Hello, welcome to History here at Oak National Academy.

I'm Mr. Newton, and I will be your teacher today guiding you through the entirety of the lesson.

Right.

Let's get started.

Over the next few lessons, we will be thinking about our big inquiry question.

Why did the Normans conquer England in 1066? This is the question we will use to investigate the immediate events leading up to the successful Norman invasion of England.

We know that King Edward died without an heir, and this triggered a succession crisis.

There were four claimants to the throne.

At this point, Harold Godwinson was king, and he had stationed his army on the southern coast awaiting a Norman invasion.

Unexpectedly, he received the news of a Viking invasion in northern England.

He marched north and defeated the Viking army, defeating Hardrada, the King of Norway and his own brother Tostig.

Three days after the battle, Duke William of Normandy landed on the south coast of England.

And later on, on the 14th of October, in the year 1066, the Battle of Hastings commenced, the result of which would dramatically alter the course of English history.

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to give an account of the Battle of Hastings.

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

The Anglo-Saxon fyrd was an army made up of mostly untrained conscripts from England's peasant population.

The housecarl was an elite unit of the Anglo-Saxon army, a well-trained and well-equipped soldier.

The knight was the elite unit of the Norman army, a soldier who fought on horseback, riding a specially-trained war horse.

A shield wall is a military tactic where soldiers stood in a long line overlapping their shields to form a wall of shields.

A feigned retreat is when soldiers pretend to retreat in order to lure the enemy into a more vulnerable position.

Today's lesson is split into two parts.

The first part we will look at the events of the Norman's landing in England.

Then we will go on to look at when the English and the Normans meets at the Battle of Hastings.

Right, let's start with the first part of the lesson, the Norman invasion of England.

So let's begin the story.

Duke William of Normandy and his army had been ready to invade England since the beginning of August.

However bad weather in the English Channel prevented his ships from sailing.

Have a look at the image.

It's a detail from the Bayeux Tapestry showing Normans looking after their ships.

William had 700 ships and thousands of troops he had to manage while he waited in northern France to invade England.

Finally, the winds changed.

William gave the order, his troops rushed to their ships, and they set sail for England on the 27th of September 1066.

Have a look at the image of the Bayeux Tapestry.

It shows Normans loading their ships.

We can see soldiers carrying chainmail armour on the left with some of them carrying swords.

We can also see a cart being pulled with a barrel, spears and helmets.

It was said that as the ships sailed across the English Channel, the fleet resembled a thick forest whose trees were sails.

Williams' ship led the way with the papal banner on the masthead.

Have a look at the image.

We can see the Norman ships with soldiers.

We can also see horses being carried by the ship on the left, but if we have a closer look at the central ship, we know that this is William's ship because it has the papal banner, which I've highlighted in the purple circle.

This would've given William and the Normans great support knowing that they had the backing of the Pope, the church and God.

Unluckily for Harold, this was a few weeks after he had sent the southern fyrd home.

At this time, Harold was celebrating in York following his victory at Stamford Bridge a few days earlier.

The image from the Bayeux Tapestry on the left shows Harold hearing the news of the Norman's landing.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

What I want you to do is fill in the blank with the correct missing word.

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

Okay.

Welcome back.

Let's see how that sentence should have read with the correct missing word.

William invaded England after Harold had fought the Battle of Stamford Bridge.

And of course, this made the Battle of Stamford Bridge very significant as it would've weakened William's army before having to fight the Battle of Hastings.

Okay, let's continue the story.

On hearing the news of William's invasion, Harold quickly rode south with his housecarls and sent out orders for reinforcements to meet him in London.

And you can see the map on the left an arrow shows the route that Harold took from Stamford Bridge to London.

So by now, William and his fleet had sailed across the English Channel and landed on the southern coast of England.

On landing at Pevensey, the Normans had constructed a castle that actually brought some of the structures for the castle with them, which they then assembled together quickly.

Once in Pevensey, they began to raid the area.

Have a look at the image on the left.

It shows Norman's burning a house forcing a mother and child to flee.

Some historians think this could be Harold's wife and child, and if that's true, we can imagine how angry Harold might be if he heard of this news.

Harold would want to rush south as quick as he could to meet William in battle.

