Who Was The Real King Harold? | King Harold: Fact Or Fiction | Timeline

I am standing at the exact site of one of the most famous deaths of all time, a death that marked the end of the best-known battle in British history. Towards dusk on October 14, 1066, an unknown archer shot an arrow into the air. From somewhere beyond those ruins, he chanced to fall directly into the eye of King Harald of England. This simple twist of fate changed our country as a result, a horde of Normans led by William the Conqueror came in to wipe out the entire way of life of course. William's propaganda machine ensures that all we ever hear about Harold is that he was the loser at the Battle of Hastings, but there is a hidden story, a tragic story of love intrigue, violence and cold hard cash.

This is the true story of the last great Anglo war. -Saxon Tracing the

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s of Harold's hidden history means embar

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on a quest across Britain and to the continent. Only by ma

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this journey will we be able to see how the events of his life conspired to put him in a countdown to the last fatal moment. It began here. This is Basel on the outer coast. Today it is a small, picturesque pleasure port. A thousand years ago it was a central port for the Saxon territory of Wessex sometime around 10:20 Harold was born and raised here the Saxon Church where he would have gone to mass there are still stalls we don't know exactly when he was born the chroniclers thought that all you needed to know about young Harold was his middle name godwinson his father was the most powerful lord in the land earl godwin of wessex godwin had risen from the lower ranks of the Saxon aristocracy and was the tenacious political fighter he needed to be.

They were turbulent times. A stone church like this was also used as a military building for centuries. The tower had been used to watch out for Viking raiders. up the Solent, but when Harold was a boy, the Danish Empire under King Cnut had seized English royalty. Edward, the Anglo-Saxon heir, had fled to Normandy. Earl Godwin had survived the seizure of power by marrying a Danish woman and giving his three older children Scandinavian names. Swain Harold fantastic, yes our English hero was actually half Viking in the ten forty two. Harold appears in The Chronicles in his own right when he was in his early 20s.

He first tasted power when the Danish Empire ended and the old English royal line was restored. who is known as the Confessor returned triumphant from exile in Normandy, but with Edward came change for the first time. He created a permanent base for the English monarchy here on the banks of the Thames, outside London, in Westminster, but Edward was a new guy. I am a stranger in his own country and may come from a long line stretching back to Alfred the Great, but he had grown up in Normandy and needed the support of the Saxon earls and, in particular, Godwin, who led Wessex.

Edward bought Godwin. He supported him by marrying the sister of Harold's daughter and then cemented the alliance by giving Harold's elder brother, Swain, an earldom in the Midlands and creating Harold Earl of East Anglia. This made the Godwins the most powerful family on earth. Harold was the image of a blonde Saxon warrior. Bearded and now with wealth, influence and his own retinue of personal troops, Harold and his family were loyal to the king, serving for long periods with the Navy protecting the English coast from raids, Edward felt no obligation in return, like any new boss, Edward wanted his. people so he began to bring in Norman nobles and give them areas of land.

He also began replacing English clerics with Norman ecclesiastics. They were people who wanted religious reform but also had a political agenda and the most dangerous of them was the new archbishop of Canterbury, Robert of zoomy heirs, one chronicler said that Robert Azumi Asia was a holdover and with the Confessor he could point out a raven and say the raven is white and Edward would agree with him, this guy was a schemer and a politician and I think he was the main driver in trying to bad mouth Godwin, Harold and all the rest of the family in the eyes of Edward the Confessor because there was a lot of profit in it, if you could get rid of this most powerful family, you could get out of the way. open to the Norman succession, but this is not just a political story, it is a personal story.

Two Korea Howards may have been driven because his father was very powerful, but his downfall was also due to his family. Her entire story is a dynastic tragedy and the course of the nation's history changed because her family fell apart. The first source of tension was that Harold's sister Edward's marriage had failed to produce an heir and in those days the woman was always to blame. Edward could not annul the marriage because Earl Godwin and his children were still very powerful, but the lack of air created external pressure on the family. They might have survived if their internal stability had not been threatened by the behavior of Harold's maverick older brother.

