The Harrying of the North

The plundering of the northern lands of England after the Norman Conquest

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The battle in which William I, Duke of Normandy killed Harold Godwineson and defeated his army on Saturday 14 October 1066 about seven miles from Hastings is a profound turning point in English history.

After the battle, the aristocracy and clergy in southern England, rallied to William. Indeed the Archbishop of York, Aldred, also supported William’s claim. He was crowned at Edward’s the Confessor’s newly built Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day 1066. That might have been that.

However William had to reward his army. He started to build wooden castles across the countryside and they levied taxes and sometimes just robbed the indigenous population. This gave rise to resistance in the west and in the north.

It was at this moment that a very last invasion took place by the Danes, and they took York and there was slaughter at the garrison. Indeed this was the only time when a Norman castle was subdued. The local population welcomed the Danes.

William got furious. He decided to adopt a scorched earth policy, and this has become known as the harrying of the North.

The English Chronicler and Benedictine monk, Orderic Vitalis (1072 to 1142), wrote the Historia Ecclesistica, in which he described the violence: helpless children, young men in the prime of life, and hoary grey beards alike were perishing of hunger.