The Battle of at

By

Jonathan and Michael Starkey

Second Edition Rev 4

Copyright © 2010-2019 Momentous Britain

All rights reserved

ISBN: 978-1-5272-4204-3

Acknowledgements

This manuscript doubtless contains more errors than we would like. We can only say that it would have been an awful lot worse without sage advice from Kathleen Tyson, Simon Mansfield and Jo Kirkham, for which we are enormously grateful. We also have to thank Nick Austin, without whom we would be stuck in the dark ages.

Dedication

With love to our mum, Maggie

About the authors

Momentous Britain is Jonathan, Michael, Dominic and Robin Starkey.

By training we are an engineer, a lawyer, a physicist and a goldsmith. We proved better at the theory than the practice. By profession we ended up as a banker, a civil servant, a computer programmer and a hairdressing salon proprietor. Our experiences and setbacks have contributed to a wide knowledge base, but very few useful skills. One exception is puzzle solving, for which we seem to have a knack.

Compulsions are in our genes. Thankfully, not the muddy fixations of our male forebears, but quirky and capricious fads. A still to make Ogden’s Old Firewhisky, a Herodotus Machine for building Giza-style pyramids and a dilapidated 1857 rose engine to clone Fabergé jewellery boxes are typical examples. Each progresses at glacial speed, interrupted by occasional short bursts of frenetic enthusiasm.

Our theory about the our first and longest fad. We have been working on it sporadically for forty years. Now that we are semi-retired, we are determined to record our thoughts and pass the baton on to professionals. Considering it cost $30,000, we need to focus on fixing the rose engine!

Contents Contents ...... 5 Introduction ...... 7 Wargames ...... 11 Part 1 - Finding the Real Battlefield ...... 22 The Traditional Landing ...... 22 The Landing ...... 28 The Camps ...... 98 The Battle ...... 154 Conclusion and postscript ...... 174 Part 2 - The Traditional Battlefield ...... 177 Battle Hill as a battlefield...... 178 Traditional battlefield and the primary sources ...... 186 Malfosse ...... 192 Evidence that Battle Abbey was on the battlefield ...... 194 Ecclesiastic fiction ...... 199 English Heritage’s argument ...... 202 Why Battle Abbey is where it is ...... 203 Part 3 - Alternative Battlefield Theories ...... 209 Caldbec Hill ...... 214 Crowhurst / Telham Hill ...... 225 Time Team ...... 244 Telham Court Hill ...... 247 Lane / Beech Farm ...... 250 Bibliography ...... 257 Endnote ...... 260

7

Introduction

No one knows for sure where the Battle of Hastings was fought because no one has ever found so much as a battle related button. It was not fought at the traditional location in Battle. At least, that is what we decided after visiting Battle Abbey on a school trip for the 900th anniversary. Even as eight and nine-year-olds we could tell that the basic events described in the traditional narrative do not match the geography and topology of the place. After searching for most of our adult lives, we think we have found the real battlefield near Sedlescombe.

These thoughts were originally published as blogs. They got big and messy. We were asked to amalgamate them into a book for reading convenience. Do not expect an academic reference. We are amateurs that write for fun. This second edition tries to clarify dozens of poorly worded thoughts from its predecessor. It could still do with someone scholarly converting it into something more professional and entertaining.

Our objective is to get archaeologists to search in the right place. Nearly all the manors that Domesday marks as ‘wasted’ were on the Hastings Peninsula. The battle must have happened in the vicinity. We will try to show that our proposed battlefield makes more sense, better fits medieval military tactics and better fits the contemporary accounts than any other candidate. These accounts include some 30 clues about the battlefield. We have come up with a credible explanation for all of them at Sedlescombe. None of the other candidates comes close.

This text is packed with statements like “we think" (160 of these alone), “we guess” (48), “we interpret this to mean", “surely", etc, which make it sound too woolly to be tenable. Other Battle of Hastings theories tend to be more assertive: “This proves …”, “The only possibility …”, etc. They over-egg the cake. R. Allen Brown once lamented that the only certainty about the Battle of Hastings is that the Normans won. He is right. Until some physical evidence turns up, no matter how confident a theory might sound, it is 8 Introduction conjecture. We are not even 100 percent confident in our own theory, which is more thorough than any other we have seen. Indeed, none of the others even answer basic questions, like: “Why did Harold not stay in ?” and “Why did Harold go close enough to the Norman army to have any possibility of losing a battle?”.

By necessity, we respond to other ideas about the battle. Our responses are not intended as criticism. In the majority of cases, we have arrived at different answers because we attach different weight or different interpretations to the same clues. Any or none of us could be right. The genuine narrative could be a combination of ideas from different authors.

Everyone that writes about the Conquest is trying to interpret contemporary accounts in a way that fits then current geography and military tactics. We have a couple of advantages over some of our predecessors, insofar as we had access to the latest LIDAR and 1m topology maps, and we worked from our own objective translations of the contemporary accounts. In general, we concur with one or more of the established translations. We will only use our own translations when this is not so.