Swayne was your typical rich kid gone. He was wrong, he was a bully and a Hellraiser. He was exiled in 1046 to Denmark for keeping a nun prisoner as a sex slave when all his lands were divided between Harold and his cousin Bjorn, but in exile he behaved very badly, but eventually Denmark expelled him. again, so three years later he appeared in England begging for forgiveness from Edward, Harold was understandably outraged all this time that he had been doing his duty serving his king as a naval commander, why should he now have to return his lands to a aristocratic spendthrift supported? for the first time Harald confronted his father the family unit was beginning to fall apart on one side there were Godwin and Swain on the other Harald his brothers and his cousin the Godwins were no longer invincible Edward passed sentence Swain must leave the possum within three days or pay with his life the rest of the Godwin was 70 miles along the coast the matter seemed settled by the King's decision as they waited in the shadow of the ancient Roman fort here at Pevensey Swain appeared on horseback for a last Appealing to his family to help reinstate him one way or another, he managed to persuade his cousin to speak to the king on his behalf.

Bjorlin set out with Swain and just three assistants. Swayne was a psychopath with a grudge that we don't know what happened. bad, but deep down Swain had more than tied him up and put him on his boat, killed his cousin in cold blood and threw him in an unmarked grave. I am too far away, the sailors of the royal fleets declared to us that he and I find it the Viking word for someone who completely unacceptable, even Swain's own ships abandoned him, he was forced to flee to England, enemies in Flanders, to despite this universal condemnation.

Earl Godwin pressed for Swain's return in 1051. He used what remnants of influence he had left to pressure Edward to allow the assassin to return to his country. The return caused tension and resentment among other nobles who had to return lands. Goodwin had other families as rivals within England and Edwards and he personally did not like each other, that seems very clear, so there are many more rivalries of personal animosity within the kingdom and As a result of all that, the Godwins quarreled and became isolated. , Edward, encouraged by Jimmy Ashe's Robert, had the opportunity to reorganize England's power base in his favor, he went on a killing spree, Edward set a trap for Godwin and brought in his brother-in-law Eustace.

Eustace and his heavily armed men orchestrated a pub fight that turned into a full-scale riot with deaths on both sides. Dover was Godwin's territory. Edward gave him the order to set an example. of the city, Godwin was faced with the choice of burning, looting and pillaging his own homeland or disobeying the king, he chose rebellion and gathered his sons to try to persuade the king to change his mind at an emergency summit, But Edward had the support of the other barons and when he refused to give Godwin safe conduct for the meeting, they were forced to flee the country, the Godwin family embarking on exile.

Harold's career seemed over, but Edward had underestimated the effects of this change in the balance of English power. The rest of the earl

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ized that if the king could ask the most powerful family in the land that no one would be safe, messages of support began to cross the channel and ten months later the Godwins returned to London. Harold and his father moored here in Southwark, in the south. bank of the Thames, Edward confronted them on the other side of the river, in those days there were no bridges, so the Bishop of Winchester traveled back and forth negotiating a humiliating descent for the king.

Godwin's lands were restored and many of Edward's Norman cronies were forced. Including the scheming archbishop, it was a victory. Robert's humiliation knew that the game was up and he immediately fled London before they returned to court and killed several people in the streets before leaving. This is the type of judgment we have. After six months, first Swain and then Earl Godwin died, leaving Harold as the new Earl of Wessex. Harold and Edward could now start with a clean slate, but the crisis of 1051 would continue to hold his hand as he fled England. Robert of the Buzzing Heirs.

