Hello, welcome to history here at Oak National Academy.

My name is Mr. Newton, and I'll be your teacher today guiding you through the entire lesson.

Right, let's get started.

In these lessons, we'll focus on a specific historical environment, Durham Cathedral.

What can Durham Cathedral tell us about the wider context of this period? What can it tell us about the background story, the people or events at the time? What is the significance of the church and cathedrals in Norman England? Does Durham Cathedral tell us to what extent the Normans reformed English church? Is Durham Cathedral an example of how William used the church to gain political control of England? Does the cathedral reflect Norman culture and values? This is how we use the site of Durham Cathedral to address broader questions about Norman England.

In this lesson, we'll focus on Durham and the North in the years after the Norman Invasion.

And by the end of this lesson, you'll be able to explain how William I used the church to help control the North.

Before we begin, we need to understand the term prince-bishop.

The prince-bishop was a role created to give a bishop greater independence and powers to control the North.

So today's lessons split up into two parts.

We'll first look at the last Anglo-Saxon bishop of Durham, before looking at the Normans taking control of Northumbria.

All right, let's begin the lesson though with the last Anglo-Saxon bishop of Durham.

After William's victory at the Battle of Hastings, it seemed that William was at first willing to give land to whoever he believed would help him control the region, whether they were Anglo-Saxon, or Norman, as long as they swore loyalty to their new king.

However, the Anglo-Saxon loyalty was questioned.

And in 1068, there was a rebellion in the North, and this rebellion was dangerous for William because it also had the backing of King Malcolm of Scotland.

William marched North, harrying and building castles as he went.

By the time William reached the North, however, the rebels had surrendered.

If you have a look at the map on the left, it shows William's march North, and as he marched North, he ordered the construction of castles.

He began building castles in Warwick, Nottingham, and then York.

Castles were almost unknown in England, and gave William a huge military advantage.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Which of the following tactics did William use to put down the rebellion in 1068? Select two correct answers.

A, building alliances with Viking forces, B, building castles in rebellious areas, C, establishing new trade routes, D, harrying the population.

Pause the video, select your two correct answers, and then come right back.

Okay, welcome back, and well done if you knew the correct answers were, B, building castles in rebellious areas, and D, harrying the population.

Okay, let's continue.

So Aethelwine, the Bishop of Durham, briefly supported the rebellion, but then he quickly begged to be pardoned and swore loyalty.

William actually kept him on as bishop, and he proved useful as an ambassador to the troublesome Scottish King.

Aethelwine and the Scottish King were on good terms. So this enabled William to use Aethelwine as an ambassador.

Seeing that there were dangers to leaving Anglo-Saxon leaders in place in the North, William appointed an outsider, a Flemish-Norman ally, Robert Cumin, as Earl of Northumbria to secure Norman control over the North.

Cumin, with the aim of asserting his dominance, carried out more violence and plunder, against the local population.

This provoked an uprising by the Anglo-Saxons in Northumbria.

Have a look at the map on the left.

And we can see Cumin and his Norman soldiers in place to secure the North, asserting his dominance and inflicting violence and plunder in the area.

Aethelwine warned Cumin not to advance on Durham as it would be dangero us, but Cumin ignored the warning and marched into Durham, and stayed the night at the bishop's home.

On the 31st of January, 1069, Cumin soldiers were killed by rebels, with Cumin burned to death in the bishop's house.

From here, the rebellion grew attracting the support of the Danes who arrived and joined the attack on Norman troops at York.

William's response was typically swift and brutal.

A large Norman army descended upon York.

However, the rebels quickly scattered.

The story goes that when William's army approached Durham, a dense fog descended upon them, and a voice was heard to say that Durham was protected by a mighty saint, and that any harm done to its citizens, would face severe punishments.

A fearful Norman army marched back home.

It seemed that the Normans were becoming wary of Northern England.

By now, uprisings were occurring in other parts of England with Anglo-Saxon and Welsh rebels, attacking across the country.

William must have felt surrounded by resistance on all sides.

As soon as he dealt with one rebellion in the North, a new uprising sprouted in the South.

William had a two-sided solution.

Firstly, he paid the Danes in the North a large sum of money to leave England.

Secondly, to ensure no further rebellions reemerged, he enacted the Harrying of the North.

If you have a look at the map on the left, it shows the Danes receiving their money, getting back on their boats and exiting England.