By laying waste to Harold's former Elden of Wessex, William was possibly attempting to provoke Harold to leave the well fortified London.

If that's the case, it certainly worked.

Harold decided to leave London before the whole fyrd had arrived.

Perhaps it was through anger, through Haste.

He wanted to protect his elder and protect England, or perhaps he was being more strategic and he had actually planned a surprise attack like at Stamford Bridge, which had been previously successful for him against the Vikings.

However, this time there would be no surprise.

William's scouts reported Harold's approach.

If you have a look at the image on the left, it shows a scout in forming William of Harold approaching the area.

William quickly brought his army out of Hastings to meet Harold on the rode from London.

Although William was able to choose the battlefield, Harold was able to position his forces at the top of a hill, later known as Senlac Hill.

This is French for Lake of Blood.

It was here at 9:00 AM on the morning of 14th of October that the two armies met.

Okay, let's have a closer look at the two armies so we can measure them up before learning about how the Battle of Hastings unfolded.

Although both armies had around 7,000 men, there were key differences between the English and the Norman forces.

The English army mainly consisted of untrained peasant conscripts of the fyrd.

This may have been because many of Harold's trained soldiers had died at Stamford Bridge.

On the other hand, in the Norman army it mainly consisted of professional trained soldiers.

William had recruited mercenaries from across Europe.

In the English army, the elite soldier was the housecarl who carried long-handled heavy battleaxes capable of slicing through a horse, housecarls were royal bodyguards.

In the Norman army, the elite soldier was the knight, who rode a specially-trained horse, which gave the knights the ability to charge and strike enemies from a height.

Okay, let's have a look at some further details here of the army.

Although Anglo-Saxon armies did usually have archers, few seemed to have made it to Hastings.

This could have been down to Harold's error as he had left London quite early.

On the other hand, the Normans had many more archers than the English.

It is also possible that a Norman archer may have killed King Harold at the Battle of Hastings.

In the English army, elite troops used horses for reaching the battle for transportation, but horses weren't used in warfare.

Anglo-Saxons fought on foot.

On the other hand, in the Norman army, Norman Knights rode trained war horses, which they used in warfare.

So indispensable were these horses that they had them shipped over from Normandy as opposed to stealing horses once they'd landed in England.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

What did Harold's army mainly consist of at the Battle of Hastings? A, cavalry and archers of the fyrd.

B, peasant conscripts of the fyrd C, professional soldiers of the fyrd.

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

Okay.

Welcome back.

Well done if you knew it was B, peasant conscripts of the fjord.

This could have provided quite a challenge for Harold going into the Battle of Hastings.

Okay, let's move on to task A.

What I want you to do is working with your partner, describe Harold and Williams' preparation for war.

To help you out here, you should try and refer to Harold's movements, Williams's movements, the English army's composition.

In other words, what was the English army made up of the details that we've gone through and the Norman army's composition.

So have a quick discussion now or jot down your thoughts on a piece of paper.

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

Okay, excellent.

Welcome back.

So there's many things you may have discussed or written down on your piece of paper, but let's have a look at some of the things that I've got here.

So firstly, Harold rushed south after the Battle of Stamford Bridge and left London before all his troops had arrived, hoping for a surprise attack.

So clearly that might have had an impact on Harold going into the Battle of Hastings.

It was his movement, the fact that he had to rush North, fight the Vikings, then rush south again.

Now either he'd been too hasty, for example, he could have waited in London for more troops to come.

On the other hand, perhaps that's what a king should do, protect the kingdom.

He needed to get down to Wessex where William was raiding the area.

And also he had the opportunity to conduct a surprise attack on William as had previously been successful for him.

Okay, the second point I've got here is William had spent weeks waiting to sail across the English Channel.

Once landing at Pevensey, he raided the area before learning of Harold's approach.

William then took his army to Hastings to meet Harold.

So Williams' movements also presented him with challenges.

He had waited weeks in France, which would've been very difficult to keep his army in order, well fed, and watered while he was waiting there.

Then he had to transport his whole army across the English Channel on ships.

He then spent some time raiding the area, building castles, preparing for attack.

So maybe this gave him an opportunity to be more prepared, and he then was given the upper hand when he learned from his scouts that Harold was approaching.