On the subject of the contemporary accounts, we should explain that we trust all and none of them. There are only a dozen or so that contain credible original information about the invasion. Most were written in Normandy to glorify Norman culture and/or their Norman sponsor. Troop numbers, casualty figures and heroic deeds cannot be trusted in any of them. The two most detailed manuscripts - Wace and Carmen - are also among the most sycophantic. The others are chronicles that abridge events into a couple of paragraphs, with potentially confusing results. None of the authors were present at the battle. Only the least trustworthy of them visited the site. Any of the accounts might be based on faulty information. Despite all this, with one exception that we address in Part 2, we cannot think of a reason that any of the authors would invent place names, place descriptions, troop movements or the major events. We trust all of them selectively.

Our investigation was like a detective story, each clue leading to the next. Introduction 9

Perhaps it was more Clouseau than Poirot. Our conclusions are linked in time, but not in consequence. We might have fingered the right battlefield even though we got the wrong landing place and/or camps. Any or all of them could be wrong. Any or all of them could be right, though not necessarily for the reasons we think. We urge you to finish, even if you vehemently disagree with some of our intermediate conclusions. Remember that every fitted piece of a jigsaw puzzle helps with the rest. You might be able to fill some gaps or correct our errors. You might contribute to one of the most monumental discoveries of the 21st century.

Books about the Battle of Hastings always seem to include a section about medieval society, the Church, feudal land tenure, Anglo-Saxon , Normandy, William, Harold, Edward the Confessor’s succession, and the events following his death. Not here. We expect readers to have this knowledge. We do not provide it. Others do a better job than we ever could. The Wikipedia entry for the ‘Norman Conquest’ covers the basics. There are dozens of books and websites that go into more detail.

Throughout this book we refer to a ‘Sedlescombe crossing’. It is important for our battlefield theory that it was easy to cross the Brede at Sedlescombe. But the Brede valley is 200m wide at Sedlescombe, which makes some historians think it was only traversable by ferry. In the early Holocene, when the Brede was tidal beyond , it would have been 200m wide at Sedlescombe at high tide. By Roman times, glacial rebound had dropped the Brede’s normal head of tide to Sedlescombe. This has to be so because the Rochester Roman road crossed the Brede at Sedlescombe. The Romans shipped a lot of iron products across the Brede. We guess they channelled the fluvial Brede and crossed the valley with a causeway and timber bridge. The abbeys of St Denys and Fécamp also shipped a lot of iron products across the Brede. We guess that they restored the Roman bridge. Failing that, we are convinced there would have been a solid shallow shingle ford.

A few words about ethnicity too. For convenience we will refer to the adversaries as Norman and English, but it is not accurate. Perhaps a half of 10 Introduction

William’s army were Bretons, Franks and others. The defenders were only English insofar as they were defending England. They are often referred to as Saxon, but this is not right either. Harold’s mother was Danish. His children had Danish names. His father was Saxon but came to power as an ally of Danish King Cnut. Harold thought of himself as ethnic Danish, as did the majority of his barons, his elite guards and the most loyal of his subjects. Wace lists the English army’s home counties. There were at least as many ethnic Danish Jutes and Angles as there were ethnic Jastorf Saxons.

11

Wargames

A teacher once asked us: “If there are 128 players in the Wimbledon Men’s Singles draw, how many matches are played?” After laboriously working it out (answer 127), someone piped up, “It’s obvious, everyone plays exactly one match in which they lose, apart from the winner”. Things look different when you know the answer. Half of Momentous Britain like to play wargames. The other half had spent forty years working out where the Battle of Hastings was fought, when one of them piped up, “It’s obvious, blah, blah, …”. Thanks a bunch.

Most of this work explains our interpretation of accounts written soon after the battle. We know this makes it read like a series of wild guesses that lead to fanciful conclusions. Our wargaming brethren pointed out that our proposed battlefield is likely to be correct based only on the geography of the region. They also noted that the sequence of events can be verified from six relatively uncontentious statements from the contemporary accounts. If you accept this, our more speculative interpretations can be viewed in the way they are intended: To colour the events rather than to define them.

The geography has changed a lot since medieval times. In those days, the Hastings Peninsula was bounded by the sea to the south, the River Ash Bourne to the west and the to the north. The Normans were somewhere south of the Brede. The English were coming from the north. In order for the armies to engage, one or other had to circumvent or cross the Brede. The Sedlescombe crossing (S on Figure 2) was at the Brede’s head of tide. It carried the Roman road from Rochester to Westfield on the Hastings Peninsula. Downstream, the estuary was 300m wide and sandy. It had a low-tide ford (BF) below Brede village. Upstream, the fluvial Brede was 5m or so wide and boggy. It had a ford at Whatlington (W). Upstream from there, the Brede and its tributary the Line were narrow enough to have been easily spanned by temporary bridges. Alternatively, there was probably a route around the river on ancient ridgeways via Netherfield (N). 12 Wargames

The essential tools for this exercise are a Roman road map (Figure 1), a topographical map of (Figure 2), Domesday, a primary school understanding of medieval history, and the knowledge of one conceit.

