Lesson video

Hello, welcome to History here at Oak National Academy.

My name is Mr. Newton, and I'll be your teacher for today, guiding you through the entirety of the lesson, breaking down any tricky concepts along the way.

All right, let's get started.

Over the next few lessons, we will be thinking about our big inquiry question, how did Anglo-Saxons resist Norman rule? This is the question we will use to investigate the events that followed William's victory at Hastings.

William had won the battle, but he and his surviving army now attempted to control a 2 million strong Anglo-Saxon population, many of which were not willing to go gently into the night.

They were ready to resist Norman occupation.

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to explain why the earls submitted to William at Berkhamsted.

Before we begin, there are a few key words we need to understand.

Plundered is when goods have been stolen violently from a place, especially during a war.

Harrying is persistently harassing or carrying out attacks on an enemy or an enemy's territory.

Submission is the act of allowing someone or something to have power over you.

And in this lesson, supplies are food or other things necessary for an army to operate.

And finally, foraging is going from place to place searching for things that you can eat or use.

Today's lesson is split into two parts.

In the first part, we'll look at the events that immediately followed the Battle of Hastings before going on to study William's brutal march through the south-east of England.

Okay, let's begin with what's happened after the Battle of Hastings.

The Battle of Hastings had resulted in huge casualties on both sides.

Some of the surviving and wounded Anglo-Saxons managed to flee, chased by Norman soldiers.

Dead bodies scattered across the battlefield were stripped of their valuables by the Normans.

King Harold's body could only be identified by his wife, Edith Swan Neck.

Have a look at the image on the left.

It's a detail from the Bayeux Tapestry showing the carnage of the later stages of the battle.

If you look closely, you can see the dead bodies of the Anglo-Saxons, and the Normans at the bottom of the tapestry.

William had killed the king of England, but this did not necessarily mean he automatically became the next king.

His next task was to convert his victory at Hastings into meaningful control over a hostile Anglo-Saxon population.

Whilst William had taken Pevensey and Hastings with his army, the rest of England's population remained free with many defiant Anglo-Saxons ready to carry on fighting.

If we look at the map, we can imagine William and his army on the south coast at Hastings.

They had a mammoth task ahead of them attempting to take control of the rest of the 2 million people in England at that time.

Despite William's claim to the throne, many would've seen the Normans as foreign invaders.

In London, crowds of warriors filled the streets.

Many of these would've been the fied that Harold had failed to wait for, and there would've been some survivors of the Battle of Hastings there.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Why did William not have control over England despite his victory at the Battle of Hastings? Was it A, he had to convert Anglo-Saxons to Christianity? B, he had to overcome a hostile Anglo-Saxon population? C, his army had fled back to Normandy? Pause the video, have a think and then come right back.

Okay, great, welcome back.

Well done if you knew it was B.

William still had to overcome a hostile Anglo-Saxon population after the Battle of Hastings.

So with King Harold dead, many rallied behind the surviving Anglo-Saxon claimant to the throne, Edgar the Aethling.

Edgar was King Edward, the confessor's nephew, and had once seemed Edward's choice for his heir.

He was the last male member of the House of Wessex.

A descendant of King Alfred the great.

Many nobles had a lingering loyalty to the house which created the nation of England.

However, as you can see from the photo of the statue on the left, Edgar was barely into his teens and may have seemed a weak prospect against the strength of William.

However, Stigant, the Archbishop of Canterbury and Ealdred the Archbishop of York, along with Earls, Edwin and Morcar, the brother Earls of Mercier and Northumbria, they all threw their support behind Edgar.

With many nobles behind him, the Witan elected Edgar as the king of England, but did not have him crowned immediately.

Unaware of the newly elected King, William waited in Hastings to see if the Anglo-Saxon nobility would surrender to him.

After two weeks of waiting, William realised he would need to force the English nobles to submit to him.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

What I want you to do here is fill in the missing name.

So you've got a sentence there that needs to be completed with the correct missing name.

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

Okay, welcome back.

Well done if you've got the correct missing name.

So let's read how that sentence should have looked.

With King Harold dead, many Anglo-Saxon Nobles rallied behind Edgar the Aethling as the next king of England.

Okay, excellent.

Let's move on to task A.

What I want you to do here is working with your partner, discuss two issues facing William after the Battle of Hastings.

