Fulk le Réehin, count of Anjou (1067–1109) described how he
fought his brother for the county over a period of eight years:
But still he attacked me yet again, laying siege to my
fortress of Brissac. There I rode against him with those princes whom God in
His clemency, permitted to join me, and I fought with him a pitched battle in
which, by God’s grace, I overcame him; and he was captured and handed over to
me, and a thousand of his men with him.
The repeated invocation of God’s name shows how few
illusions Fulk had about the chances of battle.
Duke William of Normandy shared his wariness, but in the
expedition against England battle was unavoidable. Its risks probably underlay
the unwillingness already noted of some of the Norman lords to join in the
enterprise. William’s attack on England enjoyed great good fortune. His
preparations had taken a very long time, yet he found exceptionally good
weather very late in the year for the crossing on 27 September 1066. In the
passage from Dives to St Valéry his fleet had suffered losses, but none are
recorded for the main crossing on 27 September and this suggests that the
favourable breeze that day did not exceed Force 3.5, about 10 mph. In any
greater wind his precious horses would probably have suffered losses for they
were housed in ordinary transports, not ships specially designed for the
purpose. It seems likely that he had sent out light ships to watch the English
fleet and coasts and so would have known of the partial collapse of the enemy
defences on 8 September and probably also of Harold’s march north. Since
William seems to have been well aware of Norse interest in England and had
encouraged Tosti, Harold’s estranged brother, in his attacks on England, this was
not mere good luck. William’s diplomacy to isolate Harold had been intensive
and he was able to unfurl a papal banner before his army. After landing at
Pevensey William soon realised that Hastings was a better site, and moved there
a day later. Immediately he began to fortify his bases, building castles at
both to protect themselves and provide safe harbour for the fleet. At the same
time he raided the countryside, a process shown vividly in the Tapestry. It is
possible that this ravaging, in Harold’s own earldom, was intended to provoke
the enemy into an overhasty attack, but the feeding of such a large host would
have compelled it anyway. With a secure base William could dominate the Sussex
coast, but in the longer run his situation was not very favourable, for the
English fleet would soon threaten his communications which in any case were at
risk as the weather deteriorated and the autumn storms blew up. William wanted
a quick solution, as he had probably known all along; he needed to seek battle and
to capitalise quickly on his strength and the high morale of his army buoyed up
by promises of English land. On the other hand, he hardly dared risk deep
penetration of an enemy hinterland where he would find difficulties enough
later, even unopposed. But he was ready for battle. According to William of
Poitiers, a Breton servant of the Confessor, Robert Fitz-Wimarch, sent a
message warning him of the coming of the Saxon army and urging him to take
refuge in his fortifications, but William rejected this advice eagerly stating
his desire for battle. It was William’s great good fortune that Harold played
into his hands, but this was a miscalculation brilliantly exploited by the
Norman duke.
Harold’s victory over the Danes at York on 25 September was,
by all accounts, a bloody affair which, coming on top of the losses at Fulford
on 20 September, must seriously have reduced the available effectives in the
Anglo-Saxon army. Traditionally, he is supposed to have heard of William’s
landing on or shortly after 1 October and then to have been obliged to retrace
his thirteen-day 190-mile march to London, arriving at Hastings on 13 October.
If this chronology is in any way correct, then we can suppose that not all of
his army came with him, for Ordericus says he spent five days in London raising
forces. This may or may not be precisely true, but Harold would have needed
some time to concentrate troops and surely no considerable army could have
moved so far so fast. Harold then set off and reached Battle on the evening of
13 October. We do not know what his intentions were. It is possible that he hoped
to take the Normans by surprise as he had the Norse and this was certainly what
the Normans later thought, even fearing a night attack which caused the army to
spend an uncomfortable and sleepless night. It is equally possible that he
wanted to force William’s army to concentrate by its fortifications, cutting it
off from food – a tactic we have noted used by William himself. In either case
his error was to march as close to his enemy as Battle, a mere seven miles from
the main enemy encampment. This was the edge of the wooded lands and he could
go no further for, like all Anglo-Saxon forces, his army was used to fighting
on foot – although its leading members travelled on horseback. On the open
Downs such an infantry force could be cut to pieces by the Norman cavalry. The
error was compounded because William pounced on it. For William had been at
pains to keep a close watch for enemy movements – his emphasis on good
reconnaissance was a life-long characteristic. Early on the morning of 14
October he marched quickly to Battle and deployed his army catching Harold
unawares, as the Chronicle E has it: ‘before all the army had come’ and D more
interestingly: ‘And William came against him by surprise before his army was
drawn up in battle array. But the king nevertheless fought hard against him
with the men who were willing to support him’. Florence of Worcester says that
only half Harold’s army had assembled and only a third deployed when the
Normans struck.