Figure 1: 1066 coastline showing Roman roads (black) and probable trackways (red)

Normandy had been left with a skeleton defence. William had befriended his traditional enemies in what is now northern France, in order to buy time for his invasion. Peace could not last forever. The longer William was away the greater the chance that someone would try to annex Normandy. Also, the larger the English army and the greater the attrition in the Norman army. William needed to kill Harold quickly. Defeating the English army without killing Harold would probably have led to a Fabian defence which would almost certainly have scuppered the conquest.

Domesday provides a baseline. It reports that large swathes of the Hastings Peninsula were either ‘wasted’ or that they lost most of their value at the time of the invasion; the Normans must have plundered and/or raided there. Harold was in Westminster. In between was the 120-mile-wide primeval Wargames 13 dense Andredsweald forest. Its boundary, shown in green dots on Figure 1, is implied by Domesday manors with no meadowland or ploughland. Figure 1 and Figure 2 show Roman roads in black, known ridgeways and trackways in red or white, and assumed trackways in white dots. These provided the only feasible way for armies to get around because most of the region was low-lying bog or dense woodland.

There were two possible routes that Harold might have taken to get to the battle theatre. The easterly route takes Watling Street to Rochester, then Margary 13 to the Hastings Peninsula. The westerly route takes Margary 14 from Peckham to , then cuts east across the Andredsweald on the LIN-129 trackway from Uckfield to Rye, branching at Heathfield to join the LIN-130 trackway towards the Hastings Peninsula.

There is no wargaming advantage in taking the westerly route. The LIN-129 ridgeway had no settlements for food, and it would be difficult for carts. If it is typical of most ancient forest ridgeways, it would have become overgrown when the Romans left because there was no longer a central power to organise infrastructure maintenance. Moreover, the western route provides no opportunity to muster with troops coming from Kent or with huscarls arriving by boat up the Rother. Wargamers would take the quick and simple easterly route. It does mean crossing the Rother by ferry, but the King could requisition every boat and oarsman in the region to help.

A wargamer playing the English would have an obvious starting place: To create a forward operations base close to the Hastings Peninsula, from where they could dispatch scouts, monitor enemy troop movements, create a picture of the enemy strength and position, and devise a plan of attack.

Harold would not have abandoned the Rochester road voluntarily. It was whence his reinforcements would arrive. It was the only quick and easy route to safety. It had the only solid land routes to the other Brede crossing points and to the ridgeways. If the English left the road, the Normans could occupy 14 Wargames

Figure 2: East Sussex geography and topology it to block an organised retreat and to prevent the English reinforcements joining the main army.

One place stands out as the most likely forward operations base. It is the last Wargames 15 hill on the Rochester road before the Hastings Peninsula. We will refer to it as Great Sanders ridge (G). It was good camp terrain: woody, close to running water, big enough to accommodate the English army, and protected by steep slopes around most of its periphery. It overlooked all three of the Brede crossing points and the Hastings Ridge along which the Normans would have to march if they wanted to circumvent the Brede. It seems to be a safe distance from the nearest possible Norman position.

But then there is the conceit. When Harold chose the English camp location, he thought the Norman army was weak and footbound. He had no reason to fear a Norman attack on Great Sanders ridge. It was 5km from safety at the Rother. The Normans had to be least 2km further away because they were south of the Brede. If Harold decided to withdraw, he would have thought there was no way the Normans could catch 2km uphill over 5km on foot. In reality, they had several thousand experienced knights with trained war horses that could canter to (C) before the English could run there, thereby cutting off a retreat and catching the English in the open. This conceit is not an invention. It is explained in Roman de Rou. We will return to it in the main text.

If the wargamers are right, the real battle narrative is as simple as it could possibly be. The English camped on Great Sanders ridge, at what Harold thought to be a safe distance from the Norman army. To his horror, he discovered the next morning that William had a huge cavalry that put them in range of attack and prevented an organised withdrawal. The English army was effectively trapped. William spent that day scouting the English camp and devising a plan of attack. He attacked the English camp at dawn the following day. Unlike other battle theories, this does not rely on idiotic battle tactics, suicidal surprise attacks or camping at ridiculously poor defensive positions. It just needs Harold to have one intelligence oversight.

For any sceptics thinking that a similar argument could be made for any hill in the vicinity, we disagree. The nearest potential camps to the north of Great Sanders were on the and isthmus ridges. If the English were on the 16 Wargames ridge, there would have been no way for the Normans to cut off their retreat by occupying it. The nearest potential camps to the south of Great Sanders were on the Hastings Peninsula. From a wargaming perspective, it would be unthinkable for the English to cross the Brede, either to make camp or to attack the Norman camp, before the Norman position had been scouted. Quite apart from the ambush risk at the crossing points, it probably had no food; Domesday says that there was very little farmland between the Brede and the Hastings Ridge, and the Normans had been foraging there for two weeks.

