Historical Britain Blog

Earl Godwine may have had a humiliating experience finding himself exiled in the fall of 1051, but by many accounts his absence made the Saxons appreciate him like never before.  King Edward the Confessor, ever more at home in Normandy than England, surrounded himself with Thegns and Prelates from h

By the middle of the eleventh century, Earl Godwine might have seemed pretty much at the height of his power.  His daughter was married to King Edward, Godwine himself held the most important Earldom in England and his second son Harold was Earl of East Anglia.  He had more strapping sons awaiting t

Swegn was the eldest son of a prolific family.  His father, Godwine of Wessex, worked his way up from relative obscurity to the most powerful Earl in the country.  Swegn’s future could have been assured if only he had behaved himself and not acted like a rogue and an outlaw.  He was the only one [..

William the Conqueror was not a person to mellow-out in his final days.  His temper was still quick to anger and he did not hesitate to lay waste to his enemies’ lands at the slightest provocation.  He had become excessively fat, and it was said that his antagonist King Philip of France made an insu

Earl Waltheof’s foray into the history books was unlucky and unhappy. From beginning to end, it seems like he was in the wrong place at the wrong time and never managed to live up to his destiny. Waltheof was the younger son of Earl Siward, who died when Waltheof was only 10 years old.  His older [.

Harold’s ill-fated trip to Normandy has sparked much debate among historians. Why did he go? How much damage did it cause? One thing is certain: Harold and William were far from strangers by the time they met on the battlefield of Hastings. It is thought by some that Harold was on a fishing trip in

By many accounts, the blame for Harold Godwineson’s failure to stop William’s invasion can be laid on his brother Tostig’s shoulders.  What might have started as sibling rivalry seems to have evolved into jealousy, then resentment turned into recrimination, and finally a desire for revenge seems to

It is of legends that I write in this story, rather than facts; for after almost a thousand years of history, what can we call truth out of the tiny scraps that survived?  When men claimed descent from a bear, and people believed that dragons  roamed the earth, who is to say what is fact [...]

The battle of Stamfordbridge is well-known as the turning point in King Harold’s fortunes.  But how did Harold know to rush north in the first place?  It was more than just a messenger that got his attention: a full-fledged battle was fought with great loss of life.  And Harald Hardraada was the win

If you read my post Heirs to the Throne After Canute you would see mention of Edward and Alfred, the sons of Aethelred II and Emma.  When Emma married Canute, they agreed that the sons from their own marriage would take precedence over any previous children.  This meant that the two sons from her fi