Harold managed to seize a strong position at the mouth of a
funnel through the woods on the main road by the present village of Battle. He
had a strong position for defence and his men were determined. But they had no
way of attacking the enemy who could retreat easily and attack once more,
unless they obligingly panicked. Nor could Harold’s forces retreat for the
enemy were upon them. Harold’s impetuous rush forward meant that his army was
immobilised, unable to go forward or back, and though it barred William’s route
inland the initiative in the forthcoming battle would lie with the Normans.
This is the force of William of Poitiers’s famous comment: ‘What a strange
contest then began, in which one of the protagonists attacked freely and at
will, the other enduring the assault as though rooted to the ground’. Moreover,
there was an additional problem springing from Harold’s haste; his army appears
to have had very few archers. This does not mean that they were without missile
throwers – javelins, axes and clubs fly through the air in the Tapestry. But
the bow outranged all these: it was a striking vulnerability, and William’s
deployment was organised to exploit it. His army advanced in three lines with
archers thrown forward, followed by armoured foot and then the cavalry. In
addition his line was divided into three divisions, with the Bretons on the
left, the Normans in the centre and the French on the right. In effect William
was assaulting a fortress – the close-packed Anglo-Saxon and Danish infantry
settled in a strong position on top of the hill. Of these many were
professionals as well armed as their enemies, but as the Tapestry shows there
were many lesser folk, lacking anything except a spear.
William clearly intended that his archers should weaken the
enemy by their fire, probably from about fifty yards, protected from enemy
sally by the presence of heavily armed infantry who would then charge in to the
assault making breaches which the cavalry could exploit. The strength of the
Saxon position and the effectiveness of their weapons balked the Normans. The
cavalry then joined in the mêlée until, on the left, the Bretons were repulsed
and pursued by the English: William rallied his men by showing them that the
rumour of his death was untrue and they fell upon the exposed English with
great slaughter. It was perhaps a result of this near disaster that William
resorted to feigned flight, twice drawing out substantial forces of his enemy
who were then cut to pieces. This attrition was reinforced by direct assault on
the English position, supported by volleys of arrows. In his description of
this final stage of the battle, William of Poitiers makes it clear that the
English continued to fight hard but were gradually surrounded, losses forcing
the contraction of their line. However, it was probably the death of Harold and
his brothers which led to the eventual flight.
The battle illustrates the skills of a late eleventh-century
commander. The marshalling of resources speaks volumes for the duke’s ability
to exploit the peasant surplus. Many of the soldiers in the Norman army were
paid professionals from all over France, and there were similar people, English
and Danish, in Harold’s force. William sought battle, but he had obviously
planned to fortify his bases and to live off the country. He kept a close watch
on his enemy who failed to surprise him. Unable to advance or retreat, Harold
was himself caught, on the morning of the 14 October, by the speed with which
the Normans advanced and deployed, but he managed to seize a strong position.
The Norman order of battle was well designed, for the assault and the mobility
which had given them the initiative was used with skill to erode the English
strength. A feature of the battle was William’s control of his army. He led by
example, an essential quality of a medieval commander, having three horses
killed under him, while at the same time supervising his forces and encouraging
them even at the very end when some English made a stand at the Malfosse.
Harold’s failure to await reinforcements meant that he lacked archers and so
exposed his men cruelly.
The decisive arm in the battle was, however, the Norman
cavalry. It was not that they could charge home sweeping all before them, for
clearly they could not. The Tapestry shows them not so much charging into the
enemy as jabbing and hacking at them. The mass charge with the lances couched,
which would be the feature of cavalry warfare later in the twelfth century, was
not a feature of Hastings: in the Tapestry some figures carry their lances
couched, but for the most part those with spears jab at their enemies overarm
or underarm, or even throw them, while others hack with their swords. The
question of when this style of ‘shock tactics’ was developed, with riders én
masse in close order clamping their long and heavy lances under their arms, has
been much debated. It is now generally accepted that the technique was only in
its infancy in 1066, but views of when it became a widely accepted method vary
from about 1100 to the 1140s. Inevitably much of the discussion has been based
on medieval illustrations and their interpretation, a factor which has also
complicated discussion of the size of horses. However, the illustrations used
too often show individual warriors and discussions have focused on these
portrayals. In fact mounted soldiers must quite often have tucked their lances
under their arms; it was a natural and useful way of using the weapon, though
others could be just as useful as the Bayeux Tapestry shows. What was novel was
the employment of this technique by large numbers in disciplined units, a
matter on which the illustrative material is not very helpful. It would appear
to the present writer that the First Crusade represents a critical stage in the
evolution of this technique, as will be indicated later. The Normans who fought
at Hastings probably owed their cohesion and discipline, which enabled them to
manoeuvre as in the feigned flights, to long practice in fighting alongside
their neighbours grouped around the local lord. This was not the triumph of
cavalry over infantry as portrayed by Oman, rather it was the triumph of a good
commander who used all the means at his disposal to break down a courageous
enemy. His campaign was methodical and his battle formation well adapted for
its purpose. The archers weakened the enemy and were guarded by heavy foot who
then moved to the assault followed up by cavalry. The resilience of Harold’s
force blunted this plan but William was able to extemporise the feigned flights
which weakened his enemy for the final bloody assault in which, amongst the
English, it seemed as though the dead as they fell moved more than the living.