Six statements from contemporary accounts summarise our argument. Only twelve of these accounts, plus the Bayeux Tapestry and the Domesday Book, contain trusted original information. It is standard practice is to refer to them as the ‘primary sources’. For the sake of brevity, we will sometimes refer to them using these abbreviations:

ASC = Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (reasonably contemporary with events) ASC-C, ASC-D = The versions of ASC that cover the invasion Tapestry = Bayeux Tapestry; finished c1077 Benoît = Chronique des Ducs de Normandie; Benoît de St-Maure; c1170 Carmen = Carmen de Hastingae Proelio; c1067 CBA = Chronicle of Battle Abbey; c1170 Chronicon = Chronicon ex Chronicis; John of Worcester; c1125 CKE = Gesta Regum Anglorum; William of Malmesbury; c1135 Domesday = Domesday Book; 1086 Orderic = Historia Ecclesiastica; Orderic Vitalis; c1125 Wace = Roman de Rou; Master Wace; c1160 Warenne Chronicle = Chronicon monasterii de Hida iuxta Winton; c1200 WJ = Gesta Normannorum Ducum; William of Jumieges; c1070 WP = Gesta Guillelmi; William of Poitiers; c1072

We believe that four statements from the primary sources verify the simple battle scenario explained above, and that two more pinpoint the battle’s location. Wargames 17

1. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says that: “[Harold] came against him at the estuary of Appledore”. Appledore was on the Rother estuary, so the English army must have come down the Roman road from Rochester. 2. Bayeux Tapestry Panel 48 says: “Here the knights have left Hestenga and have come to the battle against King Harold". We believe the Tapestry’s Hestenga referred to the Hastings Peninsula. Thus, the Tapestry is saying that the Normans left the Hastings Peninsula to attack the English. This means the Brede was between the rival camps. 3. Carmen says that William sent a monk messenger/spy to Harold. On his return, William asks him: “Where is the King?” The messenger replies: “Not far off. You can see his Standards”. The only pairs of camp locations on opposing sides of the Brede where this would be possible are: Woodmans Green (1E) and Canadia (1N); Great Sanders ridge (2E) and Cottage Lane (2N); Cackle Street (3E) and Starlings hill (3N).

4. Wace says that Harold and Gyrth ride off alone to scout the Norman camp at dawn on the day before battle. They: “rode on, viewing and examining the ground, till from a hill where they stood they could see those of Normans, who were near”. This would not be possible from Woodman’s Green or Cackle Street because the hills quickly drop down to river level. It is possible if they rode south from Great Sanders ridge, probably to Balcombe Green (B). 18 Wargames

5. Carmen says that when the Normans started their attack: “Suddenly the forest poured forth troops of men, and from the hiding places of the woods a host dashed forward ... there was a hill near to the forest ... they seized possession of this place for the battle". We interpret this to mean that the English left their woody camp and occupied a nearby treeless hill for the battle. The only other hills in the vicinity were four spurs pointing south from the Great Sanders ridge. If the English camp was at Great Sanders ridge, the English must have occupied one of these spurs for the battle. 6. John of Worcester says that the English were: “Drawn up in a narrow place” for the battle. The only hill adjacent to the Great Sanders ridge that could be described as a narrow place is the mid-east spur (X) along which Hurst Lane now runs. We think that is where the battle happened.

We are the first to acknowledge that the contemporary accounts are unclear, ambiguous and less than fully trustworthy. However, we think that these six statements are among the most reliable and straightforward (although even

Figure 3: The real battlefield outlined in magenta; Roman road in black Wargames 19 these have conflicting translations and interpretations). If we are right about these six, we are confident that most of our other battle related interpretations are right too. They always seem to be the least convoluted and would be the easiest for a medieval reader to understand. In our opinion, they pinpoint the battlefield at Hurst Lane near Sedlescombe, as depicted Figure 3.

A similar wargame analysis can be applied to the landing. In retrospect, we now think it does not really matter where the Normans landed, but we spend a lot of time talking about it, so it is interesting to use wargaming ideas to narrow down the possibilities.

First, did the Normans land on the seacoast or inland? A wargamer would prefer inland because it splits the defence. The idea would be to anchor line-astern in the middle of the estuary or inlet, in order to give no clue about the preferred landing side. If the defenders are on one bank, land on the other. If the defenders are on both banks, land on the side with the least defenders or with the worse defences. In the very worst case, an inland landing has to face half the defenders compared to a seashore landing. This process could be repeated, shuffling to-and-fro across the river as the defenders work their way around to the other side, gradually wearing them out and whittling them down.

Which estuary or inlet? Figure 4 is our assessment of the Hastings Peninsula coastline in 1066. The wargaming idea here is to gain as much time as possible to fortify a beachhead by landing near the mouth of a long waterway. Any defenders that happen to be on the other bank must go as far as possible inland to get to the nearest crossing point and back on the other side.

There are three plausible estuaries and inlets around the Hastings Peninsula where this would apply: the Brede estuary, Combe Haven and the Ash Bourne estuary. Hooe Haven is a fourth possible landing site. It was too short for the mid-stream anchoring ploy, but it might have had a secret advantage 20 Wargames

Figure 4: 1066 Hastings Peninsula coastline with landing site candidates we will discuss in the main text. The others are much of a muchness. The Brede had the longest way around (17 miles), but the best trackways. Combe Haven had the shortest way around (11 miles), but the worst trackways. In all three cases we reckon it would have taken roughly 6 hours to get from the mouth on one bank to the bank opposite. Six hours should be enough time to fortify a beachhead. The defenders would be exhausted by the time they arrived. And they could not have arrived much before nightfall, which would have given another 12 hours to fortify the beachhead.

