HAROLD EARL AND KING.
=1. The Return of Godwine and Harold.=--When Duke William paid his
visit to King Edward in 1052, Godwine and all his family, save only the
Lady Edith, were in banishment, and the Normans were in full power in
the land. But before long the English were longing to have Godwine back
again. Men soon began to tire of the King’s foreign favourites, who, it
seemed, could not even defend the land against the Welsh. For the Welsh
King Gruffydd came into Herefordshire and smote the Normans who held
Richard’s Castle. Men sent to ask Godwine to come back; he prayed the
King to let him come back, and he got Count Baldwin with whom he was
staying and also the King of the French to ask for him; but the King’s
favourites would not let him hearken. Then, in 1052, Godwine made up
his mind to come back without the King’s leave, as he knew that no
Englishman was likely to fight against him. He therefore set sail from
Flanders, and Harold and Leofwine set sail from Dublin. The crews of
their ships must have been Irish Danes, which perhaps made Englishmen
afraid of them. For, when they landed at Porlock in Somerset, the
men of the land withstood them, and Harold and Leofwine beat them
in a battle and harried the neighbourhood. But when Godwine came to
southern England, no man withstood his coming, but in most parts the
folk joined him willingly, saying that they would live and die with
him. The King got a fleet against him; but the crews had no heart, and
the fleet was scattered before Godwine came. At last Godwine’s ships
and Harold’s met, and they sailed up the Thames together, and came
before London on September 14. The citizens then said that what the
Earl would they would; the King and his earls brought up an army and
another fleet, but the men would not fight against Earl Godwine. Then
peace was made; it was agreed that an assembly should be held the next
day to settle everything. Then Godwine landed, having come back without
shedding of blood. Then fear came on all the Normans who were in and
near London, and they fled hither and thither. Specially the Norman
Archbishop Robert and Ulf Bishop of Dorchester cut their way out of the
city, slaying as they went, and went beyond sea, and never came back to
England.
=2. The Restoration of Godwine.=--The next day the assembly met, and
voted that Godwine and all his family should be restored to all their
goods and honours. It was voted also that all the Normans who had
misled the King, especially Archbishop Robert, who was gone already,
should be banished. So Godwine and Harold got back their earldoms,
and the Lady Edith came back from her monastery; only Swegen did not
come back; for he had repented him of his sins and gone barefoot on
a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and had died on the way back, about the
time that his father and brothers came home. Of the King’s Norman
friends some were allowed to stay, and Bishop William of London was
allowed to keep his bishopric; but from this time no more Normans got
bishoprics or other great offices. And the English Bishop Stigand got
the archbishopric of Canterbury instead of Robert. This is a thing to
be specially remembered; for it was made a charge against Stigand,
Godwine, Harold, and the whole English nation that Robert had been
driven from his archbishopric and Stigand put in his place, without the
authority of the Pope, but merely by a vote of the English assembly.
The Popes therefore never acknowledged Stigand as lawful archbishop,
and though he kept the archbishopric till four years after William’s
coming, many people in England seem to have been afraid to have any
great ecclesiastical ceremony done by him. Bishops commonly went to be
consecrated by the Pope, or else by the Archbishop of York. It is easy
to see how Duke William was able to turn all this to his own ends.
=3. The Death of Godwine.=--At the Easter-tide of the next year, April
15, 1053, Earl Godwine died. He was seized with a fit while at the
King’s table, and died three days after. The Normans told strange tales
about his death, but that is the simple story in our own Chronicles.
