A 1066 Channel crossing rewired English land and language
Duke William of Normandy led thousands of Norman, French, Flemish, and Breton troops to seize England in 1066 after Edward the Confessor's death and Harold Godwinson's brief reign. Secure rule came only after 1072, sealed with confiscations and castles.
William's claim leaned on kinship with childless Edward, who had lived in Normandy and may have encouraged him. Norwegian rival Harald Hardrada fell first; Harold followed at Hastings. Rollo's Vikings had settled Normandy under the 911 Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte; Emma of Normandy's 1002 marriage to Æthelred tied dynasties and planted Norman courtiers around Edward from 1042.
Resisting English elites lost estates or fled. Followers received redistributed land, grafting a French-speaking aristocracy onto an Old English kingdom.
The year 1066 was crowded. Harold's exiled brother Tostig raided the southeast with ships raised in Flanders, later joined by vessels from Orkney, before being driven north. In early September Harald Hardrada landed in the north with more than 300 ships and perhaps 15,000 men, reinforced by Tostig; York submitted, and on 25 September Harold crushed the invaders at Stamford Bridge. William, having won over his barons at the Council of Lillebonne, gathered a fleet at Saint-Valery-sur-Somme with large Breton and Flemish contingents. The claim by William of Poitiers that Pope Alexander II blessed the venture with a banner deserves caution. The Normans landed at Pevensey on 28 September, days after Harold's northern victory and after the English fleet had dispersed, and raised a wooden castle at Hastings as a base for raiding. Harold left Morcar, Edwin and much of his army in the north and hurried south.
Source: Norman Conquest