There are two other important factors to consider in establishing a beachhead: the defensive qualities of the terrain and the distance to the nearest defensive garrisons. Defensively the three candidates are similar. The nearest garrisons to the Hastings Peninsula were to the west and Lympne to the east. As it happens, Tostig’s attack in Northumbria meant they were unmanned at the time of the Norman invasion, but William was not to know this when he was planning it.

Combe Haven and the Brede are roughly midway between Pevensey and Wargames 21

Lympne. The Ash Bourne is skewed towards Pevensey. Assuming in each case that the Normans landed on the furthest bank from Pevensey, if the garrison had been manned, we estimate that it would have taken them six hours to get to Hooe, eight hours to get to Wilting or ten hours to get to Cock Marling at the most distant mouth of the Ash Bourne, Combe Haven and the Brede respectively. There were only ten hours of daylight at that time of year.

From a wargaming perspective, knowing nothing about contemporary accounts, William’s preference should have been to land in the Brede, with the north bank being marginally preferable to the south bank.

22 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Part 1 - Finding the Real Battlefield

For twenty years we investigated random hills on the Hastings Peninsula in the hope that one might fit the primary source battlefield descriptions. There was a serious danger of us not living long enough to reach any useful conclusion. Then we saw Nick Austin present “Secrets of the Norman Invasion”. He pointed out that the traditional primary source interpretations are less than objective. They had been shoehorned-in, to fit an assumption that the battle happened at Battle Abbey. He used other interpretations to support his theory that the battle was fought on Telham Hill. We explain in Part 3 why we disagree with his conclusion, but we stole his approach.

A knowledge of archaic languages is one of our many useless skills. Or at least we thought it was useless until now. We went back to first principles, making objective re-translations and interpretations of the primary sources. We used these to work out the likely landing place, which we used to work out the likely camps. We used those to work out the likely battlefield. In retrospect, we realise that the important camps are not tied to the landing place, but it provides a structure we will use to present our investigation.

The Traditional Landing

Everyone knows the traditional Battle of Hastings narrative. The Normans landed near Pevensey. The knights rode to modern Hastings. Everyone else sailed to a port below modern Hastings, then made their way up the cliff to join the knights in a camp at modern Hastings. Like everything else to do with the invasion, there is no tangible evidence. Instead these events have been derived from landing sites and camp locations named in the contemporary accounts, all of which sound something like Pevensey or Hastings. We are far from the first to point out that the tradition is preposterous.

Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 23

Figure 5: 1066 Hastings coastline with traditional landing locations

A deliberate landing at Pevensey is implausible. It held the only major garrison between Lympne and Porchester. Surely William would not aim to land at the one place on the coast opposite Normandy that was liable to be well defended. It was in a saltmarsh. Surely William would not land where his cavalry would be impotent. It was at the end of a narrow-necked peninsula that had no running fresh water. Surely William would not land where the wells might have been poisoned or where a few hundred determined English defenders could have blockaded the Norman army until they ran out of food. William’s destination was the Hastings Peninsula. Surely, he would not aim to land 30 miles away (by horse), on the far side of the dense hostile Andredsweald forest.

Several contemporary accounts say that the Normans landed near a port without specifying its name. Pevensey was an associate member of the in the 13th century, so it did become an important port. It was not one in the 11th century. According to Andrew Pearson, the materials to build (the Roman fort at Pevensey) and its access road were 24 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing brought by boat. Once the road was finished, they used that instead. We think the wharf fell into disuse. Pevensey had few local inhabitants, few natural resources and no farm produce. What would they distribute and to whom? Who would pay for its maintenance? A J F Dulley spent four years excavating there in the 1960s. He found the remains of a 13th century quay and some evidence of 13th century Continental trade, but nothing dated before 1200.

Several other contemporary accounts say that William headed for a safe anchorage that was well known to his sailors and navigators. Pevensey, or at least Pefenesea, which many believe to be an earlier name for it, is mentioned four times in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as a maritime refuge. It sounds like a safe anchorage that Norman sailors would know. Something must be wrong.

Figure 6: Pevensey lagoon in medieval times, based on map by Tom Chivers

According to Salzman and others, medieval Pevensey Levels was not a marine bay so much as a shallow coastal lagoon, like Venice, covered in tidal mud flats. It was retained by a shingle spit known as The Crumbles that roughly followed the modern coastline. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 25

Note how Tom Chivers' map (Figure 6) shows the lagoon dotted with place names ending ‘ea’, 'ey’ or 'eye’. In this area, as local name expert Simon Mansfield once told us, ‘ea’ means island. These are surviving places that were inhabited islands during Saxon times.

Pevensey was 2km inland of the proper coast. Its name ends 'ey' but it was never an island, because a Roman road ran over land that connected it to the mainland. Ships could have been deliberately beached on the mud flats near Pevensey, but it would have been a risky business. We explain below why we think that Pefenesea did not refer to modern Pevensey but to somewhere more out to sea.