Then his son Harold succeeded him as Earl of the West-Saxons, and
was the chief ruler of England during the remaining thirteen years
of Edward’s reign. There is no sign of any dispute between the King
and the Earl, though Edward’s chief favourite was not Harold, but
his younger brother Tostig. The King was allowed to have his Norman
friends about him in offices of his court, but not to set them over
the kingdom. Bishoprics were given either to Englishmen or to men from
Lorraine, that is, we should now say, from Belgium, who could most
likely speak both Low-Dutch and French. The King’s nephew Ralph and
his friend Odda kept their earldoms as long as they lived; but, as
earldoms fell vacant, they were given to men of the two great families
of Godwine and Leofric. Ælfgar son of Leofric succeeded Harold in
East-Anglia. In 1055 Siward of Northumberland died, and his earldom was
given to Tostig the son of Godwine. And when in 1057 the Earls Leofric
and Ralph died, the earldoms were parted out again. Ælfgar took his
father’s earldom of Mercia; only Ralph’s earldom of Hereford, which
needed specially to be guarded against the Welsh, was added to Harold’s
earldom. Godwine’s son Gyrth succeeded Ælfgar in East-Anglia, and his
other son Leofwine got Kent and the other shires round London. Thus the
greater part of England was under the rule of the house of Godwine, and
what was not remained under the house of Leofric; for when Ælfgar died,
his son Edwin succeeded him.
=4. The Scottish and Welsh Wars.=--These later years of Edward’s reign,
in which Harold was truly the ruler of England, were marked by several
stirring events. Thus there was a war with Scotland, where the crown
had been more than once disputed between two families. The present king
Macbeth had come to the crown after a battle in which Duncan the former
king was killed. Duncan was a kinsman of Earl Siward, who therefore
wished to restore his son Malcolm. In 1054 Siward entered Scotland,
defeated Macbeth, and declared Malcolm king; but the war went on for
four years longer, till Macbeth and his son were killed and Malcolm got
the whole kingdom. Then there were several wars with the Welsh, under
their last great king Gruffydd son of Llywelyn. In 1055 Earl Ælfgar
was banished; he then joined Gruffydd in an invasion of Herefordshire.
Earl Ralph went out to meet him; but either he only knew the French way
of fighting or he liked it best. So he made the English go into battle
on horseback, to which they were not used, and they were therefore
defeated. Ælfgar and Gruffydd then burned and sacked Hereford; but
Earl Harold came and fortified the city afresh. Peace was made with
Gruffydd, and Ælfgar got his earldom back again. Gruffydd presently
made war again, but he lost part of his lands at the next peace.
He seems to have always kept up his connexion with Ælfgar and his
family, and he married Ælfgar’s daughter Ealdgyth. At last in 1062 his
ravages could no longer be borne, and it was determined to subdue him
altogether. The next year Earl Harold waged a great campaign in Wales,
in which, the better to fight among the mountains, he made the English
take to the Welsh way of fighting, and so made all the Welsh submit.
Gruffydd was presently killed by his own people, and Earl Harold gave
Wales to two princes, Bleddyn and Rhiwallon, to hold as the King’s
men. These Welsh and Scottish wars make up nearly all that happened
between England and other lands during this time. There was peace with
Normandy; but Duke William paid no more visits to his cousin the King.
Of a visit which Earl Harold made to him we shall speak presently.
=5. The Succession to the Crown.=--All this time men must have been
thinking who should be king whenever King Edward should die. By English
law, when the king died, the Wise Men chose the next king. But they
chose from the kingly house, and, if the last king left a son of an
age to rule, he was almost always chosen. Indeed, if he were actually
the son of a king, born after his father was crowned, he had a special
right to be chosen. But the crown had never been given to a woman, nor
does it seem that the son of a king’s daughter had any claim above
another man. But it was held that, though the crown could not pass by
will, yet some weight ought to belong to the wishes of the late King.
Now King Edward had no children, and the only man in the kingly house
was his nephew Edward, the son of his elder brother Edmund Ironside.
This is he who had been sent away as a child in Cnut’s time. He was
now living in Hungary, with his wife and three children, Edgar,
Margaret, and Christina. King Edward in 1054 sent for him to come to
England, doubtless meaning that he should succeed him. This shows that
he had quite given up all thought of being succeeded by his Norman
cousin. Edward the Ætheling--that is, the king’s son, as son of Edmund
Ironside--came to England in 1057; but he sickened and died soon after
he landed. His son Edgar was quite a child, and was not a king’s son.