To help you out here, you could consider the hostility to a foreign invader, the situation in London at the time, and the Witan's role in electing a king.

So pause the video, have that discussion, or you could jot down your ideas on a piece of paper and then press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, great, welcome back.

Hopefully you've had some really interesting discussions there.

So many issues may have arisen.

Let's have a look what I've got here.

We can see what you may have discussed.

William and his army had invaded England from Normandy and killed many English, including King Harold.

William now needed to control 2 million Anglo-Saxons, many of whom were hostile towards the Norman invasion.

For example, there were many feared soldiers in London who wanted to continue fighting.

So we can see there's a big issue there for William to overcome.

A hostile Anglo-Saxon population, and many of them had congregated within London.

Okay, let's have a look at another issue.

Another issue for William was that the Witan was important in deciding who the next king of England was.

And they had chosen Edgar the Aethling.

The Witan and many Anglo-Saxon nobles did not support William and refused to submit to him.

So this was a big issue for William.

He needed the population to accept that he was the legitimate king.

However, in Anglo-Saxon England, it was the Witan that was very important institution in selecting the next king, and they chose Edgar.

Okay, excellent.

We've reached the halfway point of the lesson.

So let's now look at what William did next.

William's brutal march through Southeast England.

So William decided to lead his army on a brutal march through Southeast England, burning and plundering their way through Sussex and Kent.

The illustration on the left is from a mediaeval manuscript, and it shows a house being plundered by soldiers.

This violence was known at the time as harrying, and it became a recurring theme of how William secured control over his kingdom.

The bio tapestry on the left shows Norman troops harrying, in this case, burning down an English house.

Okay, let's have a look at Williams march through southern England, and we can use the map on the left to track this trail of destruction.

So as you can see from the red line on the map, the beginning of Williams march was directed along the South Coast.

Williams first stop was Romney.

He punished this town for killing Normans whose ships had got lost during their journey across the channel.

After destroying homes and farms in Romney, William next went to Dover.

This was a well defended area, which was all the same quickly burned to the ground.

It was here after plundering and foraging in search of nourishment, in search of food and water.

William and his men became ill, perhaps from some bad food or water.

This highlights that although the Normans had military strength, they were vulnerable in a foreign land a long way from home with their supplies gone.

William decided to leave some of his army at Dover to secure the South coast so that reinforcements and supplies could be brought over from Normandy.

The rest of his men would push on plundering the land for supplies and intimidating the population into submission.

Canterbury was next to submit to William, which we can see on the map was very close to Dover.

Canterbury held religious importance in England and would've been a great achievement for William's task of controlling England.

William then sensed men to take Winchester.

We can see that William sent his troops some distance southwest of London, showing the importance of Winchester to William.

Winchester was the capital of Anglo-Saxon England, where the Royal Treasury and Edward the confessor's widow, Edith were located.

William decided to be lenient here and accepted their submission to his rule without resorting to violence and plunder.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Why was William's army considered vulnerable after the battle of Hastings? Select three correct answers.

A, they had inexperienced soldiers.

B, they had limited supplies.

C, they relied on foraging and thundering.

D, they were viewed as foreign invaders.

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

Okay, welcome back.

Let's check those answers.

So William's army were vulnerable because they had B, limited supplies.

C, they relied on foraging and plundering and D, they were viewed as foreign invaders.

Okay, let's continue.

William's army then marched to London, which at this time was a city primarily located on the north side of the river Thames.

If William wanted control of England, he would need London and the important nobles there to submit to him.

However, London had been well fortified by the Romans and had city wolves surrounding it.

The city was also teaming with soldiers.

Have a look at the image on the left.

It's an illustration of London's defensive features.

We can see London on the North Bank of the river Thames, with only one bridge to access the city.

We can also see the city walls surrounding London offering lots of protection.

So with William's options limited, he once again opted for violence to scare the rebellious Anglo-Saxon nobility into submission.

William decided to march in a loop around London, harrying as he went.

He harried west into Hampshire, then burned and plundered his way north through Berkshire and Oxfordshire.

Arriving at Wallingford, the Normans rested.

This was a place where the river Thames could be crossed without the need for boats.

So a great place to rest up before crossing the river Thames and continuing with his loop around London.

This was also the point at which William's tactics paid off.

The Archbishop of Canterbury Stigant submitted to William at Wallingford and removed his support from Edgar the Aethling.