He had taken Harold's younger brother and a nephew hostage and handed them over to his new master William, Duke of Normandy. The two young relatives languishing in a foreign dungeon were a ticking time bomb that would eventually lead to Harold's downfall. Harold Godwinson had survived exile and crisis to become the most powerful earl in the kingdom as Edward, the confessor's right-hand man, he commanded the army, he was about to face his first challenge, the Welsh were threatening to invade England, the country Hereford's border had always been vulnerable to attack when Edward had brought The Norman nobles into England his motives were partly strategic;

On the continent, the Normans had devised the technology of the modern Bailey Castle and easily defended a fortress from which a lord and his men could rush out to do battle or retreat from an invading force without giving ground. northern cast Alan brought his technology with them this is one in the US Harold in Herefordshire actually became one of Harold's personal possessions. Most people around here don't even know it was a castle. It is known locally as the mound, but is actually a classic modern Bailey design. They would have flattened the entire area around here. and they got all the land put there where the trees are and then they would have protected this inner mound with a wooden palisade and they would also have protected the outer ring around here with another palisade, so it would have been practically impregnable and if you look over there You can see what overlap he was in to prevent the world from raining on the gong, but King Edward had entrusted this key territory to a relative known as Shy Ralph, the Welsh swept the border pushing Ralph's forces aside. when running, he said. and burning the Cathedral, there was only one man to deal with the crisis.

The campaign of Harold the Welshman demonstrated Harold's worth as a politician and as a soldier. If you go there today, you can still see Harold's legacy in the design of the old town. negotiated a deal giving land in exchange for a withdrawal of his foot, then talked about strengthening the city, building moats and city walls, restored wounds surrounding Tesco's barbed wire marked the course of defenses of Harold, but Griffith, the Welsh leader, continued to cause trouble on the border, so on Christmas 1062, Harrell decided to settle the Welsh problem once and for all. Wales was Afghanistan to England, it was a

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ly dangerous place to go into because the English had heavier armed troops where you could get stuck there and get attacked in ambushes.

Harold came up with a radical solution: the Saxon equivalent of the commando unit. He decided that the way to separate Riffin was to conduct a lightning attack right in the heart of his territory. He first purchased to march at lightning speed past Hereford and westwards against Griffith's own Castle. I think one of the significant things about Harold in Wales is that he absolutely says that here was someone who was an innovator of military tactics, someone who knew that things had to change and that you would adapt to the circumstances when Griffith escaped. Harold launched a second In this phase, his brother Tostig continued to attack by land while Harold sailed around the coast to destroy the forts that the Welsh thought were protected by the mountains.

In the end, the demoralized Welsh signaled their submission by sending Harold, the head of their leader. Harold was proving invaluable to King Edward and reaped the rewards of his position. His role as Earl of Wessex gave him estates throughout southern England. His success in Wales also gave him land on the border. He was theequivalent to a billionaire and lived his life. He loved Hawking's sport. which had the same prestige as the current polo, he was famous for taking the Hulk everywhere and had the best collection of books in Europe on the subject. A wealthy man in the 11th century was expected to have a suitable wife and Harold was no exception.

Edith Swanneck was noted for her beauty. What was unusual for the time is that they also had a genuine relationship that lasted until Harold's death. From what we can see, Harold had one of the royal relationships in medieval history. They were probably others we don't know. I don't know, but we certainly know that Harold and Edith Gooseneck were very happy if you want a certain love story in other matters Harold followed the customs of the time, rich men had the duty to finance religious institutions by founding a church or a church. He improved his earthly reputation and bought credit in the afterlife.

King Edward, for example, was spending a fortune on an abbey near his new base at Westminster. Harold chose projects to rival the kings. He believed that he had been cured of some type of paralysis when he prayed. at the shrine of the holy cross a war venture in Essex it was here that he built WalthamThe abbey which gave its name to the town and the current church is half the size of the abbey in its heyday. Harold splashed money on the project, bringing precious relics from trips to the continent and providing expensive accessories such as a gold and marble altar, evangelical books with silver covers, and a famous vestment embroidered with eight kilos of gold thread, but just when it seemed that Harold had it all made the worst mistake of his life.