Moreover he was not born in the land, and he could hardly have been
much of an Englishman. Men had therefore to think who should be king
if King Edward died before Edgar was grown up. One can fancy that the
King might have wished to leave the crown to his nephew Earl Ralph;
but, though he was the King’s nephew, he was not of the kingly house,
and he was not an Englishman. Ralph too died the same year. We can
hardly doubt that from this time men began to think whether a time
might not come when they should have to choose a king not of the kingly
house. From this time Earl Harold seems to hold a special place, and
to be spoken of in a special way. His name is joined with the King’s
name in a way which is not usual, and he is even called _Subregulus_
or _Under-king_. All this looks as if the thought of choosing him king
whenever Edward should die was already in men’s minds.
=6. Earl Harold’s Church at Waltham.=--In those days almost every great
man, both in England and in Normandy, thought it his duty to make some
great gift to the Church, commonly to found or enrich some monastery,
to build or rebuild its great church or minster. Many monasteries were
founded and churches built at this time in Normandy by Duke William
and his barons. And it was the same in England. King Edward’s great
business was to rebuild and enrich the minster of Saint Peter on the
isle of Thorney in the Thames, which, as standing west from the great
church of London, the church of Saint Paul, was known as the _West
Minster_. So the Lady Edith, Earl Leofric and his wife Godgifu, Earl
Siward, Earl Odda, and many bishops and abbots, were busy at this time
building churches and founding monasteries. Earl Godwine is the only
great man of the time of whom we hear nothing of the kind. Earl Harold,
on the other hand, was as bountiful as any of them, only his bounty
went, not to the monks, but to the secular clergy. These were those
clergy who were not, like the monks, bound by special vows in their
own persons, but only by the general law of the Church. They were the
parish priests and the canons of cathedral and collegiate churches;
only in England several cathedral churches were now served by monks,
and more were afterwards. For the monks were much more in fashion
just now; Earl Harold however, when he founded a great church, placed
in it not monks but secular canons. This was at Waltham in Essex. A
church had been founded there in Cnut’s days by his banner-bearer Tofig
the Proud, who put in it a rood or cross which had been brought from
Leodgaresburh (afterwards called Montacute) in Somerset, and which was
thought to work wonders. Harold now rebuilt Tofig’s church on a greater
scale; and, whereas Tofig had founded only two priests, Harold raised
the number to twelve, one of whom was Dean, and another _Childmaster_.
Earl Harold had through his whole life a special reverence for the Holy
Cross of Waltham, and in battle the war-cry of his immediate following
was “Holy Cross.”
=7. Harold and William.=--The Duke of the Normans and the Earl of
the West-Saxons were thus both of them winning fame and power, each
of them on his own side of the sea. They were beyond all doubt the
foremost men, the one in England, the other in Gaul. But there was a
difference between their positions which arose out of the different
political conditions of England and Gaul. Harold was a subject of the
King of the English, his chief adviser and minister, the ruler of a
great part of the kingdom under the King. But he was still a subject,
though a subject who had some hope of being one day chosen king over
his own land and people. William could not be called a subject of the
King of the French; he was a sovereign prince, ruling his own land, and
owing at most an external homage to the king. But he had no chance, as
Harold had, of ever becoming a king in his own land; his only chance
of becoming a king was by winning, either by force or by craft, the
crown of England. Harold and William were therefore rivals. By this
time they must have known that they were rivals. But as yet nothing had
happened to make any open enmity between them. They could hardly have
met face to face; but each must have carefully watched the course of
the other. And before long they were to meet face to face; but there
are so many stories as to the way in which their meeting came about
that it is very hard to say anything at all certain about it. Harold
made a journey on the continent in 1058, when he made the pilgrimage to
Rome. And it is said that, on his way back, he carefully studied the
state of things among the princes of Gaul. At that time William’s chief
enemies, Henry of France, William of Aquitaine, and Geoffrey of Anjou,
were all alive, and it may be that Harold had some schemes of alliance
with some of them, in case William should ever put forth any dangerous
claims. But of the details of this journey we know nothing. The Norman
writers always said that Harold at some time or other took an oath to
William, which he broke by accepting the English crown. But they tell
the story in so many ways, with so many differences of time, place,
and circumstances, that we cannot be certain as to any details. The
English writers say nothing about the story; but the fact that they do
say nothing about it is the best proof that there is some truth in it.
