Hello, and thanks for joining me today for this Oak Academy history lesson.

My name is Mrs. Knox, and today I'll be guiding you through the resources and materials associated with this lesson.

So let's get started now.

Our lesson today is part of a unit of work on the Norman conquest, where we're asking, how do we know about the impact the conquest had on mediaeval England? Now in our lesson today, we'll be covering Norman changes to the English landscape.

By the end of the lesson, you'll be able to explain how historians can use material remains to understand the use of castles in Norman England.

Now, in our lesson, we'll come across a couple of keywords today, so let's take a look at those now.

The first word that we'll see is the word siege, which is the act of surrounding a town and refusing to let people out or goods in.

We'll also use the term motte-and-bailey castle, which is a type of fortification introduced to England by the Normans.

Our lesson today is going to be in two sections, so we'll get started now with section one, which we'll look at rebellions against William the Conqueror.

Have a look at the photograph, which is now on the screen.

What do you notice about this building? Why do you think it was built? And what made it difficult to attack? Pause the video for a few moments and jot down some ideas.

These are the kinds of questions which historians have asked when looking at this structure.

The photograph is of Totnes Castle in Devon, and we're going to come back to it later in the lesson.

You may have noticed that it seems very tall and imposing.

We must assume that it was built perhaps as a lookout post.

It's on the top of a mound of earth, which would make it very easy for surveying the surrounding landscape.

We may also think that it was built for defensive purposes.

Being all the way up on that piece of earth with those high stone walls would make it very difficult to attack.

Soldiers would have to be going uphill, and arrows could be raining down upon them, so there has to be some kind of defensive purpose to this as well.

But it's also worth thinking about the psychological effect of seeing this on the landscape and the impact it might have had on people who saw it.

Was it also there to intimidate and to frighten them? These are the kinds of questions which historians might be thinking when they look at a castle like this.

In the course of this lesson, we are going to seek some answers to these questions.

William built over 700 of these castles during his reign, not personally, of course, he had them built by others, and many of them were built by his loyal followers, the barons and the nobleman who had travelled over from Normandy with him to share the victory at Hastings, and to divide up the spoils of England once the victory was secure.

William and his followers must have had a reason for building over 700 of these.

Historians have tried to find out why.

In order to understand why, we need to know a little bit about the kinds of rebellions which William faced.

William was crown King of England on Christmas Day, 1066 in Westminster Abbey.

This is the place where Edward the Confessor, the previous legitimate king of England in the Norman view was buried.

So William had strengthened his claim to the throne by having the crown placed upon his head and by strengthening the connection between him and Edward the Confessor.

He had been crowned by Ealdred, the Archbishop of York, who was a highly respected and influential churchman.

But this didn't mean that everyone in England supported William's right to take the throne.

The citizens of London may have submitted, but people in other areas of the country had different ideas.

I want to tell you about two different examples of rebellions where William's responses were very different.

This tells us something about how he planned to rule England and how he dealt with rebellions when they occurred.

The first rebellion I want to tell you about took place in Exeter in 1068, just two years after William had been crowned.

Exeter was a very important trading city in the county of Devon in the South West of England.

Not only did it have advanced trade links with northern Europe, and particularly with Normandy, but it was also an important port of exchange with Ireland, where the Godwinsons enjoyed some support.

William had to travel down to Exeter in 1068 because it became clear that the citizens of the city were refusing to open the gates to him.

William, therefore laid siege to the city.

William's intention was essentially to starve the citizens of Exeter into surrender.

The intention of the citizens of Exeter was to launch a rebellion and to keep William out.

Some of the sources describe what happened next.

William came to an agreement with the citizens of Exeter.

In other words, he reached a deal.

He negotiated with them and found a compromise solution.

The citizens of Exeter agreed to open the gates to William, allowing him peacefully into their city, and they agreed to recognise him as the rightful king of England.

But this exchange came at an important cost.

William, for his part, had to agree to lower the taxes that the citizens of Exeter had to pay.

Now, they claimed, of course, that they were simply renewing a right and a privilege which had been exercised in the day of King Edward.

Essentially, William was being forced here, or perhaps he was choosing to negotiate and come to terms with the rebels.

He was trying to find a peaceful solution without resorting to violence and bloodshed.

That's really interesting when we compare his actions in Exeter to his actions in the North of England, and particularly his actions in Yorkshire in 1069.

In 1069, yet another rebellion against William took place, and once again, it was in the North of England, which had always been a difficult area for English kings to control, and which had been even more difficult for William.

The nobleman whom he sent north to control the area kept getting killed, and the local population had no sense of loyalty to him.

In fact, many of them felt more of a sense of loyalty to their Viking roots.

So in 1069, when yet another rebellion occurred, William had had enough.

Now, the sources disagree about the extent of his response, but they do agree that it was brutal and savage.

One chronicler records that he had over 100,000 people killed as a result of this rebellion.

Viciously, he rode his soldiers through the villages of Yorkshire.

He burned houses with people inside them.

He scattered salt in the earth so that the crops would not be able to grow.

He was trying to cause a famine.