William now headed northeast back toward London, passing through Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire before stopping at Berkhamsted.

If we look at the map, you can see the way that William's March of destruction was looping around London.

And we can imagine how the Anglo-Saxon nobles and their soldiers were feeling with the towns and villages and ashes around them all submitting one by one.

Edgar the Aethling, Ealdred the Archbishop of York, and the earls, Erwin and Morcar made the journey from London to Berkhamsted to submit to William.

They swore oaths to obey him.

The image on the left is an illustration of a noble submitting to William.

We can see the noble is knelt before William, who is seated on his throne.

This gives us an idea of what an oath swearing ceremony might look like.

An oath was a public promise to be loyal to William.

The promise was with the king and God.

It was unlikely you would break a public and spiritual promise like this.

It would not be good for your reputation or your soul.

The Anglo-Saxon nobles also had to give over hostages.

And in return, William promised he would be a merciful ruler.

William and his army marched into London where the people were now ready to surrender.

By now, it seemed as if the people were anxious to have William crowned as soon as possible to prevent further violence and disorder.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

What tactic did William use to get the submission of the earls? A, diplomacy.

B, giving them money.

C, Harrying.

Pause the video.

Have a think and come right back.

Okay, welcome back.

Well done if you knew the answer was C.

William used harrying to get the submission of the earls.

Harassing the people and the land of England.

Which Anglo-Saxon nobles submitted to William at Berkhamsted? Select three correct answers.

A, Archbishop of York.

B, earls Edwin and Morcar.

C, earls Gyrth and Leofwine.

D, Edgar the Aethling.

Pause the video.

Have a think and come right back.

Okay, welcome back.

Well done if you had the correct three answers.

The nobles who submitted to William, were Archbishop of York, earls Edwin and Morcar and Edgar the Aethling.

Okay, let's move on to task B.

What I want you to do here is describe two features of William's march through south-east England, and I want you to refer to the following in your answer, harrying and Norman vulnerability.

You must provide detailed information to support each feature.

So use all the knowledge and details that you have from the lesson to describe those two features.

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

Okay, great, welcome back.

So you may have slightly different answers from mine, but let's have a look what I've got here.

One feature of William's march through south-east England is that it involved harrying the population.

For example, Williams Army destroyed farms, burned villages, and plundered across the south-east of England.

Another feature of William's march through Southeast England is that it highlighted Norman vulnerability.

The Norman army relied on plundering and foraging in search of food for the troops and horses as they had limited supplies.

Okay, great.

Let's now move on to the second part of task B.

What I want you to do here is give three reasons why the earls submitted to William at Berkhamsted.

Try to include the following in your answer.

So I've given you three prompts here to help you complete the answer.

So I want you to mention the harrying of the towns and villages, the march in a loop around London, and Edgar the Aethling.

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

Okay, great.

Welcome back.

Your answer may include some of what I have here.

Let's have a read of it.

So the first one, William harried towns and villages, destroyed homes and farms and plundered royal treasury at Winchester.

This forced the earls to submit, or they would witness the spread of violence and theft against their people.

So a strong reason therefore why the earls were ready to submit to William.

Let's look at the next one.

William marched in a loop around London, harrying as he went.

Edgar the Aethling, Ealdred Archbishop of York, and earls, Edwin and Morcar felt surrounded and cut off from any help.

And as I've said before, we can imagine how they were feeling in London witnessing this trail of destruction surrounding them.

And the final reason Edgar the Aethling was barely into his teens and many powerful nobles had been killed at Hastings.

Edgar and the remaining earls may have felt in a weakened position and powerless to take action.

Okay, that's excellent.

Let's summarise today's lesson, the submission of the earls in 1066.

William had won the Battle of Hastings, but his army was vulnerable in a foreign land with limited supplies.

If William was to be king, he needed to control 2 million Anglo-Saxons, many of whom were hostile towards the Norman invasion.

William harried and plundered the south-east of England to force the Anglo-Saxon Earls to submit to him as their ruler.

Earls, Edwin and Morcar, Edgar the Aethling, and Stigand the Archbishop of Canterbury submitted to William.

Okay, great.

Well done on a brilliant lesson.

And thank you for joining me for the beginning of our story of what William did after the Battle of Hastings.

I hope you've learned a lot in this lesson, and I will see you next time when we continue our inquiry into how the Anglo-Saxons resisted Norman rule.

See you in the next lesson.