It is implausible that the Normans would intentionally land at Pevensey and William took steps to avoid landing anywhere unintentionally. Poitiers says that the Normans moored on a sandbank off St Valery to avoid any risk of arriving at an unfamiliar or dangerous anchorage in the dark. Poitiers, Carmen and Malmesbury say that they moored again off the English coast to wait for daylight and the tide, presumably to make sure they avoided cliffs, sand banks and muds flats. Even if we imagine that adverse weather or poor navigation did force the Norman fleet into Pevensey Lagoon, they would simply have landed on the east bank which was on the lee side of the inlet, close to their destination and accessible along the deep channel of the Ash Bourne.

A transfer from Pevensey, or anywhere else, to the Bourne estuary and Priory valley below modern Hastings is equally implausible. The Bourne was a short gorge with no strand. The Priory was a marshy inlet with less than a mile of strand, unable to fit more than a third of the Norman fleet. The mouth of the Bourne and Priory are at the windward end of 4 miles of perilous sea cliffs. A minor sailing error, a change of wind or a sudden stiff breeze could have dashed half the Norman fleet. Those same sea cliffs could have trapped the Norman fleet inshore for weeks on the prevailing breeze. It might have been disastrous if they came under siege, which is more than likely given that the 26 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing place the Normans are supposed to have camped, at the end of a steep sided spur, was perhaps the most siege prone place on the Hastings Peninsula.

The only explicit evidence that the Normans landed or camped near Hastings comes from the monks of Battle Abbey, in Brevis Relatio and the Chronicle of Battle Abbey (CBA). Both say that the Normans camped at a port named Hastinges, then later they seem to imply that Hastinges was near the castle at Hastings. We dispute the translations upon which this is based, and they are in passages that cannot be trusted. We will return to both these issues below. Even if the translations are right, it could be a misleading anachronism, with one reference to Hastinges’s meaning at the time of the invasion, the other to its different meaning when Brevis Relatio and CBA were written.

Historians also have toponymic evidence. Most of the contemporary accounts say that the Normans landed and/or camped at Hæstinga port, or somewhere that sounds like it. It is widely believed that Hastinges castle and rape, from which modern Hastings gets its name, was named after Hæstinga port. Perhaps they were both named after a nearby settlement of the Jutish Hæstingas tribe. In either case, the argument goes, they were probably adjacent. Thus, if the Normans landed at Hæstinga port, it must have been below modern Hastings in the Bourne estuary or the Priory valley or both. The argument is credible. Probably 90% of the places in southern England with names ending -ing or -ingas derive from similar sounding coterminous Anglo-Saxon settlements. But there are exceptions.

At least one contemporary account suggests that Hæstingas referred to a region rather than a settlement. If so, Hastinges castle and Hæstinga port could both have taken its name without any implied juxtaposition, apart from that they were both in that region. The other accounts do imply that Hæstingas, or somewhere sounding like it, referred to a Saxon era settlement, but this does not mean it was coterminous with Hæstinga port or modern Hastings. Winchelsea and Romney, just up the coast from modern Hastings, are both named after Anglo-Saxon settlements that were several miles from their modern namesakes. It is quite feasible then that Hastinges castle, and therefore Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 27 modern Hastings, was several miles from a Hæstingas settlement and/or Hæstinga port. Turning this around, Hæstinga port could have been several miles from and modern Hastings.

There is no shortage of arguments that Hæstinga port was not in the Bourne estuary or Priory/Priory valleys. As we say above, they were at the windward end of 4 miles of sea cliffs, which would jeopardise landings and which might trap ships inshore for weeks. According to the Hastings EUS, the area around Hastings has been subject to 22 archaeological excavations since 1968, plus dozens earlier, without showing any evidence of a Saxon era port or of Saxon era occupation.

Above all, a major international port like Hæstinga port needed goods to export and/or a densely populated hinterland to draw imports. The Bourne/Priory valleys had neither. East Sussex was sparsely populated with less than a thousand families according to Domesday. The closest city was Canterbury, 35 miles away, which had its own port. East Sussex did have the biggest iron bloomeries in the country and the greatest salt production in southern England. All of it was shipped afar by sea. But the only active iron and salt production in medieval times was in the Brede basin, on the far side of the Hastings ridge. There is no credible reason why bulk goods like iron or salt would be carried up, over and down the Hastings ridge when they could be shipped out on the Brede.

In summary, the Normans probably did land and/or camp near Hæstinga port. The orthodoxy that it was in the Bourne or Priory valleys below modern Hastings is based on the flimsiest of evidence. It has not been contested because there has been even less evidence that Hæstinga port was anywhere else. We will explain where we think it is more likely to have been in the next section, ‘The Landing’.

28 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

The Landing

A profusion of place names

Of course, none of the contemporary accounts actually say that the Normans landed or camped at Pevensey or Hastings because none of them were written in modern English. Most were written in Latin. The exceptions are Roman de Rou and Benoît which were written in Old French, and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle which was written in Old English. In those pre-map days, there were no standard place names spellings. Written place names were transliterated from the way they were spoken. Every author had their own stab at it. Those mentioned in relation to the landing include:

Pevenesæ, Pefenesea, pefnes ea, Peneuessellum (one 's’ or two), Pevenessellum, Peuenesea, Peuenesel, Penevesel; Hæstingas, Hastingas, Heastinga, Heastingum, Hestingan, Hestinga, Hestenga, Hastingae, Hastingum, Hastinges, Hastingis, Hastingues

These are the place names that get translated into modern English as Pevensey and Hastings to form the tradition that the Normans landed at Pevensey and camped at Hastings. The only justification for the translations is that modern Pevensey and Hastings are in the vicinity with similar sounding names. Lazy translation in our opinion. Perhaps we can do better.

