She and her husband Geoffrey, Count of Anjou, enjoyed quite 
rapid success in Normandy, but in England an extended civil war developed. The powerful royal government 
that had characterised earlier Norman kingship broke down. In 1153 it was agreed that Stephen should 
enjoy the throne for the rest of his life, but that he should be succeeded by Matilda's son, Henry of 
Anjou. The settlement might not have meant to have been observed, but Stephen died late in 1154, and 
Henry was crowned king. He thus added England to his extensive continental lands, which included Normandy, 
Anjou, and his wife Eleanor's inheritance of Aquitaine.

The Normans also expanded into Scotland and Wales, although in a very different way from the conquest 
of England. Scottish kings from the time of Malcolm Canmore (1058 - 1093) looked to introduce Norman 
personnel and practices into their realm, perhaps out of respect for a perceived cultural superiority, 
but certainly in order to strengthen their own political position. Particularly under David I (1124 - 
1153), major land grants were made to Frenchmen - for example the grant of Annandale to Robert Bruce, 
ancestor of the later Scottish king of that name.   

The kings and churchmen also brought the Scottish church more closely into line with that of Christendom 
further south. Malcolm and his wife Margaret founded the Benedictine monastery of Dunfermline, while 
David I introduced new monastic orders such the Cistercians and Premonstratensians. There were significant 
periods of antagonism between Scottish and English kings, but also periods of peace such as in the time 
of David I of Scotland and Henry I of England.

Norman expansion into Wales took a different form still. Whereas in England the invasion was led by 
the duke, and in Scotland Normans were invited in by kings of the native line, in Wales, aggressive 
Norman expansion was led largely by the aristocracy. Incursions took place all along the Anglo-Welsh 
border, but most notably in the north, from the earldom of Chester, and in the south. In the latter 
region emerged the Marcher lordships such as those of Pembroke and Ceredigion. The English kings did 
participate in the process, and Henry I in particular was active in Wales. However, with the accession 
of Stephen in England there was a major reassertion of independent Welsh power.

Slowly the English and Normans came together through the necessity of living side by side and also 
through marriage. With many of the rank and file Normans, and their French colleagues, being men of 
small worth, they had little option, but to mix in with their English neighbours, leaving their noble 
masters to carry on the illusion of being truly French. But even they, with their children being 
raised by English nannies and their English reeves and stewards managing their estates, became first 
Anglo-Norman, and then English. 


Norman Castles
**************

The Normans had an enormous influence on architectural development in Britain. There had been large
scale fortified settlements, known as burghs, and also fortified houses in Anglo-Saxon England, but 
the castle was a Norman import.

Numbers are uncertain, but it seems plausible that about 1,000 castles had been built by the reign 
of Henry I, about four decades after the Norman conquest. Some were towers on mounds surrounded by 
larger enclosures, often referred to as 'motte and bailey castles'. 

Castles were a very good way for the Normans to expand their grip on the English people. The English 
population greatly outnumbered the Normans and the Normans had to create an atmosphere in which they 
were feared by the English, therefore, minimising the possibility of an uprising by the English. Castles 
were the sign of Norman power and might. They could be easily seen and as such acted as a deterrent. 
The castles warned the English that Norman soldiers lived in these castles and that any attempts to 
rise up against them would be met with force.

The castles also gave the Norman soldiers a safe place to live. They were, after all, invaders. William 
had built a temporary castle at Pevensey to house his troops when they landed in September 1066. This 
would have been a motte and bailey castle. These types of castles were quickly put up all over England 
after the Battle of Hastings to enforce Norman control.
    
Other, later castles, were immense, most notably the huge palace-castles William I built at Colchester 
and London. These were the largest secular buildings in stone since the time of the Romans, over six 
centuries earlier. They were a celebration of William's triumph, but also a sign of his need to overawe 
the conquered. Churches were also built in great numbers, and in great variety, although usually in 
the Romanesque style with its characteristic round-topped arches. The vast cathedrals of the late 11th 
and early 12th centuries, colossal in scale by European standards, emphasised the power of the Normans 
as well as their reform of the church in the conquered realm. Buildings such as Durham cathedral 
suggest the strength and vibrancy of the builders' culture in rather the same way as the early sky-
scrapers of New York.

The Normans also continued the great building of parish churches, which had begun in England in the 
late Anglo-Saxon period. Such churches appeared too in the rest of the British Isles, and can still 
be seen, for example at Leuchars in Fife. A lord might display his wealth, power and devotion through 
a combination of castle and church in close proximity, again as still spectacularly visible at Durham.




Sources:
'Ordericus Vitalis - Ecclesiastical Historii', Geoffrey Gaimer
'A History of the British Nation' by AD Innes, 1912
www.battle1066.com
www.princeton.edu
John Hudson, University of St Andrews
www.regia.org
www.britainexpress.com
www.historyonthenet.com
www.eyewitnesstohistory.com