Harold (29 page)

A realistic assessment of the probabilities would appear to indicate that no Papal support was in fact provided for William’s expedition. Indeed, William of Jumieges makes no mention of any such support for William, a curious omission if it had in fact existed. Instead it would seem that what William of Poitiers reflects in his account is a later retrospective sanction by the Papal court for the
fait accompli
represented by William’s conquest. In particular, the imposition of a penance on the Norman troops, who participated in the expedition, suggests that it was not seen as a ‘just’ war but rather as one of aggression. This would also explain the curious lack of any diplomatic response from Harold to William’s claims at the Papal court since there were in fact no such claims at this time. William of Malmesbury’s later account of Harold’s failure to counter William at the Papal court is clearly inspired by the need to respond to the Norman texts. The story of Papal support for William probably arose after the Conquest, when few men had an interest in proving otherwise. After 1066 and particularly after 1070, the Papacy was unlikely to support dispossessed English exiles against the by now securely installed King William. By then, William’s victory had made the judgement of God clear and the Pope still had to avoid offending the King of England, who was now William himself.
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It is likely therefore that Duke William prepared his expedition in a favourable political climate but without the almost universal backing indicated by William of Poitiers. William’s fleet was ready in the mouth of the river Dives sometime after 18 June, when the dedication of his wife Mathilda’s abbey at Caen may have represented a preliminary to the great venture. It was probably ready to set sail in July, but contrary winds confined it to harbour for around a month. Subsequently the fleet moved from the Dives to St Valery-Sur-Somme at some point between mid-July and 27 September, most possibly late August or early September. This event has been seen as a prepared move to secure a shorter crossing. However, the evidence of Poitiers is rather that once it had set out for somewhere else (surely England), it was ‘blown by westerlies’ into the roadstead of St Valery. This surely indicates an unintentional arrival at St Valery and losses by drowning suffered on the voyage are also suggestive of this. The most likely explanation of this evidence is that the invasion actually set out from the Dives at this time but that the wind changed and perhaps rose also, driving the fleet to seek shelter in St Valery. There, contrary winds prevented any further invasion attempts. William of Poitiers’ eloquent pleas in favour of William’s strength in adversity at this point speak of this being a reverse rather than a planned move.
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Meanwhile, on the other side of the Channel Harold had maintained his watch against invasion all summer and autumn with his fleet on the Isle of Wight and his land forces along the coast. No invasion arrived because of the contrary winds noted above. The English sources agree that Harold was then forced to disband his land and sea forces on 8 September. The reason for this was that all their provisions had been consumed and that they could not be kept any longer. This is hardly surprising, following four months on standby, by the largest forces ever assembled in England. This date probably marked the end of the two-month service period of the second of two hosts called out one after another that summer, an immense and complex feat of organization. This has been seen as a failure of Harold’s organization, in comparison with William’s success in maintaining his invasion forces, even though Poitiers admits that the latter also faced scarcity. It is unclear how long the Norman forces were actually maintained. It may have been as little as two months, and it seems likely that the invasion force was smaller than that required to garrison the long Channel coastline. It would seem that both men in fact had excellent logistical support.
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As Harold’s forces disbanded on 8 September and he rode inland, probably towards London, the fleet sailed back up to London apparently losing many men on route. This statement in the Chronicle is not elaborated on and may represent no more than drownings due to bad weather, possibly even the same as that which struck the Normans during their preemptive invasion and led them to St Valery around this time. However, there are some hints at the possibility of more than a coincidence of bad weather linking the two naval forces. Chronicle E states that Harold ‘went out with a naval force against William’. Unfortunately, this particular text is extremely brief at this point and since Chronicle C shows Harold not present with the fleet at this time, it may in fact refer merely to his earlier sailing from Sandwich to the Isle of Wight against William’s possible invasion. More interesting is the reference in Domesday Book to Aethelric, who ‘went away to a naval battle against King William’. This appears to suggest a clash actually occurred between the fleets since otherwise no such naval conflict is known. If this interpretation is correct, it places William’s initial sortie from the Dives around 8 September when Harold’s fleet returned to London, and the forces may have met in mid-Channel. It would also help explain William’s retreat to St Valery and the losses suffered on both sides, but this must remain speculative.