The ‘P’ names can be narrowed down. Latin had no 'v’ sound, the closest being 'f’. Before the Renaissance, the Latin letter 'v’ was pronounced 'u’. Thereafter 'u' was added to the alphabet. The choice was down to when and who copied or transcribed the original manuscript. In this document we will generally substitute 'v’ by 'u’ in Latin transcriptions of place names. Also, Latin long 'e’ and Latin short 'i’ were pronounced similarly and were interchangeable in Latin transcriptions of place names. The Old English letters 'f’ and 'v’ were allographs, used depending on whether the sound was in the middle or ends of a word. We will generally use 'f’. Applying these Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 29 substitutions and removing declensions leaves three root names: Pefenesea, Peuenesel and Peneuesellum. They have enough similarities that they could refer to one place, and enough differences that they could refer to two or three places.

The 'H’ names are easier to whittle down. There is a widespread consensus - i.e. Wikipedia says - that the name is Old English, deriving from a Jutish tribe known as the Hæstingas. -ingas -inga -inge -inges or -ingum are Old English declensions of the same stem. There was no diphthong 'æ’ in the Classical Latin alphabet. It was often substituted by 'a’ or 'e’ in transcriptions and transliterations of proper nouns. As above, Latin long 'e’ and Latin short 'i’ were interchangeable, and declensions can be removed. Thus, most (or perhaps all) of the place names in the ‘H’ group might refer to the same place. It cannot be modern Hastings.

An inland landing

Figure 7: Tapestry Panel 39

Our first objective was to locate the landing place. Our starting point was Bayeux Tapestry Panel 39 (Figure 7). It shows horses being unloaded as the invaders arrive in England. To the right are a row of empty boats. Their masts are down, and they are on the land side of the esquire. They must have been dragged up onto a beach or riverbank ... well, apart from the two that seem to be self-levitating, perhaps. 30 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Figure 8: Tapestry Panels 6 above, 34 lower left and 36 lower right

Tapestry Panels 6 and 34 (Figure 8) show how the Tapestry depicts anchors being used in shallow water. Panel 36 (Figure 8) depicts empty boats tied to poles in shallow water. They must be on a marine shore where they are exposed to storm and tide. The boats shown in the invasion are not tied or anchored. They are sheltered and above the tide, which probably means they are in an estuary or inlet.

This is not a new idea. Nick Austin uses exactly this argument in “Secrets of the Norman Invasion” to support his theory that the Normans landed in Combe Haven. It was pointed out to us on the Reading Museum Tapestry replica while it was on display at Battle in 1966. The guide just (wrongly) assumed that they were in the bay at Pevensey.

An inland landing would only contradict one contemporary account, Orderic Vitalis, who specifically says the Normans landed on the seashore (‘littus maris’). He has to be wrong. The only coastal strand in the vicinity was at modern Bexhill. It was a three-mile wide narrow-necked peninsula in those Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 31 days. It looks siege prone, perhaps even by a garrison size force. In general, Orderic repackaged other accounts. We guess he got the wrong end of the stick. Not only would a Bexhill landing invite a disastrous siege, but it would give away the potentially huge benefit of splitting the defence (as discussed in the Wargames section).

Several of the other contemporary accounts support an inland landing. Carmen says: “Since leaving the sea behind, you seize a sheltered strand”. It uses the term ‘litora’ rather than ‘littus maris’ which usually means an inland strand. The only ‘sheltered’ places are inlets and estuaries. Carmen also says that the landing was in a “calm basin”, which means an estuary or inlet. Baudril of Bourgueil quotes William saying: “Whither would ye flee? Our fleet is far from the shore: we removed all hope of escape when we moved away from that”. The Warenne Chronicle reports that: “without any resistance between the forts of Hastinges and Pevenessullum he entered the land of the English". If he entered the land of the English still aboard ship, he sailed into an estuary or inlet.

Wace mentions the Norman ships being at anchor, which would be unlikely if they were in an estuary or inlet, but it is a misunderstanding. What he actually says is: “together they cast anchor and ran onto dry land; and together they discharged themselves". They cast anchor before running aground. We interpret this to mean that drop anchor to form a line astern while still in the centre of the estuary, then they simultaneously sail, row or pole ashore. This is exactly what we describe in the Wargames section as the best method to split the defence.

Wace makes it sound like they let out their anchor lines as they came ashore, presumably in case they had to quickly haul themselves back into the river after an ambush. Tapestry Panel 39 does not show any anchor lines. This is understandable for the boats that have already been unloaded because they would weigh anchor before being dragged up the bank. Perhaps there should be an anchor line on the ship that is unloading horses. Maybe the artist or embroiderers missed it. But the ship is being held steady by a man with a 32 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing pole. This would not be necessary if the ship were still anchored. We think it more likely that they weighed anchor before reaching the shoreline.

