Good King Harold’s Eye

1066 is perhaps the best-known date in English history. Certainly, I should not have to elucidate that it was the year of the two major battles that secured the Norman invasion of England and put William The Conqueror on the throne. The first of these battle was fought at Stamford Bridge against the Vikings; the second, much more famous, was the Battle of Hastings.

As famous as 1066 and Harold’s last battle is the Bayeux Tapestry, a Norman work of art that immortalized events and the final moments of Harold’s life. For centuries, the version of history taught as fact is that depicted in the Tapestry; Harold, so the Norman story goes, was hit in the eye with an arrow at the height of the battle. With the death of their King, the English army was defeated. However, the events received as fact for hundreds of years are, in fact, wrong.

It is certainly true that Harold and William brought their armies to Hastings and there met in battle. However, the story related in the Bayeux Tapestry was conceived over a century later by French nuns who had only fragmentary accounts of events on which to base their tapestry. To understand what really happened on that day in 1066, one must be in possession of certain facts that the originators of the tapestry were ignorant.

First, it is necessary to understand that a group of nuns living in a convent in France had little or no contact with the outside world; while they had correct knowledge of the arms and armor used by both sides at Hastings, they were utterly devoid of any military experience; they lived in an age of total female repression where women were utterly excluded from military matters.

Second, it must be understood that the eyeslit of an English helm was little more than an inch (about 3cm) across. While Norman helmets were visorless and sported only a nose guard to protect the wearer’s face, English helms at that time were based on the Anglo-Saxon design, featuring a half-face visor that left only the wearer’s mouth and jaw exposed. Even at close range, with an unimpeded aim and no distraction, only a highly proficient archer would be capable of hitting such a minute target. At Hastings, as at every other battle of the era, the archers were positioned at the farthest limits of bowshot, well back from the savage melee of swords, axes and spears that constituted the center of the fight. The method of archery used under such circumstances was not to loose specific shots at individual targets, but to shoot upwards, over the heads of one’s own infantry, to pour arrows down like rain on the enemy. To prove this it is necessary only to glance again at the helmets worn by fighting men at the time; both Norman and English helms were conical, specifically designed to deflect arrows and weapons falling from above.