The Normans and the Norman Conquest

The `English' who faced the forces of William duke of Normandy on 14 October 1066 were by no means a pure-bred and unified island race, nor was the flower of England's manhood laid low by an army of self-seeking Norman opportunists. R. Allen Brown traces the forces and influences that shaped both England and Normandy in the decades before 1066, and, in what has been a controversial subject, takes the firm view that William had a legitimate claim to the English succession. His analysis, initially unfashionable and unpopular, has had a profound influence on the popular view of the Norman Conquest. In the aftermath to the Battle of Hastings and all that followed, the Normans wrestedthe Anglo-Saxon realm from its cultural links with Scandinavia and Germany and brought England into the sphere of influence of northern France. A new ruling aristocracy, a new system of social and military organisation, and a cultural revolution in art and architecture resulted. The new order, allied with the most important elements of the Anglo-Saxon inheritance, the monarchy and the Church absorbed, strengthened and reformed by the Normans produced adegree of political unity and social dynamism previously unknown, bringing a re-invigorated England fully into the mainstream of the dynamic expansion of western Latin Christendom.R. ALLEN BROWN was Professor of History at King'sCollege, London. The annual conference on Anglo-Norman studies held at Battle, near Hastings, which he inaugurated, continues as a witness to the fresh impetus of enquiry which he brought to all aspects of Anglo-Norman life and culture.