The Chronicles say that in 1064 heralds crossed the channel from below on a diplomatic mission to Normandy. The events of the visit have been obscured by stories written after the Norman conquest to justify the invasion of William the Conqueror. They say Harold was sent by King Edward to reaffirm the promise that William could be king of England after Edward's death, but this is Norman's twist - finding Harold's true reasons for saving the world involves a bit of work. detective the official Norman version is this 1051 King Edward promises William of Normandy the throne of England and in 1064 King Edward sends Harold to confirm that promise, but what this official version conveniently forgets is that between these two days in 1056 King Edward also sent Harold to Hungary on a long and expensive mission to bring back a distant relative who was hiding his intention to succeed him and this young man was still sitting at the English court.

The official version just doesn't fit, it seems much more likely that Harold went to France on his own on a brave rescue mission. The hostages were the reason Knotty actually made his trip to Normandy. There was no reason to deselect a foreign outsider as king, one who probably would not have been accepted by the English nobility when Robert, he of the buzzing heirs, had fled back to the continent with Harold's relatives; he had encouraged William of Normandy to believe that Edward had promised him the English throne 12 years earlier. Later, Harold undertakes what he believes is a simple mission to negotiate the release of his brother and his nephew, but he does not know about the promise to William.

He was not aware of the

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that William had ambitions to take control of England like them. They are waiting to take advantage of any opportunity to do so, how come we basically fell into a trap to find out what happened next? You have to come here to Beier, in Normandy, to see a document produced a decade after Harold's visit. This is where Harold's story begins to be told. Told not only in the chronicles written by monks but in the first comic strip in history, the Bayeux Tapestry, it is an extraordinary work, if you have only seen reproductions you have no idea of ​​its scale or the detail of the embroidery, it is 70 meters long. long was originally commissioned to be hung in the nave of the Cathedral here in Peyer and who made it by English seamstresses in Canterbury the tapestry shows that things went wrong for Harold from the beginning he was blown off course he made a crash landing on the coast and was taken captive by the local baron the man who came to the rescue was William Duke of Normandy Harold was safe but his bargaining power was destroyed he now owed his life to the man who was to be his undoing in Hastings Harold was out of La frying pan and the burning hell in the year 1064 Harold Godwinson set out on a mission to rescue his brother and cousin who had been handed over as American hostages to William Duke of Normandy, but his stay soon turned into something much more complicated and sinister, half guests of honor, half prisoner, he was now a member of Williams' entourage and was reluctantly dragged around Dookle's strongholds like this one on Col between William and Harold.

Now they began a subtle political game of cat and mouse. You didn't keep the most powerful English earl a virtual prisoner. Unless you wanted something, Harold knew he was part of a larger political agenda masterminded by a man who had built a reputation as one of Europe's tough men. His father died when William was a child on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and she trained him. years fleeing through Normandy with various tutors and uncles to stay alive, so when he arrived in 1820 and actually had the rule of Normandy, he would have been quite a tough person, he had been trained in a way that brooked no opposition William had Established a fearsome military empire The Normans were not French at all but descended from the Vikings When Harold joined William on a campaign against the Duke of Brittany, it gave him the opportunity to evaluate the tactics of the north and prove his own worth as a warrior usually. very impressed by how Williams' force was crossing the lulling river that empties into the CML Sound Michelle on the borders of Normandy and Brittany and suddenly Herald noticed that some of the Knights were sinking in the quicksand and quick as lightning the he wrapped his arms around her.

The chest of one of them brought him to safety, then he went back in and rescued a second. Harold's reward was to be knighted by William. A double-edged sword involving pledging obedience to his new Lord Williams agenda was beginning to unfold and then came the blood from William's body. He brought Harold to the Cathedral here as a buyer, demanding that Harald take a solemn oath on holy relics to support Williams' claim to the throne of England. Harold was under duress and swore with the 11th century equivalent of crossed fingers breaking an oath was monumental and as far as William was concerned, Harold was bound by him.

I will take a dark oath, but I realized that this was the only way he would escape, but knowing that they had no intention of supporting him later, Harold returned home knowing that his perjury would come. He came back to chase him, but as he returned he was preparing another nail for his coffin, again there was trouble within his own family. Harold's next brother in Kostik was the Earl of Northumbria and ruled all of northern England. The region was wild and uncivilized, but it had advantages: Northumbria paid half the taxes of any other place in England and then discarded it.