And he poisoned wells, so that people didn't have any drinking water.

Some sources tell us that many thousands of refugees fled south to escape the devastation which William had left behind.

Once he arrived in York, which was the most important city in that part of England at the time, he destroyed much of it.

Other sources tell us that he raised parts of it to the ground.

He launched a savage assault upon the cathedral there, and in the rubble that Christmas Day, he wore his crown amongst the ruins as a sign of how powerful he had become, and to remind those rebellious Yorkshiremen that he was now in charge.

So we can see that William responded differently to these two rebellions.

In the first instance, he responded with compromise, whereas in the second, he was very savage.

Even those writers who are sympathetic to William, that's the chroniclers who are pretty much on his side most of the time, can't do anything but condemn him for the violence and the savagery of his actions.

William's actions in Yorkshire have been referred to as the Harrying of the North.

To harry means to harass, to chase, to make something difficult for somebody.

And William's actions have been described as harrying because of how difficult he made life for those people in Yorkshire whom he didn't kill during the initial wave of violence.

Okay, it's time now to have a check of your understanding so far.

I'd like you to answer this question, true or false, William the Conqueror always responded to rebellions using violence? Press pause and then when you're ready to hear the answer, press play.

You should have said the correct answer was false.

Press pause again and now write an explanation about why the answer is false.

In your explanation, you could have said that William sometimes used violence in response to rebellions, and other times he laid siege to the city and negotiated a deal.

Here's another quick question now, what was the Harrying of the North? Was it, A, William's promises to the citizens of Exeter, B, William's brutal response to a rebellion in Yorkshire, or C, William's plan to build castles throughout England? Press pause and then press play for the correct answer.

Well done if you said the correct answer was B, the Harrying of the North was William's brutal response to a rebellion in Yorkshire.

After the Harrying of the North, William left York, but not before he built two really important structures in the city.

He built two motte-and-bailey castles.

Now, I think it's particularly important that he built two motte-and-bailey castles and not just one.

It goes to show how worried he was about maintaining control in that region.

Clearly one purpose of these castles was to keep power, to ensure that rebellions were less likely, and to show potential Anglo-Saxon rebels who was now in charge.

We're going to look briefly at the image on the screen and talk about the features of the motte-and-bailey castles, which made these aims possible.

This is an artist's depiction of what a motte-and-bailey castle would have looked like.

Of course, it's not a photograph because we didn't have photographs in the 11 century, and these motte-and-bailey castles were initially built from wood.

It means that the initial building hasn't survived, but we'll see later on an example of a motte-and-bailey castle that was later rebuilt in stone, parts of which do still survive.

So let's look firstly at what is described here as the fence.

You'll also sometimes hear this referred to as the palisade.

The fence was really the first line of defence for the people living within the castle.

You can see that just beyond the fence, a deep ditch has been dug.

The purpose of this is to make it more difficult for attackers to get inside the castle compound.

The fence is there to keep attackers out.

Encircled by this large fence is the area of earth known as the bailey.

The bailey is what we might in these days just called the courtyard, and this courtyard would've been full of noise and smells.

Lots of people would've lived there.

There would've been children playing there perhaps.

There would've been livestock and farm animals in there.

So you can see how the artist has depicted this.

There are also some cattle, some chickens.

It would've been very noisy, very dirty, and very smelly.

But the bailey was really where many people within the castle compound, if it was large, would have lived.

Another really important feature of the motte-and-bailey castle, and the clue is in the name, is the motte itself.

The motte was a mound of earth usually built for the purposes of constructing the castle, so it's essentially a manmade mound of earth.

And you can guess exactly who the Normans got to build these mounds of earth.

Of course, it was the local Anglo-Saxon population.

And this is another sign that the Normans were now in charge.

Having that mound of earth served two really important purposes.

In the first instance, it made it possible for the Normans to see a long way into the distance, so they would know if anybody was coming.

They'd be able then to prepare their defences.

But in the second instance, it meant that the castle was built to be seen.

It would intimidate the local population and make them frightened of rebelling.

Finally, on the top of the motte, you can see that there is the watchtower.

This watchtower is also sometimes referred to as the keep.

In most motte-and-bailey castles, which would've been rather small, there wouldn't have been room for many people in this watchtower.

But again, it would've helped the Normans to keep a lookout and to give them advanced warning that they needed to prepare their defences if any rebels were on the way.

So we can see from the features of the motte-and-bailey castles why William might have built them, and how they might have helped to deter rebellions.

Indeed, rebellions did become much less frequent throughout his reign, partly as a result of this building programme.

All right, time now for another check of your understanding.

I'd like you to fill in this sentence.

The what was a courtyard surrounding a mound of earth? Was it A, motte, B, fence, C, watchtower, or D, bailey? Press pause to complete your answer and then press play.

You should have said that the bailey was a courtyard surrounding a mound of earth.

Here's another check now of your understanding.

True or false, William's motte-and-bailey castles deterred rebellions? Press pause and then press play for the answer.

That's right, you should have said the answer is true.

Pause the video again to write an explanation for why the answer is true.