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In any case, by the middle of September Harold was back in London perhaps preparing for the feast of the exaltation of the True Cross on 20 September, and the large forces he had gathered back in May had been stood down. William had failed to arrive because of the unfavourable weather, and the prospect of invasion must have appeared to have been receding. The season of autumn storms was now approaching fast and no invasion was likely to come after that. In 1014 a great tide (no doubt a combination of gales and high autumn tides), which flooded many parts of the country, is recorded for 28 September – the very day of William’s subsequent landing at Pevensey in 1066. Also, if Harold was informed by his spies of William’s failed attempt to cross the Channel and his losses, it may have appeared to him that the invasion had already failed. This latter possibility would be reinforced if a fleet encounter had taken place and Harold’s men had reported back on losses in the Norman fleet and its subsequent withdrawal.
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Then Harold our king came upon the Norwegians by surprise and met them beyond York at Stamford Bridge with a large force of English people.
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I
n September 1066 King Harold may have considered that his major problems were behind him. He had beaten off the attacks of Tosti and had apparently faced down William of Normandy’s projected invasion, if not defeated it. However, both these threats were about to revive in even more formidable form and would eventually overwhelm him.

The new threat inspired by Tosti emerged from Scandinavia, an area very familiar to the people of eleventh-century England. The population of large areas of northern and eastern England included significant numbers of descendants of earlier Viking settlers, whose culture had significantly effected that of their new home. It was also from this region that a series of Viking attacks and raids had been launched which had culminated in Cnut’s conquest of England in 1016. In 1066 the region was made up of the three relatively new kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and Sweden. The last of these does not concern us here but the others had strong links with England during the late tenth and early eleventh century. The rulers and potential rulers of these new kingdoms – men like Swein ‘Forkbeard’ and Olaf Tryggvason – had launched raids against England in order to secure wealth, which in turn enabled them to employ troops and reward followers, and hence rule more effectively at home. This process reached its apogee when Cnut actually conquered England in 1016, securing not just a share of England’s wealth but all of it. It was this wealth which enabled him subsequently to build up a North Sea empire incorporating England, Denmark and Norway. He also used it to employ troops to enforce his rule in Scandinavia and to bribe men to support him and desert his rivals.
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The death of Cnut in 1035, quickly followed by those of all his sons by 1042, not only brought about King Edward’s succession to the throne of England, but also left Denmark and Norway to their own devices. In Denmark Swein Ulfsson, Cnut’s nephew, secured the kingship. In Norway Magnus Olafsson returned from exile in Russia, where he may have secured the wealthy backing of Prince Iaroslav of Novgorod, to seize control and expel the Danes. He went on to invade and conquer Denmark, forcing Swein Ulfsson into exile in 1043 and, as we have seen, to seek English aid in 1047. In 1043 Magnus’s control of both Denmark and Norway presented a threat to England which, it will be recalled, King Edward took very seriously.
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It was into this arena that Harald
Hardradi
, who was known as the ‘Thunderbolt of the North’, returned in 1045. Harald’s career is recounted only briefly and rather inaccurately in Adam of Bremen’s contemporary account. A much fuller account is included among the later sagas of the Norwegian kings composed by Snorri Sturluson in the thirteenth century. These sagas, including that of Harald, were written down anything up to 200 years or more after the events which they describe, and are therefore not very reliable. However, the saga narrative does incorporate a number of short verse stanzas, composed by contemporary skalds or court-poets, which although also orally transmitted are so constructed as to make the introduction of significant errors or changes somewhat more difficult than in the prose. On the other hand, although normally less easily changed, the very complexity of these skaldic poems sometimes makes them difficult to interpret. In general terms, the poems do tend to be more reliable than the prose, but can only be considered useful where other more contemporary sources provide support for them.