For there are many Norman slanders against Harold which they carefully
answer; so we may be sure that, if they could have altogether denied
this story, if they could have said that Harold never took any oath
to William at all, they would gladly have said so. We may therefore
believe that Harold did take some kind of oath to William, which oath
William was able to say that Harold had broken. But further than this
we can say nothing for certain. All that we can do therefore is to tell
the story in that way which, out of the many ways in which it is told,
seems the least unlikely.
=8. The Oath of Harold.=--It would seem then that, most likely in the
year 1064, after the Welsh war, Harold was sailing in the Channel, most
likely with his brother Wulfnoth and his sister Ælfgifu. They were
wrecked on the coast of Ponthieu, where Count Guy, according to the
cruel custom of the time towards shipwrecked people, shut up Harold in
prison, in hopes of getting a ransom. But the Earl contrived to send
a message to Guy’s lord Duke William, and the Duke at once sent to
release him, paying Guy a large ransom. William then took Harold to
his court at Rouen and kept him there as his guest in all friendship.
Harold even consented, in return doubtless for the kindness which the
Duke had shown him, to help William in a war which he was carrying on
with the Breton Count Conan, a war in which William and Harold together
took the town of Dinan. At some stage of this visit Harold took the
oath. It seems most likely that the oath really was simply to marry one
of William’s daughters, but that the oath was accompanied by an act
of homage to William. Such acts of homage were often done in return
for any favour, without much being meant by them; and Harold had just
received a great favour from William in his release from Guy’s prison.
The act might be understood in two ways; but it is plain that William
would have a great advantage when he came to claim the crown, from the
fact that Harold had in any way become his man. All kinds of other
stories, some strange, some quite impossible, are told. Harold is made
to promise, not only to secure the crown to William on Edward’s death,
but to give up the castle of Dover and other places in England to be
held by Norman garrisons. And there is one specially famous tale how
William tricked Harold into swearing quite unwittingly in an unusually
solemn way. He was made, so the story ran, to put his hand on a chest,
and it was shown to him afterwards that this chest was full of the
relics of saints. And those who tell this story are much shocked at the
supposed crime of Harold, but seem to see no harm in the trick played
by William. The stories all contradict one another; but they all agree
in one thing, namely in making Harold promise to marry a daughter of
William. And this promise he certainly did not keep. After all this,
Harold went back to England, leaving, as it would seem, his brother
Wulfnoth as a hostage for fulfilment of his promise, whatever that
promise was.
=9. The Revolt of Northumberland.=--It will be remembered that Tostig
the son of Godwine had been made Earl of the Northumbrians on the death
of Siward in 1055. Beside Northumberland, his earldom took in the
outlying shires of Northampton and Huntingdon. The Norman tales speak
of Harold and Tostig as having been enemies from their boyhood; but
there is nothing to make us think that there is any truth in this, and
Tostig helped Harold in his Welsh wars. Tostig had also some wars of
his own with Malcolm of Scotland, who invaded Northumberland, although
he and Tostig were sworn brothers. Tostig also, like Harold, made
the pilgrimage to Rome, and, when he and his people were robbed, he
used some very bold language to Pope Nicolas. In his own earldom he
had a fierce people to rule, and he ruled them fiercely; beginning
with stern justice, he gradually sank into oppression. He seems also
to have given offence by staying away from his earldom with the King,
with whom he was a great favourite, and handing Northumberland over
to the rule of one Copsige. At last, when he had put several of the
chief men to death and had laid on a very heavy tax, the whole people
revolted. This was in October, 1065. They held an assembly at York, in
which they declared Tostig deposed, and chose Morkere the son of Ælfgar
to be their earl. Under him Oswulf, a descendant of the old earls,
was to rule in Bernicia. They rifled Tostig’s hoard; they killed his
followers and friends, and marched to Northampton, harrying the land
as they went. There Morkere’s brother Edwin, the Earl of the Mercians,
met them with the men of his earldom and a great body of Welshmen. Thus
half England was in revolt. Tostig meanwhile was hunting with the King
in Wiltshire. The King was eager to make war on the Northumbrians; but
Earl Harold wished to make peace, even at the expense of his brother.