And then we see the most notorious act of William's reign, the Harrying of the North.

This large scale harrying took place in the region between Durham and York, and aimed to systematically destroy food supplies in Yorkshire to ensure no further rebellions reoccurred.

Thousands died in the famine that followed.

Bishop Aethelwine may have once again been implicated in the Northern rebellion.

He escaped the Harrying of the North by fleeing to Lindisfarne, carrying the relics of St.

Cuthbert with him.

Eventually, Aethelwine was imprisoned and died in 1071.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Which two-part solution did William enact, after the rebellions of 1069? Select two correct answers.

A, he agreed to make Edgar the Aethling his heir.

B, carried out to Harrying of the North.

C, negotiated a peace treaty with Malcolm III.

D, paid the Danes money to leave England.

Pause the video, select your two correct answers, and then come right back.

Okay, welcome back, and well done if you knew the correct answers were, B, carried out the Harrying of the North, and D, paid the Danes money to leave England.

Okay, great, let's move on to task A.

What I want you to do here is, starting with the earliest, sort these events into time order done.

And you can see I've given you a list of four events on the left-hand side, and I want you to put them into the correct order in the boxes on the right.

Pause the video, have a go at the task, and then come right back.

Okay, welcome back.

Let's check those answers.

So the first event was that William appointed Robert Cumin as the Earl of Northumbria, and Cumin decided to assert his dominance, and carried out violence on the region, leading to our next event where Robert Cumin and his men were killed in Durham, with Cumin being burned to death in the Bishop of Durham's house.

So then William responds by enacting the Harrying of the North.

Aethelwine tries to flee the harrying, but is eventually imprisoned and died.

Okay, great.

So we've now got some context of the early years of William attempting to take control of the North unsuccessfully, as he faced quite a lot of resistance and opted to do the Harrying of the North.

So let's move on to the second part of the lesson where we can see how William tries to tighten his control of the North, taking control of Northumbria.

From 1068 to 1071, William had faced Anglo-Saxon rebellions with Scotland supporting and hosting the rebels, and had carried the harrying of Northern England as far North as Durham.

In 1071, William appointed a new Bishop of Durham, a Frenchman called William Walcher.

This was actually part of a wider purge of the senior Anglo-Saxon clergy.

Officially, a king required the agreement of the pope to depose a bishop, something that William's successors struggled to achieve.

But William and his Archbishop of Canterbury, Lanfranc, had the support of the papacy in carrying out the sweeping reforms of the English church.

So therefore, William was able to replace Anglo-Saxon bishops with allies who would do all they could to reinforce Norman control over their diocese.

That's the region of bishop controlled.

The papacy knew that these would be bishops who would carry out the reforms that Lanfranc was championing for them in England.

By the end of the purge, only three out of 15 bishops were English.

In 1072, William launched an invasion of Scotland, and Malcolm quickly swore homage to him.

As William returned South through Durham, he ordered the construction of a castle next to the cathedral.

The image on the left is a map of Durham from 1610.

We can see the River Wear meandering across the map in a kind of brownish colour.

And the cathedral and the castle are shown within the loop of the river right next to each other.

And we can imagine that this would've been a prime defensive location, the river providing protection with both these structures looming on high ground.

The castle was to provide William's new bishop, Walcher, with a home of greater protection.

In practise, Walcher acted as Earl of Northumbria after 1075.

Earl Waltheof of Northumbria had been involved in the 1075 Revolt of the Earls.

The installation of Walcher as Bishop, accompanied by the construction of a castle, demonstrates the close connection between the church and the military in Norman control, over the English population.

In May 1080, a dispute with Northumbrian nobles, led to the murder of Bishop Walcher in Gateshead.

The dispute then escalated into a rebellion in which the nobles attempted and failed to capture Durham Castle.

William responded by sending Odo of Bayeux with an army.

Odo hurried Northumbria and looted the cathedral.

And later, a new castle, and I'm emphasising new castle here, was built near the site of Bishop Walcher's murder on the River Tyne.

And the reason I'm emphasising the new castle built on the River Tyne is because this is where the modern city of Newcastle upon Tyne, gets its name from.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Why did William I build a castle in Durham? Select two correct answers.

A, to give Bishop Walcher a comfortable home.

B, to help subdue the population.