It was not the shock value of the cavalry which triumphed, but their
disciplined mobility and courage. Unbroken infantry was always highly dangerous
to cavalry. At Bourgethéroulde in 1124 some of the rebels rejoiced when the
English king’s household troops dismounted, but the experienced Amaury de Montfort
took a more realistic view. ‘A mounted soldier who has dismounted with his men
will not fly from the field – he will either die or conquer’. At Tinchebrai in
1106 Henry I of England (1099–1135) dismounted much of his force and it was
these that halted Robert Curthose’s last charge. Indeed, the value of infantry
in anchoring a line of defence was always recognised – Leo VI ‘the Wise’
(886–912) had suggested that infantry be posted behind cavalry in the line of
battle so that the latter could withdraw behind them if things went badly, and
King Baldwin of Jerusalem (1118–32) would use just this formation at Hab in
1119. An eleventh-century Spanish Muslim writer, Abu Bakr at-Turtusi suggested
a rather more complex though not dissimilar tactical formation:
The tactics we use and which seem the most efficacious
against our enemy are these. The infantry with their antelope [hide] shields,
lances and iron-tipped javelins are placed, kneeling in ranks. Their lances
rest obliquely on their shoulders, the shaft touching the ground behind them,
the point directed towards the enemy. Each one kneels on his left knee with his
shield in the air. Behind the infantry are the picked archers who, with their
arrows, can pierce coats of mail. Behind the archers are the cavalry. When the
Christians charge, the infantry remains in position, kneeling as before. As
soon as the enemy comes into range, the archers let loose a hail of arrows
while the infantry throw their javelins and receive the charge on the points of
their lances. Then infantry and archers open their ranks to right and left and
through the gaps they create, the cavalry rushes the enemy and inflicts upon
him what Allah wills.
In recognising the limitations of cavalry and the value of
infantry we need to bear in mind that the horses used at Hastings were
comparatively small animals. Recent research suggests that in the late eleventh
century a horse of twelve hands was quite large, and one of fourteen or more
exceptional. To put this into perspective, a Shetland is ten hands, a twelve-hand
horse would now be classified as a pony, and fourteen a small hunter. These
estimates are based on examining the representations of horses in the Bayeux
Tapestry, particularly in relation to their riders. In the Tapestry all the
horsemen arc riding ‘long’, that is with their legs at almost full-stretch and
feet in stirrups fully extended, a configuration which gives stability. In all
cases the rider’s legs project well below the body of the horse, suggesting a
small animal. It is possible that this is an artistic convention but the story
of Richard, son of Asclctin of Aversa, who liked to ride horses so small that
his feet almost touched the ground is well-known. Moreover, similar
representations are known in quite different contexts; an eleventh-century
Spanish marble relief and the early twelfth-century Commentaries of Beatus (BM
Add 11695) arc examples and many more could be cited. It is interesting that in
the Aquileia mural of a crusader with spear couched pursuing and killing a
Saracen, no difference in the size of horses is suggested, and this seems to be
generally true of early twelfth-century pictures. William’s knights charging
uphill against steady infantry must have needed good nerves and it is doubtful
if they were aware of the ‘shock’ effect which later writers would ascribe to
them. What happened along the crest of that hill where Battle Abbey now stands
must have resembled the sixteenth-century ‘push at pike’, not the charge of
some Hollywood Light Brigade. William exploited his good luck and, decisively,
used the mobility of his cavalry with great skill. But the fact that cavalry
was decisive does not mean that it was totally dominant, as later experience
mentioned here shows. William was certainly careful to bring plenty of
foot-soldiers with him. Battle was always chancy – William was able to rally
his men against one early moment of panic which could have destroyed him. Once
this crisis was over he held the initiative and could plan his attacks and he
did so to great effect. Hastings was a decisive battle largely because the
killing of Harold and his brothers, together with a large number of thegns
whose deaths came on top of the butchery at Fulford and Stamford, deprived the
Anglo-Saxon realm of much of its leadership. Harold himself paid the price for
his folly in engaging too soon. Even so, the battle did not deliver the whole
realm to William. He would soon be crowned, but it was only by terrible
devastation in the north and covering the land with a network of castles that
he was able to secure his hold. This process of conquest was greatly facilitated
by the lack of castles in England. The English learned – Hereward built a
castle at Ely in 1071 – but by then it was too late and William’s long war of
attrition, which followed Hastings, was on the brink of success.