The King at last gave him full power to settle matters; so he held
an assembly at Oxford, and, as he saw that it was hopeless to try to
reconcile Tostig and the Northumbrians, he granted their demands. Peace
was made, and the laws of Cnut were renewed; that is to say, it was
decreed that Northumberland should be as well ruled as it had been in
Cnut’s day. Morkere was acknowledged as Earl of the Northumbrians; but
Northamptonshire and Huntingdonshire were given to Waltheof the son of
Siward. And Oswulf, one of the blood of the old Northumbrian earls,
ruled, seemingly under Morkere, in the northern part of the earldom,
that which was now beginning to be specially called Northumberland.
Tostig was banished and sought shelter in Flanders. By this revolution
the house of Leofric became again at least as powerful in England as
the house of Godwine, setting aside the personal influence of Harold.
=10. The Death of Edward.=--We have now come near to the end of King
Edward’s reign. All this time he had been building the great church of
Saint Peter at Westminster, close by his palace, and he was just able
to finish it before he died. The Wise Men came together at Westminster
for the Christmas feast of 1065; the King wore his crown as usual; but
he fell sick before the hallowing of the new minster, which was done
on Innocents’ Day. Before the feast was over, on January 5th, 1066,
he died, the last King of the male line of Cerdic. Before he died, he
uttered some strange words which were taken to be a prophecy, and which
were in aftertimes understood of the Conquest of England and of the
succession of the kings who followed. But his last act was to recommend
the Wise Men to choose Earl Harold as king in his stead. The next day,
the feast of the Epiphany, King Edward was buried in his own church of
Saint Peter. He had built it specially to be the crowning-place and the
burying-place of kings. It was put to both uses within a few days after
it was hallowed.
=11. The Election and Coronation of Harold.=--And now the time had come
for which men must have been looking so long. King Edward was dead; a
new king had to be chosen, and there was no one in the kingly house fit
to be chosen. As the Christmas feast was not yet over, the Wise Men
were still gathered together at Westminster; so that they could choose
at once. It is not clear whether anybody in England knew anything
about Harold’s oath to William; if anything was known of it, it must
have been held to be of no strength. Nor do we know whether the claims
either of William or of Edgar were spoken of or thought of. The thing
which is certain is that, as soon as Edward was dead, the assembly
met, and, according to the late king’s wishes, chose Earl Harold King.
The next day he was hallowed to king in the new church of Saint Peter;
that is, he was crowned and anointed, and he swore the oath to his
people. As men had doubts whether Stigand of Canterbury was a lawful
archbishop, the rite was done by Ealdred Archbishop of York. Of this
there is no real doubt, though some of the Norman writers say that
Harold was crowned by Stigand. That is, they wish to imply that he was
not lawfully crowned. For in those days the crowning of a king was not
a mere pageant. It was his actual admission to the kingly office, just
like the consecration of a bishop. Till he was crowned, he might have,
by birth or election, the sole right to become king; but he did not
become king till the oil was poured on his head and the crown set upon
it. So men might argue that, if the rite was done by an archbishop who
had no good right to his see, the coronation would not be valid. All
this is worth marking, as showing the feelings of the time. But there
is no doubt that Harold came to the crown quite regularly, that he was
recommended by Edward on his death-bed, that he was regularly chosen by
the assembly, and regularly crowned by Archbishop Ealdred. If things
had gone on quietly, Harold would most likely have been the first of
a new line of kings. This event in our history is very much like what
had happened among the Franks three hundred years before. The last
King of the house of the Merwings was deposed, and Pippin, the father
of the Emperor Charles the Great, was chosen King in his stead. Only
in England there was no need to depose Edward, but merely to choose
Harold when he died. And in one very important point the change of the
kingly house among the English was quite unlike the same change among
the Franks. For the Pope specially approved of the election of Pippin,
while the Pope was very far from approving of the election of Harold.