C, to provide protection for the Bishop of Durham.

Pause the video, have a think, and come right back.

Okay, welcome back, and well done if you knew the correct answers were, B, to help subdue the population, and C, to provide protection for the Bishop of Durham.

Okay, let's continue.

So William decided to step up Norman control in the North further still.

The Northumbrian government was consolidated with the arrival of the new Bishop of Durham, William of Saint Calais, who you can see on the manuscript on the left.

William made him a prince-bishop.

This gave Bishop William increased powers to control Durham and Northumbria.

This was similar to when William created the Marcher Earldoms to defend the English-Welsh borderlands, with the Marcher Earldoms being given, almost king-like powers over their areas of control.

As prince-bishop, William of Saint Calais, could impose taxes to fund the raising of an army to help him control the rebellious North and secure the Scottish border.

As part of this, William accepted the area from the doomsday survey, which suggests taxes were not paid to the king for this period.

With this increased power came vast wealth, and this was to attract ambitious bishops to a difficult and dangerous job as Cumin and Walcher had discovered.

The prince-bishop role also revealed that Norman leadership in the North needed to have a connection to the church to use the powers of St.

Cuthbert to be able to govern.

In 1093, William St.

Calais ordered the construction of a new cathedral on the site of the Anglo-Saxon building, which housed St.

Cuthbert's relics.

The new Durham Cathedral was built on an incredibly grand scale, and the interior decoration was an Anglo-Norman spectacular.

The imposing Romanesque architecture suited the military and administrative control the church aimed to maintain over the region.

Have a look at a fantastic photo on the left.

It shows Durham Cathedral and castle, overlooking the River Wear.

And I think this really shows how the cathedral dominated the physical landscape of Durham and served as a permanent reminder of a foreign occupier in Durham.

Another great photo here shows that the new Durham Cathedral was built on a grand scale.

It really is a stunning piece of architecture, and still inspires all to this day.

We should also remember, however, that the cathedral was built using the forced labour of Anglo-Saxon peasants.

So many Anglo-Saxons might have felt intimidation as well as all.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Why did William the first create the role of prince-bishop in Durham? Select two correct answers.

A, to allow bishops to get rich.

B, to increase the powers of the Bishop of Durham.

C, to help control the rebellious North and secure the Scottish border.

Pause the video, select your two correct answers, and then come right back.

Okay, welcome back, and well done If you knew the correct answers were, B, to increase the powers of the Bishop of Durham, and C, to help control the rebellious North and secure the Scottish border.

Okay, great, let's move on to task B, and I've got a statement here for you.

Castles were the main way that William used to control the North.

So I want you to use the example of Durham Cathedral and your contextual knowledge to disagree with this statement.

Of course, we can use Durham Cathedral and your contextual knowledge as evidence to agree with the statement.

But for this task, I want you to focus your efforts on finding evidence which disagrees with the statements.

Pause the video, have a go at the task, and then come right back.

Okay, welcome back, and well done for having a go at that task.

So there's many ways you could have answered that question, but compare your answer with what I have here.

"Although castles were important in William's control of the North, the church was just as significant.

William ordered a castle to be built in Durham to provide his new bishop, William Walcher, with maximum Norman security.

Walcher acted as Earl of Northumbria after 1075.

This shows the close connection between the church and the military control of the North.

William I first then created the role of prince-bishop, giving the Bishop Durham extra secular powers to control the rebellious North and secure the border of Scotland.

These included the power to tax the population to raise an army to control the area as required.

The prince-bishop role combined religious and military power, as well as enormous wealth.

From 1093, William St.

Calais's impressive new cathedral, right next to the castle demonstrated the power of the church's prince-bishop in the North." Okay, great, let's summarise today's lesson, Durham Cathedral and the Norman government.

William I dealt with the rebellious North by enacting the Harrying of the North and removing senior clergy such as Aethelwine, the Bishop of Durham.

William used the church to control the North.

He ordered a castle to be built in Durham to provide his new bishop, William Walcher, with a home of greater protection.

William I created the role of prince-bishop, giving bishops extra secular powers to control the rebellious North and secure the border with Scotland.

William of St.

Calais built a grand cathedral in Durham, symbolising the military and administrative control the church had over the region.

Well done on a brilliant lesson, and thank you for joining me as we delved into the broader context of Durham Cathedral.

See you in the next lesson.