Key people or things Flashcards
what are three things William did to assert his authority after taking power?
William let the Anglo-Saxon Earls of Mercia and Northumbria, Edwin and Morcar, keep their lands because they had not fought against William at Hastings. The only condition was that they accepted William’s authority as king and as their feudal lord.
William transferred land ownership from the nobles who hadn’t supported him to Norman barons who had. These were men he could trust and rely on.
The greatest change introduced after the conquest of 1066 was the introduction of the feudal system. Norman feudalism was different from the Anglo-Saxon system in one important way - King William owned all of the land. William could now decide who to lease the land to.
what was the feudal system?
The system of giving land in exchange for duties had existed before the Norman Conquest but William confiscated land from Anglo-Saxons, which created a whole new power structure. Norman feudalism was based on royal strength.
what are three key features of the feudal system?
The king owned all the land but gave some to the barons.
The barons had to fight for the king and train knights for him. The knights then received some land from the barons.
The villeins worked on the land for the knights and barons. They paid them taxes and gave them some of their crops, as well as fines if they broke the law.
who was odo before and during the invasion?
Odo was King William’s half brother. He was also the Bishop of Bayeux, he fought at Hastings and commissioned the Bayeux Tapestry to celebrate the conquest.
what was odo’s status after the invasion?
Odo became the Earl of Kent and grew very rich by seizing as much land as he could. King William trusted him and he ruled the south of England as a regent whilst the king was away in Normandy.
who was FitzOsbern before and during the invasion?
FitzOsbern was related to King William and the two were close friends for many years. FitzOsbern was the brains behind the invasion - he ensured there were enough men and boats to conquer England.
what was FitzOsbern’s status after the invasion?
FitzOsbern was a reliable military commander and he helped to consolidate King William’s power in central and western England. FitzOsbern became the Earl of Hereford, Worcester, Gloucester and Oxfordshire amongst others. FitzOsbern acted as regent alongside Odo during the king’s absence.
what happend in the revolt against Eadric the ‘wild’
Norman earls took advantage of the confusion in 1067 to extend their land in Shropshire and Herefordshire on the border with Wales. The hilly border was known as the Marcher lands. This created resentment amongst the Anglo-Saxon thegns who held the land, especially Eadric. Under his leadership Anglo-Saxon forces allied with the Welsh princes, Bleddyn and Rhiwallon, ransacked Hereford before disappearing back into Wales.
what happened in the rebellion of the north?
Between 1066 and 1071 five different earls led Northumbria. The first, Morcar was replaced in 1066 and the two earls that followed him were murdered. Cospatrick, an Anglo-Saxon, paid William to become earl but he quickly changed sides and became involved in the rebellion against William across the north which was led by the Edwin of Mercia, Morcar and Edgar Atheling. Support for the rebellion grew when William tried to install the Norman, Robert de Commines, as earl of Northumbria. Robert and his army of 900 men were massacred in Durham because the people of Northumbria did not want to have a Norman as their earl.
who joined the rebellion in the north after the massacre at durham
Edgar Atheling joined the rebellion after the massacre at Durham and became the figurehead for the resistance.
what happened in the rebellion of the east
According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle the greatest threat to William I since he became king came in the spring of 1070, when the Danish King Sweiyn sent an army to conquer England. The army he sent was not large enough to restart the northern rebellion but it was large enough for King William to pay the Danes a large amount of money to leave. Some Danes landed in East Anglia to support the rebellion led by Hereward the Wake. Not much is known about Hereward except that he was an English thegn who became involved in disputes with the Norman barons that were given land in Lincolnshire. Hereward fought a guerrilla war against the Normans until King William captured his base on the Isle of Ely. Hereward was pardoned by William but Morcar, who came to support Hereward, was imprisoned for life.
what did the chronicler, Orderic Vitalis describe the harrying of the north as?
‘he made no effort to restrain his fury and punished the innocent with the guilty. In his anger he commanded that all crops, herds and food of any kind be brought together and burned to ashes so that the whole region north of the [river] Humber be deprived of any source of sustenance’.
What drove William to this level of cruelty?
When William and his fellow Normans began to take land and increase taxation the people of the north probably felt they had more to gain from rebelling than from submitting. They were used to acting relatively independently.
The Scots and the Danes supported the rebels in the north. Both wanted to take some or all of England for themselves.
William did try to deal with the people of the north peacefully just after his conquest, but hostility towards Norman rule grew strong when he left England in the hands of his vice-regents, Odo and William FitzOsbern. Fighting all over the country and facing foreign invasion, William believed the safest way to control the north was to depopulate it.
what were the consequences of the Harrying of the North
refugees (long term)
Many people fled from William’s army and settled in other parts of the country. Some escaped to live in southern Scotland.
Resistance (short term)
Some of these refugees joined up with resistance struggles in the Welsh Marches and the rebellion of Hereward the Wake in East Anglia.
Ruin (long term)
In 1086 the Domesday Book recorded that large areas of Yorkshire were ‘waste’ and many manors of northern England had lost over half their wealth and population since 1066.
what areas of land were Odo and FitzOsbern given and why
Odo was given control of the south-east, this was to protect the channel crossing to Normandy and FitzOsbern was given land along the Welsh marches.
He built a number of castles there and maintained a large force of knights to prevent attack from across the Welsh border.