Aghhhh made the fatal mistake of trying to fix this with a tax increase. Harold and his brother would have met Lady Godiva, but unlike us, who only remember that she toured Coventry naked, they would have remembered her famous trip as a tax protest to try to persuade her husband, the Earl of Mercia, to reduce the burden on his oppressed people. Kostik would have done well to follow Godiva's example, but he didn't. In one fell swoop he doubled Northumbria's taxes, the king agreed, but the people of Northumbria did not. On 3 October 1065, local nobles stormed York, looting its armory and killing its men.

They marched south demanding a change of governor. Ironically, they wanted to. Lady Godiva's grandson, on the other hand, the rebels had reached Oxford when Edward put his main man on the case to negotiate what Harold Hurd presented him with a dilemma: the election was a civil war that would fatally weaken England, leaving it open to attack William of Normandy or abandon his own brother Harold chose country over family and recommended that Edward give the Northumbrians the leader they wanted to throw away. Teague was outraged and went into exile, vowing revenge on a brother who became his archenemy.

King Edward never saw the consecration of Westminster. Abbey, the nobility who had gathered for the grand opening were going to witness a much greater drama. Edward had fallen ill on Christmas Day, deteriorated rapidly and died on January 4 on his deathbed, altering the succession in favor of Harold, the existing heir. He was easy meat too young for William of Normandy. The English nobles were present to approve the dying king's wish. On January 6, the new abbey witnessed two events: Edward's funeral and the enthronement of King Harold of England. Harold Godwinson was the only man you could elect king if you were of right mind in England in 1066, long before Edward died, they expected an invasion of Norway, a possible invasion of Denmark and certainly an invasion of Normandy as soon as the old king died when the news of Edward's death broke. death came to the continent Harold's rise was a consummate party William did not take it well he was hunting in the woods when a messenger brought him the news that Harold his sworn man had seized the crown they say he went straight home without a word and he sat for hours with his head buried in his cloak there, I stood with my forehead against a pillar trying to cool the anger inside and then when he recovered enough to speak, this is the mayor of the sewers at the mouth of the River Dave in Normandy. and here, 950 years ago, William began to build an immense fleet, 700 warships and transports to invade England, it was a war on an industrial scale, they would have cut down around 60,000 trees and employed around 8,000 men, but more than that, the support structure to raise the money and feed water to the workers would have involved everyone in Normandy when William awoke from his wrath, no one was left untouched.

The church added Eve has a list of all the nobles who sailed with William, but she initially had trouble recruiting many, she thought of a campaign. against the powerful English it was suicide what influenced them it was religion William managed to persuade the Pope that his invasion was a crusade against an English king who broke out and an archbishop who had not been properly appointed by the church the Pope gave his blessing and allowed William to use one of the perjured relics in battle the skeptics lined up Harold called up the English Reserve and stationed them along the south coast throughout the summer they waited while adverse winds prevented Williams' armada from finally setting sail Harold He disbanded the troops so they could go and continued with the harvest and as soon as he did so an invasion came, but not from the south.

Harold's brother Tosti was out for revenge. Kostik had already had a disastrous solo attempt, but now joined his meager force of 12 ships, the mighty fleet of the fire giant King Harald Hardrada had gained a reputation across Europe as a physically enormous, ruthless warrior brought With him seven thousand five hundred battle-hardened men sailed through the silt before taking York King Harald's response was swift and brave. He decided to make the same type of lightning attack that had worked against the Welsh. He headed north and organized troops to receiving it while being forced to march twenty-five miles a day was a tremendous logistical feat having to march One hundred and ninety miles along the Great North Road, which was little more than a go-kart track, on the 24th it reached the outskirts of Europe, the unsuspecting invaders were Waiting at the crossing of the River Derwent at Stamford Bridge, they were miles from their ships and because it was hot, many had abandoned their armor.

