The Norman Conques tW illiam t he C

The Norman Conques t
W illiam t he Conqueror 's coro na t ion did no t go as
planned. W he n the peop le shouted
"God Save th e
King" the nervous
Norman guards at W estminst er
Abbey rhoug
ht th ey were going to attack William.
In th eir fear th ey set fire to nearb y houses and rhe
coronation ce remony ended in disorder.
A lthough Will iam was now crowned king. hi s
conquest had on ly just begun. and t he fight ing
lasted for ano ther five years. T he re was an A nglo
Saxon rebellion again st th e No rrnans every year
unt il 1070.
The small Norman army march ed from
village
to vi llage , dest roying places it co uld no t
cont rol. and building forts
to guard o t hers. It was a
true army of occupat ion for at least twenty years.
The north was parti cu larly hard to control. and th e
Norman army had no mercy.
When the Saxons
fough t back.
the Normans burnt. destro yed and
killed. Bet ween Durh am and York not a sing le
house was left st and ing. and it took a century for
the north to recover.
Few Saxon lords kept the ir lan ds and th ose who d id
were t he very sma ll num ber who had acce pt ed
W illiam immed iately. A ll the o thers lost
everyt hing. By 1086. twenty years after th e arriv a l
of the Normans , on ly two of th e greater landlo rds
An (ITgu mt.'JI1 beru't't'n King Henry' 11 L1nJ his archbishop, Thomas Bt"ckt't .
Beh ind Beeker send am knighrs, probr.lbl)' those who killed him 10 pkast'
Henry. Thepie/ure iUustrafes the stnj~ll." berueen Church andsWleJuring
the early Middle Ages. The Church controlled mone:,. land (including roo m
lIndfe lu.l.u este res}, and men. As a resl.lr , the kings of England had 10 be
wry careful in their dealings u'irh cht' ChIITCh . Th.>:o Irlt'd 10 pre tenr tiny
mcrecse in Church power, and tried to ,If>poinl bishops u·ho U'OlI/J hi: mOTe
ln~'al lfl lhe kinR rhan 10 [he Ch l ~rch. Becket died because he [rit.'J w pr ew nr
[he kinR from gaininRmore control 0/ C hllKh affairs.
and on ly two bishops were Saxon , Willi am gave th e
Saxon land s to hi s Norman nobles, A fter eac h
English rebelli on there was more land
to give away.
His army in cluded
Norman and o the r French land
seekers. Ov er 4.000 Saxon landl ords were replaced
by 200 Norman ones.
Feudalism
W illiam was careful in t he way he gave land to h is
nobles. T he king of France was less powe rful t
han
man y of the grea t lan dlords. of whom W ilIiam was
the outsta nd ing example. In Engl
and. as each new
area of land was ca pt ured . Wi lliam gave parts of it
as a reward to hi s captains.
This meant th at th ey
held separate sma ll pieces of land in differ
ent part s
of th e co unt ry so th at no noble co uld eas ily or
quickly gat he r his fightin g men
to rebel. Willi am
on ly gave some of hi s nobles larger esta tes a long th e
troublesome borde rs with W ales and
Scotl and. At
t he same t ime he kept en ough land for him self to
make sure he was much st ronger than hi s nobles,
Of all t he farmland of England he gave ha lf to t he
Norman nobles, a quarter to the C h urch, an d kep t
a fifth him self. He kept th e Saxon syste m of
she riffs, and used th ese as a ba lance to local nob les.
As a result Engl
and was different from the rest of
Europe because it had one powerful fam ily, inst ead
of a large number of powerful nobles. W ill iam , and
the kings after him . th ough t of England as th eir
personal property.
William organ ised his English kin gdom accord ing
to
the feud al syst em which had a lready begun to
de velop in England before hi s arr iva l. The word
23
An Illu str at ed H isrorv of Britain
Casrle Rising in Norfolk, a fine exo.mple of !hes!One,built keeps the No-mens built in rhe ear(~
tU'ft/fth cenrury. These replaced !heearlier Ncmnan "mcne andbailey" cudes. u:hich were earrh
mounds SUTTOtmded by a wooden fena or paIfuade. A s!One·lrnilr keep of !he IU'U' kindWd5
extremel)' difficult to capture, except by surprise . Keeps of this kindhad a weU, p-ro~.'iJ ing fTe5h
water far a long siege.
"feuda lism" co mes from th e Frenc h word [eu, whi ch
th e Normans used
to refer to lan d held in re turn fo r
dut y or service
to a lord. The basis of feuda l soc iety
was t he ho lding of lan d , and its ma in purpose was
eco no mic. T he cen tral idea was t
hat all lan d was
owned by the king but it was h eld by others. ca lled
"vassa ls", in retu rn for services and goods. T he king
gave large estates to h is ma in nobles in return for a
pro mise
to serve him in war for up to forty days.
T he nobles a lso had to give hi m par t of t he prod uce
of th e land . T he grea te r nob les gave pa rt of t he ir
lan ds to lesser nob les, kn ight s. and o t he r
"freemen". So me freemen paid for the land by
doin g mi lirary service . wh ile o t he rs pa id r
ent. The
nob le kept "serfs"
to work on hi s own land. T hese
were no t free
to leave t he estate, and were often
lit tl e better t ha n slaves.
T he re were t wo basic princip les to feuda lism: eve ry
man had a lord. and every lord had
land, T he king