So he may have been able to mobilise quickly to Hastings to be able to choose the battlefield rather than be surprised attacked by Harold.

Another points here of the English army composition.

So the English army consisted of a core of elite housecarls with the majority being the untrained peasant conscripts of the fyrd.

So again, we can think of pros and cons of this composition.

Undoubtedly, Harold had troops which were locals.

They knew the terrain, they were on home turf as it were.

He also had highly skilled housecarls with their deadly battleaxes.

But his challenge was that his army consisted of many untrained peasant conscripts of the fyrd.

Okay, now let's look at the Norman army composition.

The Norman army mainly consisted of professional soldiers with a mix of archers, infantry foot soldiers, and knights.

So the Norman army seems to be more varied.

Different types of soldiers are there, and mainly professional soldiers, which may give William an upper hand against the local troops of the Anglo-Saxon English.

Okay, we've now reached the point in the lesson where we can now actually look at what happened at the Battle of Hastings.

So Harold had quickly mobilised out of London, made his way down to meet William, and had managed to occupy the high ground of the battlefield.

Once here, the English army took its preferred formation, the shield wall.

Have a look at the image, it's a recreation of an Anglo-Saxon shield wall on a hillside.

The shield wall involved the troops in the front line overlapping their shields with their spears sticking through the wall.

Behind the shield wall were several rows of soldiers.

Amongst these soldiers were housecarls who would step through the shield wall with their long battleaxes, swipe, then step back.

What this meant was that despite the shield wall primarily being defensive, it had an element of offensive deadly attacks from housecarls with their battleaxes and the spears sticking through the shield wall.

On the left is an illustration of a housecarl and we can see he's holding a battleaxe.

King Harold would've been at the centre of the wall surrounded by his housecarls, giving orders and motivating the army.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Which two of these were English tactics used at the Battle of Hastings? A, a defensive shield wall.

B, a wedge formation to break up the enemy line.

C, hold position at the top of Senlac Hill.

D, use of housecarls to charge at the Norman cavalry.

Pause the video, select two correct English tactics, and then come right back.

Okay, welcome back.

Well done if you knew the first tactic that the English adopted was the defensive shield wall, and then they'd held the position at the top of Senlac Hill, giving them the advantage of having the high ground of the battlefield.

Okay, let's continue.

Have a look at this battle map.

This gives us a bird's eye view of the Battle of Hastings.

We can see Harold at the top of Senlac Hill.

Harold's troops are in red, and we can see his army have formed a shield wall.

At the bottom of the hill, the Normans took a mixed formation.

On the map, we can see Williams troops highlighted in blue at the bottom of Senlac Hill.

We can also see they have a mix of soldiers.

So the first line were skilled archers.

The second line of the Norman army were a mix of professional infantry, foot soldiers and untrained soldiers.

And the knights followed in the third line with William at their centre.

Norman Knights were highly skilled at fighting on horseback.

They used lances when charging at the enemy.

Have a look at the image, it's a modern photo of a battle reenactment featuring Norman knights, and you can see the knights carrying his kite shaped shield and a lance.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Williams army had a mixed composition, which two of these troop types featured in his army at the Battle of Hastings? Pause the video, select your two troop types, and then come right back.

Okay, great.

Welcome back.

Well done if you knew the first type of soldier that William had in his army were archers, and the second one were the knights.

So trumpets signalled the start of the battle and arrows were fired uphill at the English.

The English used their shields to protect them from the arrows.

Have a look at the image.

It shows Norman arrows being fired at the English shield wall.

If you look closely, you can see some arrows sticking out of the English shields.

Okay, let's go back to our battle map.

William now ordered his infantry, the foot soldiers to charge at the shield wall, and we can see the map the infantry from the second line charging up the hill.

However, the English used spears and battleaxes to fend off the attack.

Next, the Norman knights charged up the hill, but also failed to break the English defences.

And on the map we can see the cavalry from the third line charging up the hill.

However, the hill meant that the horses were not able to pick up speed, and the spears sticking out of the shield wall made an effective defence against the Norman's charge.

The battle raged on like this for many hours with persistent Norman charges, but the English shield wall holding strong.

The whole battle lasted for eight hours, which was very long for a battle in this period.

And we can see in the image from the Bayeux Tapestry a Norman cavalry charge at the English shield wall.