Harold marched on York, the townspeople were driven to the city gates and Harold's forces marched across Stamford Bridge, six miles further, when Harold arrived on the horizon the invaders saw the Saxon weapons shining like a broken ice field The Norwegians who were trapped in the jump quickly returned to the first side of the bridge for a chance to form a decent defensive formation. The story goes that the entire Saxon advance was stopped by a fearsome Viking who held the bridge and single-handedly killed forty-five men until a cunning man from English Spears waded into the river and pushed into the unprotected area below his level. mesh when the English crossed the bridge and the battle itself joined the ancient warrior tradition of protecting.

The walls would cut into each other until a gap was made, the front line would bend like this and then the next I can't, so you have a whole wall builtof shields interlocking the main weapon, but always the sword that can be used to Strike over the shield wall, whether cutting or pushing, we would also use the SWAT squad and that is where you would get the famous two-handed one. Hopefully, it punches a hole in the enemy shield wall and then they could deploy back inside their shield. The battle was fierce and bloody. and ultimately the survivors set sail in only 24 of their original 300 ships. 60 years later, the piles of bones from decomposing corpses remained a local landmark.

Harold had won an extraordinary victory against one of the most famous warriors of the age that the diplomat had ever allowed. The remnants of the defeated Norwegian army left in peace as long as they promised never to return, they kept their word and Harold Hard Radha's raid was the last major Viking assault on Britain; In other circumstances, he stood alongside Trafalgar in the Battle of Britain. but the celebrations were short-lived. Devastating news came from the south coast, there he was celebrating with his men after having fought off the most terrible threat to England and then the news comes that this guy from Normandy had taken his penalty, so it's like Who do you want to be?

As a millionaire you are almost there, win the next battle and not only do you have England safe but you are the greatest king who ever ruled, so Harold gathered his weary troops and headed south to meet his fate in Stamford Bridge. King Harald had achieved one of the greatest victories in British history, but three days later, William of Normandy landed in the sky, 400 kilometers to the south. Harold had another supply set up. William quickly decided that the Pevensey marshes were indefensible and he moved to the hill country near Hastings, news reached him the next day. of Harold's great victory, not wanting to make the same mistake as the tough Radha William, he decided to entrench himself near his ships and devastate the nearby countryside, the Bayeux tapestry offers the first portrait of the effects of war on the civilians of those in which a mother and her son flee as refugees. his home in flames Harold's determination and stamina were impressive, he left behind much of his tired northern force and set out with his leading professionals on the return journey to the south, it is likely that William knew that Harald Hardrada was leaving for the northern England and, although the accounts will tell us that the winds did not allow them to sail from Normandy when they wanted, in fact, they did not sail until September and it was a long time to wait for the winds, it is likely that William decided to wait knowing that there would be an attack from the towards the north and then he already knew that the troops would have been weakened.

Harald's meeting with any reinforcements he could muster at a local landmark known as the Hoary Apple Tree. The next day he would change his name forever. Harald only had to survive the battle to leave William without reinforcements or escape he took the perfect defensive position on this hill Diaby was later built specifically to mark the place Harold and he chose his ground well he and his men rose to about 200 meters In each direction this wall was built to echo that formation a shield wall for five or even six men. The king and his knights rode into battle, but when they got here they got off and took their place in the war along with everyone else.

I'll probably use whatever is most appropriate, most appropriate. technology for Hastings was defending Hill was closing the road to London it was essentially a defensive action at nine in the morning the battle began with a blast of trumpets the Normans climbed the hill in full armor they could hear the roar of the Saxons shouting and beating their shields with their weapons in their midst King Harald is the battle cry of the Holy Cross infantry then his cavalry broke against the shield wall like waves against a jetty did the Saxons not actually move? It was the Normans who broke first a sudden panic on the part of the men of Britain on Williams' left flank spread throughout the army word had spread that William had been killed the retreat began threatened to turn into a rout the first time he broke and followed the rules down the hill possibly they thought the Normans were defeated naively the Normans were defeated at that moment, maybe it was Harold's mistake that he didn't connect all those forces on that first hill, Tony Williams' horse who died, realizing the problem, raised his helmet so that his men could see that he was still alive, he gathered them together and read the route, they cut off the pursuing Saxons and formed a small defensive circle there, but they were slowly torn to pieces. because the horses were able to turn quickly and come back towards those men and eliminate them maybe William then saw the advantage of this because again and again William used it that afternoon and well into the night they would ride up to the shield wall and then they would fade and disappear.