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Harald
Hardradi
was uncle of King Magnus Olafsson, who now ruled both Norway and Denmark. Earlier, both men had been chased into exile at the court of Prince Iaroslav of Novgorod, when Cnut completed his conquest of Norway in 1030. There Magnus remained, awaiting an opportunity to return, which duly presented itself on Cnut’s death in 1035. In contrast, Harald took service as a mercenary with the famous Varangian regiment of the Eastern Emperors between 1034 and 1043. Fortunately, his career as a mercenary is recorded in a contemporary Byzantine source called ‘Advice for the Emperor’, which shows that he served in Sicily and Bulgaria and was rewarded with titles of rank. As a result of this service, Harald gained great experience of all kinds of warfare, and accumulated immense wealth in mercenary wages and captured booty. He used this wealth to secure an advantageous marriage with Elizabeth, the daughter of Iaroslav of Novgorod, probably in 1044, and to finance his return to Norway in the following year.
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On his return Harald also used his wealth to purchase, or extort, from his nephew Magnus a share of his kingdom, and following Magnus’s death in 1047, Harald took the whole of Norway for himself. The Byzantine influence on Scandinavian coin design at this time, resulting from the dispersal of Harald’s treasure, has been noted. Almost immediately, Harald attempted also to seize Denmark, which Magnus had ruled and which Harald no doubt considered part of his inheritance. In the confusion following Magnus’s death, that kingdom had been re-occupied by Swein Ulfsson, and thereafter Harald engaged in a bitter sixteen-year struggle with Swein for possession of it. In this long contest, Harald seems to have won most of the battles, burning the Danish trading centre of Hedeby in 1050 and the churches of Aarhus and Schleswig. However, he failed either to eliminate Swein or to gain full control of Denmark. Meantime, the wealth he had brought back from the east, and whatever he had collected from successful raids on Denmark, was gradually dissipated. Thus the early skaldic poems in
Harald’s Saga
often refer to his riches on his return from Constantinople, but seldom do so after the end of the long war with Swein. Indeed, some confirmation of this can be seen in the coinage struck in Harald’s later years, which was much more crude and debased than that of his early reign. Perhaps Adam of Bremen’s claim that Harald despoiled the tomb of his own half-brother, St Olaf, at Trondheim, and Pope Alexander’s letter of admonishment to Harald concerning the selling of bishoprics are also evidence of his increasing need for cash. Thus when the long war with Swein ended in a rather inconclusive treaty in 1064, Harald stood in need of a new source of wealth to support his rule and one was soon to be offered to him.
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The exiled Tosti spent the summer of 1066 in Scotland, smarting from the failure of his single-handed attempt at restoration in May. He now sought potential allies powerful enough to assist him in restoring his fortunes. King Malcolm of Scotland was still consolidating his hold over his own kingdom and, in any case, was not capable of opposing Harold of England. Tosti may have sought assistance from his cousin, King Swein of Denmark, as the later
Harald’s Saga
states. If he did so, he must have been disappointed. King Swein was also Harold’s cousin, and, in any case, was unable to leave his kingdom for fear of a resumption of Norwegian attacks. Although Swein had ended his long war with Harald of Norway in 1064, the latter remained a potent threat. In these circumstances, Tosti’s thoughts must have turned quite naturally to Norway and to King Harald.
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Harald of Norway certainly had more than enough experience and the necessary temperament to undertake an invasion of England. He had a battle-hardened army and fleet at his command, which despite their recent failures in Denmark had just spent two years restoring its fighting strength and its morale in a series of local campaigns in Norway. Tosti would have had little difficulty in contacting Harald from his base in Scotland and there can be little doubt that he did so. It is unlikely that Tosti actually visited Norway, but not impossible. A late source speaks of Tosti’s Northumbrian ally Copsi visiting the Orkney’s to recruit troops for Tosti, and perhaps he also acted as his ambassador to King Harald in Norway. Certainly in some form or other, contact was made, as Chronicle C and John of Worcester make it clear that Tosti had a prior agreement with King Harald of Norway to join him in an invasion of England.
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