If you look closely, we can also see a housecarl who has stepped to the front of the shield wall and is swinging a battleaxe at a Norman knight.

So we can see on our battle map here, the Norman forces pressing up against the English shield wall.

However, the combination of the shield wall and the higher ground seem to have given the English an early advantage.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Why was the English shield wall able to hold off the Norman knights? Discuss reasons with a partner so you can hold a quick discussion or perhaps jot down some thoughts on a piece of paper.

And I've given you the image from the Bayeux Tapestry there to perhaps prompt some reasons from you.

Pause the video, have a quick discussion, or jot down some thoughts and then come right back.

Okay, great.

Welcome back.

Could have talked about many things or written down different thoughts.

Here's what I have though.

So the English shield wall was able to hold of the Norman knights perhaps because horses could not charge uphill, it would've been very difficult for them to build up speed going up the higher ground.

So this would've been a great tactic for Harold to have occupied that high ground.

Another reason the English shield wall was able to hold of the Norman knights was the Anglo-Saxons had spears sticking out of the shield wall and they acted as a good defence.

And then also, housecarls stepped through the shield wall and would swing their axes at knights, which we can see happening in the image.

Okay, back to our battle map.

So the Battle of Hastings raged on for hours.

However, there was a turning point in the battle.

A section of the Norman army began to retreat, and we could see on the map the Norman soldiers on the left side of the battlefield retreating.

It is not clear why, but some have suggested that a rumour had spread that William had been killed.

This was important because usually when an army's leader had been killed, the soldiers without their leader would either surrender, give up, or flee the battlefield, seeing that the battle had been lost.

Perhaps we can make an analogy here of when playing chess, when the king is put in checkmates, the whole army, all the pieces loses the battle or the game of chess.

So in other words, with the rumour of William being killed, this would've been very damaging to morale on the battlefield and soldiers may have questioned whether they should carry on fighting or not.

It was at this critical moment that William tipped back his helmet to show he was still alive.

Have a look at the image.

William is highlighted in the green circle here.

If you look closely, we can see him tipping back his helmet.

This would've motivated his troops to keep fighting.

We can also see William's trusted followers helping to reassure the Norman troops.

It's at this point that William may have then experimented with feigned retreats.

A feigned retreat was a tactic that Norman had used before.

This tactic was like a fake retreat, a pretend retreat in the hope you could trick the enemy into moving into a more vulnerable position.

Seeing the retreat, some of the English broke from their shield wall and ran down the hill in pursuit of the retreating soldiers.

The fleeing Norman soldiers would've been attempting target to cut down as they ran away.

Some of those peasant conscripts in the fyrd may have also wanted to take the opportunity to steal some weapons.

If you have a look at the map, we can see the English troops pursuing the Normans down the hill.

However, once the English had run down the hill, they were now in a vulnerable position as the shield wall had been broken.

The Normans then swiftly turned around and cut the English down.

Look at the map, we can see the English chasing after the feigned retreat.

Then the Norman swiftly counter attacking the more isolated section of the shield wall.

However, it should be said that this was quite a risky tactic that the Normans did here with their feigned retreat.

And it took a lot of skill to carry out.

As a feigned retreat risked the Normans being cut down as they ran with their backs to the English.

The risk would've been that a feigned retreat could have turned into a real retreat.

However, the Norman feigned retreat was successful as it broke the English formation.

As the shield wall weakened Norman archers and knights began to damage the English forces.

Eventually, the knights could ride through the shield wall and the English line was divided into scattered groups.

As nighttime drew in, reports spread across the battlefield that King Harold had been killed.

Realising that their king was dead, many English fyrd soldiers lost hope and began to flee.

In the image we can see the carnage of the battle at this point.

We can see a housecarl here swinging his battleaxe at the horse of the Norman knight.

We can also see at the bottom of the image, lay the dead bodies of the Anglo-Saxons and the Normans.

So there is some debate around how Harold was killed.

Some sources say that an arrow pierced his eye, but others claim that William and a few knights knocked Harold down before beheading and disembowelling him.

Have a look at the image.

It's a detail from the Bayeux Tapestry.

The words at the top read, "Here, Harold the King is killed." Some people have assumed that Harold is referring to the person here highlighted in the green circle.