They walked away and thought about a party and then quickly turned around and came back. towards the enemy little by little, in the 11th century, battles used to last two hours at most, but here they were still fighting after nine and a half hours and Hound was so close only another half hour and he would have won because if it were night there was fallen then only had the chance of receiving reinforcements the next day, but the tide was turning when the Saxons retreated, the Norman cavalry gained a position on the flat ground at the top of the hill, but the real key to the battle is given for all those little archers that start to appear in the lower margins of the tapestry at this point it was an arrow that really made the difference when Harald was seriously wounded in the eye the so-called Saxons missed the arrow it didn't kill him we know this is Harald with the arrow in the eye his name is printed above but other stories speak of cavalry arriving to finish him off it seems that this whole scene is a storyboard this is Harold but so is this and if you believe that the figure that falls with his the leg cut does not have an arrow look again the seams were removed sometime in the last 900 years you can see the holes where the arrow once was Harold's body was mutilated the chronicles say his head was cut off, the entire right leg and half of its left, everything of value was stripped from the corpses that were left naked to rot or, in the case of the rich, to be rescued for burial the next day, this entire area It was covered with severed and dismembered corpses, stripped of their armor, the bounty hunters were It was impossible to know which one was Harold's until Edith, searching swan-necked among the bodies, found him here.

According to the chroniclers, she identified him by certain marks on his body, presumably the intimate knowledge of the love of a lifetime. Harold's mother offered her weight in gold for the body. a final test of Godwin's wealth, but William refused. The last thing he wanted was for a Saxon cult to be built around Harold's shrines. The oldest accounts say that William buried Harold by the sea, but later tradition says that his body was taken to his great foundation at Waltham Abbey and that it became the accepted burial place of the last Anglo-Saxon king, but has now New evidence has emerged that questions that tradition.

A historian from Bazán's own house has established a vital connection between 11th century records and a local archaeological discovery in the town. In his heart he always knew that King Canute's daughter was buried here in his parish church, but then, in the fifties, when they put in some heating, they discovered another important one: next door, here, they opened the tomb naturally and thought that there was frankly, there was no head and the right leg was completely missing and 2/3 of the left leg was not there either, but in the tapestry there is only one leg cut off, you are talking about the head being missing and the other leg there was two stories that came out, one from the bishop at a meal where he describes the wounds suffered by the body that came out at around 10:00 67 about only a year after the conquest and there he gives exactly that description, the head was, a severed leg was thrown away and the tapestry completes the picture with the other leg cut off, therefore just a mutilated body and then every time Pottier also really confirms that he said he was very rusty, sure and what do we have here, he became the boss of the season .

Williams after the conquest here was able to ensure that the tomb did not act as a focus of political discontent as he talked about the business of eliminating the Saxon aristocracy, introducing a new culture and a new language and blackening the name of the defeated Saxon king. I think this country should erect a splendid monument to Harold. This was a man who defended England against all odds and who fell heroically surrounded by the cars of his household fighting to the last man around his king. He didn't give up and we. We should celebrate him and we should celebrate his Englishness and the achievement of 500 years of native English civilization that meant so much in medieval Europe that it had such a civilizing effect and all of that is what Harald represents, he represents the value of the Old English really.

I have been all over the country searching for the true heart and what I found was not a loser, but a charismatic leader who but for a twist of fate could well have ended up as a national hero in the same mold as Elizabeth the First or Nelson or Churchill but the arrow hit the target and the battle was lost and in a way England also lost something because although there is no doubt that the subsequent mixture of Norman and Saxon culture has given us great wealth and vitality, it also gave us a new era, fanned the rat elite who spoke a different language and were completely isolated from the people who ruled years later, that social chasm still takes a long time to bridge.