You could have said that the castles reminded the Anglo-Saxons that the Normans were powerful and in charge.

It's now time to put what you've learned into practise by completing this task.

Firstly, I'd like you to define each of the following features of the motte-and-bailey castle.

Press pause and when you're ready to see the correct definitions, press play.

Welcome back.

Let's see how you got on.

For motte, you could have said a mound of earth.

For bailey, you could have said courtyard.

For fence, you could have said an offensive structure designed to keep out invaders.

And for watchtower, you could have said a structure designed to house to soldiers.

Next, I'd like you to study the illustration of this motte-and-bailey castle.

I'd like you to label each of the features from part one of task A on the illustration.

Press pause to complete the task, and then press play to see the correct answers.

Welcome back.

You can use the label diagram on the screen to correct your answers.

Well done if you manage to get all of the labels in the correct locations.

We're ready now to move on to the second section of today's lesson.

This section will focus on Totnes Castle.

Let's have a look at this photograph of Totnes Castle together.

I find this photograph so instructive because it gives us a sense of how this castle must have been perceived by the Anglo-Saxons, who were perhaps forced to help build it and certainly forced to see it each day.

You can see the town of Totnes below huddled beneath the castle, and you can see the motte, the mound of earth rising above the town.

There's something so interesting about this spatial relationship, the centrality of the castle and the height, which shows the power which the Normans now have taken on.

It's worth saying that the stone structures which are there on top of the motte and the defensive stonewall running up to it are later additions.

They don't date to the 11th century, but the motte itself and the mound of earth does.

And so Totnes Castle is a really well preserved Norman motte-and-bailey fortification.

It really is a defensive structure.

It gives us a sense not only of what the Normans were trying to achieve when they built the castle, but also how the Anglo-Saxons must have felt when they looked at it.

As I mentioned previously, William the Conqueror didn't build or indeed order the construction of all of these 700 castles himself.

That wouldn't have been possible.

But he did leave it to some of his followers to order the construction for him.

Some of the motte-and-bailey castles, which he did have personally constructed, have become very famous.

Windsor Castle, which is still a seat of the British monarchy, would perhaps be the most famous example.

Totnes Castle, as you can see, is much more humble and on a much smaller scale.

It was built by one of William's followers called Judhael, probably just shortly after the conquest when William was trying to consolidate his power over England.

This photograph shows the castle from a different angle, and we saw this photo at the beginning of the lesson.

Knowing what you know now about motte-and-bailey castles, you can see exactly why the structure would've been so intimidating to the local Anglo-Saxon population.

The path which now cuts across the motte and which can be used by tourists interested in climbing it was not there in the Norman times, so you can imagine just how inaccessible the top of the motte would have been.

This was an imposing structure which towered over the town, and in this way, even by looking at the building and analysing its material physical remains, historians can learn something about the impact of the Norman Conquest.

They can learn about what the Normans were trying to achieve.

Yes, this was built to defend soldiers, to house them in a place where they could be safe from attack and rebellion.

But it was also built to deter rebellions and to remind potential Anglo-Saxons of the power and might, and the potential Anglo-Saxon rebels of the power and might of the conquerors, and to show them that the Normans were now in charge of England.

And at the same time, the building can tell us about how Anglo-Saxons would've reacted, because as humans, we can look at this structure and we can imagine how they must have felt when they looked at it nearly 1000 years ago.

All right, it's time to check your understanding once more.

True or false, William the Conqueror personally constructed Totnes Castle? Press pause and then press play for the correct answer.

You should have said the correct answer is, of course, false.

I'd like you to press pause now and write an explanation about why the answer is false.

In your answer, you could have said that Totnes Castle was constructed on the orders of one of William's loyal soldiers, Judhael.

Next, I'd like you to choose the two correct answers.

Motte-and-bailey castles were constructed to provide homes for Anglo-Saxons, defend the soldiers who lived in them, make the landscape look more interesting, or to intimidate potential rebels? Press pause and then press play for the correct answer.

You should have said that there are two correct answers: B, that they were constructed to defend the soldiers who lived in them, and D, to intimidate potential rebels.

Finally, in this section, I'd like you to answer each question in one sentence.

From the material remains of Totnes Castle, what have historians learned about, one, the purpose of Totnes Castle, and two, the impact of Totnes Castle? Press pause and then press play to see what you could have written.

Welcome back.

You could have said the purpose of Totnes Castle was that it was built to house soldiers and to deter rebellions.

As for the impact, you could have said historians have seen that Totnes Castle altered the town's landscape, and it would have intimidated the local Anglo-Saxon population.

We've now reached the end of our lesson today, so let's have a quick summary.

There were many rebellions against Norman rule in England after 1066.

700 motte-and-bailey castles were built during Williams reign, and castles both defended their Norman inhabitants and intimidated potential English rebels.

Historians have used the material remains of structures like Totnes Castle to understand why they were built and how they changed England.

Many thanks for your hard work in our lesson today.

I hope you feel confident that you've met your learning objective for the lesson, and that you'll join me for a future Oak Academy history lesson.