403. The Norman Conquests: The Battle of Hastings (Part 3)

On a ridge in Sussex on October 14, 1066, two armies met in a battle that would determine the fate of the English crown. The Norman duke William had spent months waiting for a favorable wind to cross the Channel, while the English king Harold Godwinson had just marched his army three hundred miles south after defeating a Norwegian invasion at Stamford Bridge. What followed was a day-long struggle that remains the most famous battle in English history—but the decisive moment, the death of Harold himself, is far more ambiguous than the familiar image of an arrow through the eye suggests.

Mark Morris, author of books on both the Anglo-Saxons and the Norman Conquest, explains that William’s strategy was unusual for the period. Norman warfare was typically cautious and attritional: you harry the countryside, burn villages, and destroy crops until the local population submits. Battle was something to avoid at all costs, because it was seen as a judgment from God—too risky to stake everything on. But this was a succession dispute, not a border squabble. Only one man could wear the crown, and William could not afford to let Harold live. So he adopted a battle-seeking strategy, burning his own metaphorical boats: his men were told that the only way to survive was to win.