We can see that this could possibly be Harold trying to pull an arrow from his right eye.

However, others claim that Harold is in fact this figure here with the Norman knights cutting Harold down.

It's also possible that both of these scenarios happened to King Harold.

Nonetheless, Harold reached a brutal end.

Some sources states that his body was unrecognisable.

Harold's brothers, Leofwine and Gyrth, and the last remaining housecarl fought to their death.

The image shows the death of Leofwine and Gyrth Godwinson as they tumbled to the ground.

Whilst their housecarl continued to stand and fight, trying to hold their ground on top of Senlac Hill.

William had won the Battle of Hastings and large numbers of the Anglo-Saxon nobility had been wiped out.

The Normans will go on to transform England society and how it is ruled.

And 1066 was the last time that England was successfully invaded and conquered.

Okay, let's have a check for understanding.

Which tactic did William reportedly use to successfully weaken the English shield wall? A, archer's attack from behind the shield wall.

B, downhill charged by knights.

C, feigned retreats.

D, siege warfare.

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

Okay, great.

Welcome back.

Well done if you knew it was C, feigned retreat which William reportedly used.

Okay, true or false? The death of King Harold meant the English army ran away.

Is that true or false? Pause video, have a think, and come right back.

Okay, welcome back.

Yes, well done if you knew that was false, but why was that false? I want you to be able to justify that answer so we can see that you really do know what's happened.

Was it A, the fyrd and housecarls continue to fight until they were all killed? Or B, although much of the fyrd fled after Harold was killed, housecarls continued to fight to the death.

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

Okay.

Welcome back.

Well done if you knew it was B, although much of the fyrd fled after Harold was killed, housecarls continued to fight to the death.

Okay, let's move on to task B.

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

And you can see I've given you a list of events on the left.

I want you to place these into the boxes on the right.

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

Okay.

Excellent.

Well done for having you go out the task.

Let's see what the correct time order should have been.

So the first event was that Harold occupied the hilltop with a shield wall.

The next event was Norman archers and knights charges are ineffective.

And then the third event was a section of the Norman army feigned retreat.

And this was obviously a turning point in the battle.

And then the final event was, the English shield wall is broken and Harold is killed.

Okay.

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

What I want you to do here is describe two features of the fighting at the Battle of Hastings.

You must provide detailed information to support each feature.

Using phrases like for example, or this means, or this is when will help you to structure your answer to include this additional information.

So we're just looking for you to identify two features of the Battle of Hastings.

Then you need to give me a bit of information, which it describes those features.

And it's in that sentence.

If you use a phrase like for example, or this is when, that's a useful sentence starter to get you to describe the feature further.

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

Okay.

Excellent.

And welcome back, there's many ways you could have answered this question, but compare your answer with what I have here.

One feature of the fighting of the Battle of Hastings was the shield wall formation.

Okay, so you can see I've identified a feature of the Battle of Hastings, which was the shield wall.

Now we need to give just a sentence or two to further describe that feature.

And the sentence starts I've used here to help me begin that sentence is this is when.

This is when the Anglo-Saxon soldiers stood in a long line locking their shields together to form a wall of shields.

In other words, I've just provided the definition of the shield wall.

Another feature of the fighting at the Battle of Hastings was the feigned retreat tactic.

So we can see I've identified a feature which is the feigned retreat.

I now need to define that or give some further information about the feigned retreat.

This is when Norman soldiers pretended to retreat in order to lure the enemy into a more vulnerable position.

Okay, great.

Let's summarise today's lesson.

The Battle of Hastings.

William of Normandy invaded England immediately after Harold had fought the Battle of Stamford Bridge against the Vikings.

English and Norman armies were a similar size, but Harold's army had a majority of untrained peasant conscripts of the fyrd.

Whilst William had a mix of professional soldiers, knights and mercenaries.

Harold held the high ground on Senlac Hill with a shield wall.

However, William's tactics, including a feigned retreat, broke the shield wall and brought him victory.

Okay, excellent.

Well done on a brilliant lesson.

And thank you for joining me as we learned about one of the most important battles in English history.

I will see you next time when we continue our inquiry into why the Normans conquered England in 1066.

See you in the next lesson.