The conquest of England is not isolated as an example of
large scale and complex military effort in late eleventh century Europe. Only a
few years later Robert Guiscard, the Norman conqueror of South Italy, launched
a great expedition to capture the Eastern Roman Empire. This involved the
raising of a fleet and a great army which was kept in the field for some four
years from 1081–5. Guiscard had been seeking a Byzantine marriage for his
family and when his efforts collapsed be took advantage of the internal
weakness of the empire in the early years of Alexius I Comnenus (1081–1118). It
was an extraordinarily bold act, for Robert’s brother, Roger, would not
complete the conquest of Sicily until 1091, while he himself had promised to
aid Pope Gregory VII (1073–85) against Henry IV of Germany. In these
circumstances the Byzantines were able to create diplomatic difficulties by
subsidising Henry IV, inflaming hostility amongst the many Norman leaders who
had resented the Hauteville domination, some of whom were actually employed as
mercenaries by Alexius, and by playing upon Venetian concern about a Norman
dominion on both sides of the Adriatic. This diplomatic background severely
hampered the Norman campaign. War opened late in 1080 when Bohemond landed at
Avlona with the vanguard of an army 15,000 strong whose core was a purely
Norman force of 1,300 knights. By 17 June 1081, after seizing Corfu, Robert and
Bohemond were before Dyrrachium, the western terminus of the Via Egnetia, the
great road to Constantinople, held for Alexius by George Paleologus. A close
siege was established around Dyrrachium with the construction of a great
leather-covered siege-tower. Against it, Paleologus built a tower on the wall
equipped with wooden beams to hold off the Norman attack, and as the two towers
engaged, his troops sallied out and burned the siege-tower. In July 1081 the
Venetians largely destroyed the Norman fleet, and Guiscard was now faced with a
strong Greek army under Alexius which by 15 October was close to Dyrrachium.
Guiscard’s situation was now extremely difficult, his communications were cut
and an enemy force was in the field. Alexius debated whether to attack, or to
establish a counter-blockade which would starve the Normans. There was much to
commend either course of action. The problem with blockade was that it would
take time and Alexius had problems elsewhere, and it was probably because of
this that he advanced to battle on 18 October 1081. Guiscard burned the remnant
of his fleet, forcing his troops to fight. He seems to have surprised Alexius
by leaving his camp early in the morning, so that it was captured by the
garrison of Dyrrachium and other forces sent by Alexius. As the Greek army
deployed, the Varangian guard, numbering in its ranks many Anglo-Saxons,
prepared for action. Then they charged, contrary to Alexius’s orders and though
they pushed back the horse and infantry under the count of Bari, they were
overextended and defeated by an infantry charge in the flank. Many of Alexius’s
compound force, including the Turks and the large Slav force under their ruler
Bodin, then fled making no effort to intervene as the Normans fell upon Alexius
in the centre. Guiscard’s victory opened the way for the fall of Dyrrachium in
February 1082 enabling the Normans to advance via Deabolis to Kastoria in the
spring of 1082. At this point Guiscard was forced to return to Italy by revolt
in his own lands, fanned by Byzantine money and by Henry IV’s assault on Rome
which Alexius had encouraged, leaving Bohemond to conduct a campaign whose immediate
purpose was probably to secure a firm base for further advance. Although a
number of cities fell and Bohemond twice defeated Alexius’s efforts to relieve
Joannina the Norman expedition was now in difficulties. Bohemond failed to
seize Ochrida and Berroea, while the fort at Moglena fell to a Byzantine
counterattack. Skopia, Pelagonia and Trikala, amongst others, fell, but the
siege of Larissa was undertaken late in 1082 at a time when there had been
desertions and treachery in the Norman force. These symptoms of exhaustion
prepared the way for Alexius to challenge Bohemond in the open field. His
earlier experience had not been good. Anna tells us that after the defeat at
Dyrrachium Alexius had decided that: ‘the first charge of the Keltic cavalry
was irresistible’. In his attempts to relieve the siege of Joannina he used
strategies to counter this. In his first effort he strengthened his centre with
wagons mounted with poles, whose presence was intended to break up enemy
cavalry assault. However, Bohemond was forewarned and attacked on the flanks.