=12. King Harold in Northumberland.=--One of the English Chronicles
says that the nine months of the reign of Harold were a time of
“little stillness.” So it truly was; he was hard at work from the very
beginning. At what time Duke William first sent to challenge the crown
is not certainly known; but it is not likely to have been very long
after Harold’s crowning. Of this however we shall best speak in another
chapter. But the new king found at once that part of his kingdom was
not ready to acknowledge him. This was Northumberland, to the people
of which land he had lately shown so much favour by confirming their
deposition of his own brother, and their choice of Morkere as their
earl. Harold had indeed been crowned by their own archbishop, and
their chief men must have acknowledged him along with the rest of the
Wise Men; but we should remember that at an assembly in London, though
there would be many men present from Wessex, Mercia, and East-Anglia,
there could not be many from Northumberland. This would indeed be
true of almost every assembly that was held at all; for the three
usual places were Winchester, Westminster, and Gloucester, all of them
places convenient in turn for different parts of southern England,
but none of them convenient for Northumberland. But the change of the
kingly house was an act of greater weight than any other, and the
Northumbrians might have some kind of ground for saying that the choice
had been made without their consent. How far the brother earls Edwin
and Morkere had anything to do with stirring up discontent we cannot
tell; but their doings both before and after look like it. Anyhow the
Northumbrians refused to acknowledge King Harold. The King now did just
as he had done a few months before. He did not think of force; but he
went himself to York, taking with him his friend Wulfstan Bishop of
Worcester, a most holy man, who was afterwards called Saint Wulfstan.
At York he held an assembly, and the speeches of the King and the
Bishop persuaded the Northumbrians to submit without any fighting. And
it was most likely at this time, and by way of further pleasing the
Northumbrians, that King Harold married Ealdgyth the sister of Edwin
and Morkere and widow of the Welsh King Gruffydd. He thus made it
quite impossible that he could marry Duke William’s daughter. And the
Norman writers do not fail to speak against the marriage on that score,
and further to blame him for marrying the widow of a man whom he had
killed. Yet Harold had simply overcome Gruffydd in fair warfare, and he
had nothing to do with his death, which was the deed of Gruffydd’s own
people.
=13. The Comet.=--King Harold came back from York to Westminster,
and there kept his Easter feast. The usual place was Winchester; but
London was now growing in importance, and specially so during these
few months of Harold’s reign. For he was busy the whole time in making
ready for the defence of all southern and eastern England, and for this
London was the best head-quarters. He did not appoint any earl of the
West-Saxons, but kept Wessex in his own hands, while the south-eastern
shires formed the earldoms of his brothers Gyrth and Leofwine. We read
much of his good government and good laws, which of course simply means
that he went on doing as king as he had done as earl. For any making
of new laws he had no time. But he seems to have given what heed he
could to ecclesiastical appointments and reform; for it was specially
needful for him to get the clergy on his side. One thing specially
marked this Easter assembly. A most brilliant comet was seen, which is
recorded by all manner of writers both in England and elsewhere. In
those days, when astronomy was little known, men believed that a comet
was sent as a sign that some great event was going to happen. So now
men gazed at the hairy star, and wondered what would come of it. By
this time every one must have known something of the great struggle
which was coming. The comet, it was thought, foretold the fall of some
great power; but they could not yet tell whether it foretold the fall
of Harold or the fall of William.
=14. Summary.=--We have thus seen how, after the death of his father,
Harold, as Earl of the West-Saxons, gradually became chief ruler of
England, and how the path was opened to him to become king on Edward’s
death. We have seen how he made some kind of oath to Duke William which
might be said to be broken by his accepting the crown. We have seen how
he was nevertheless regularly named, chosen, and crowned king, and how
he got possession of the whole kingdom. We have now to see what was
all this while going on beyond sea, what preparations his rival Duke
William was making, and what other dangers were threatening England
from other quarters.