It was not a decisive defeat and the emperor returned, this time protecting his
centre with caltrops, iron barbs scattered on the ground – but Bohemond again
attacked on the flank. At Larissa in the spring of 1083, however, Alexius lured
much of Bohemond’s force away from his camp which the Byzantines captured, thus
forcing the Normans to raise the siege, although the victory left the Norman
army intact. Bohemond was now faced with retreat and a discontented army which
had not been paid and this forced him to return to Italy, while Alexius mopped
up his garrisons. In the summer of 1083 a Venetian fleet took Dyrrachium and with
the fall of Kastoria to Greek forces in November it seemed that the campaign
was over. In the autumn of 1084 Robert Guiscard raised another army and a fleet
of 150 ships. He defeated the Venetian fleet before Corfu, which he again
seized, but his army was decimated by illness on the mainland and it dissolved
totally when he died in July 1085.
Byzantine Horse Transport.
The Norman war against Byzantium was a long affair. It was
almost certainly prompted by the weakness of the empire at this juncture, but
Guiscard had underestimated his own problems and the range of his enemies,
whose various attacks sapped his army. It became a war of attrition in which
both sides were desperately short of resources. After his defeat at Dyrrachium
Alexius had to resort to seizure of church wealth to raise another army.
Bohemond, left in charge by his father, prosecuted a skillful campaign. The
Normans continued to be a strong fighting force, but their two victories over
Alexius were inconclusive, as was his sole victory over them. In the end, shortages
of money and men were more acute on the Norman side than on the Greek, but it
was a close-run affair. It is remarkable that the Normans of South Italy could
sustain such an effort at all in the circumstances. Certainly the campaign made
Bohemond’s name as a soldier.
The campaigns of William the Conqueror and Robert Guiscard
were, however, somewhat unusual for the ferocity with which they were fought
and the readiness of both sides to resort to battle. When the Conqueror died in
1087 he divided his land between his sons. Robert Curthose held Normandy and
William II ‘Rufus’ became king of England. The third son, Henry, was given
money which he used to found a lordship in the Cotentin. These dispositions
were soon challenged by the brothers, each of whom hoped to gain the whole
inheritance of his father. When Rufus died in a hunting accident in 1099 the
youngest brother, Henry, took up the challenge with ultimate success, for he
seized the English throne and then Normandy with the victory of Tinchebrai in 1106.
In nearly twenty years of war Tinchebrai was the only major battle. In the
first stage of the conflict, Odo of Bayeux conspired with many of the nobility
of England against the king, and Robert Curthose sent Robert of Bellême and
Eustace of Boulogne who seized Pevensey and Rochester. However, he failed to
raise an expedition to support them and the plot fizzled out. In the next
phase, William, with his far greater resources, set about seducing the duke’s
vassals and thereby securing castles as bases. It was in eastern Normandy north
of the Seine that William concentrated his efforts from 1089 onwards, building
a strong position. Robert’s counter-offensive was supported by King Philip of
France who, however, allowed himself to be bought off by William. In November
1090, the English king was able to take advantage of factional struggles in Rouen
and all but seized the city. It was not until 1091 that William came in person
to the scene of this desultory fighting and raiding, which were brought to an
end in February 1091 by a peace between the warring brothers. This gave William
a strong position in Normandy, in part at the expense of Henry’s lands in the
Cotentin and inaugurated a period of rapprochement during which the two
brothers tried to impose order in Normandy. By 1093, however, the two brothers
were again at war and the following year William led a strong army into
Normandy. This time Robert waged quite a successful campaign against William
and his allies, seizing important castles and threatening his long-established
hold on eastern Normandy, until Philip of France was once again bought off with
English bribes. It was probably in anticipation of this campaign that in 1093
William met Robert II of Flanders and concluded a treaty under which the count
of Flanders undertook to supply mercenaries to the English king. In the end,
the English campaign came to a halt when Robert Curthose took the cross. Abbot
Jarento of St Bénigne, the papal legate, then negotiated an arrangement whereby
Robert pawned the duchy to William for three years for the sum of 10,000 marks.
This freed Robert Curthose to join the crusade and provided finances for him.