A landing in some of the smaller estuaries and inlets around the Hastings Peninsula can be eliminated by calculating how much landing space the Normans needed. That depends on the number and size of the boats, which in turn depends partly on how many troops and horses they carried. We explain our calculation below

The Size of the Norman Army and Fleet

Wace says that there were 696 ships in the Norman battle fleet. Brevis Relatio says 782. Both exclude cargo carriers. The Ship List says 1000 in total. Wace is unlikely to have undersold the grandeur of the Norman fleet. Brevis Relatio is unlikely to have oversold it. Gillmor has verified that 700 was roughly the upper limit of troop and horse carriers that could have left St Valery on one tide at that time of year. Perhaps the discrepancy between Wace and Brevis Relatio is those lost on the crossing or perhaps some horses were brought on barges. We will assume that the number of troop carriers and horse carriers was close to Wace’s figure, say 700. Wace says that 400 of them were horse carriers, leaving 300 troop carriers.

Trying to assess the size of the Norman army is more subjective. Reputable estimates vary widely: between 3,000 and 12,000 for the infantry; between 1,000 and 3,000 for the cavalry. Peter Poyntz Wright estimates that Normandy could field 1,200 knights on their own. Wace infers that Normans made up more than half the invading army. Even if all the Norman knights were mobilised, William’s cavalry could not have been much more than 2,000. The horse carriers depicted on the Tapestry have 10, 8, 4 or 3 horses, although it might only be figurative. Gillmor has calculated that most of the Norman fleet was re-purposed from existing cargo vessels. Typical cargo ships of the day would carry no more than 4 horses. An average of five, equating to 2,000 cavalry, does not seem unreasonable. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 33

Rupert Furneaux estimates the number of Norman troops from the size of the ships shown on the tapestry. He comes up with 7,500, including 2,000 knights. Poyntz Wright compared the Norman fleet to other contemporary battle fleets to arrive at 3,000 infantry and 800 archers. Domesday and other records suggest that William gifted land to 7,000 of his supporters. This figure includes more than a thousand non-combatants but presumably excluded some fatalities. We think the number of fatalities was a few hundred. This suggests the number of invading combatants was between 6,000 and 6,500.

Kathleen Tyson interprets Carmen to be saying that there were 6,000 invaders. It says: “Quippe decem decies decies et milia quinque diversis feriunt vocibus astra poli". Traditionally this has been translated as: “Surely ten million million and five thousand men in varied voices echo to the distant heavens". It was simply thought to mean an awful lot. Kathleen Tyson makes the translation: “Surely ten times ten times ten and five thousand men ..."; in other words, 6,000. Now that she has pointed it out, we are convinced she is right. We have seen that translation of ‘decies’ to ‘ten of’ before. It might seem a very odd way to say 6,000 but Carmen is a Latin poem. Latin poems are not constructed to rhyme but to flow as ‘iambic pentameters’. This structure is an iambic pentameter whereas the Latin for ‘six thousand’ and for ‘ten times ten times ten times six’ are not.

We like the look of Carmen’s size of the invading army. It is specific and it ties in with the more rational of the other estimates. We will assume in the rest of this document that the Norman army had roughly 2,000 knights with coursers or destriers, plus 3,000 infantry and 1,000 archers.

It would be helpful to calculate the amount of shore space needed to land the Norman fleet. Neumann used Froud’s hydrodynamics on the Channel crossing speed to estimate that the troop carrying longships had an average beam of 2.77m. However, he did not allow for how long the Normans moored near St Valery or near the English coast. The average beam was probably greater. 34 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

If there were 6,000 troops on 300 longships, as we estimate above, each boat would have carried 20 troops plus attendants and sailors. That would put them in the category of 20-oar Snekka style longboats, which typically had a beam of between 2.5m and 3m. This is corroborated by the 32-oar replica at Pegwell Bay (Figure 9) which has a 5.1m beam, and by the Tapestry, which shows most of the invading longboats with 20 oars. Most of the horse carriers brought three or four horses. That puts them in the category of Karvi style fishing and cargo boats, which typically had a beam of 4.5m. There were more Karvi than Snekka. We will assume the average beam for the battle fleet was 4m.

Figure 9: Viking replica longship at Pegwell Bay

Wace says that the Norman fleet lands together. It does make military sense to land simultaneously, thereby stretching the defence to give the best chance of establishing a beachhead. This was as true for D-Day as it was for William.

The only way to affect a simultaneous mass landing in an estuary or inlet was to anchor line-astern midstream, then to simultaneously sail, row or pole ashore. It makes no odds here, but Tapestry Panel 39 (Figure 7) is traditionally interpreted to be showing Norman boats being poled ashore. We are unconvinced. The ship is already aground. It seems to us that the man in the stern is holding the boat steady with a pole while the horses are unloaded. The ship’s oar ports are closed, so it was not rowed ashore, but its Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 35 mast was up when it ran aground, so it might have sailed ashore. The other boats that are already out of the water have open oar ports. They might have rowed, sailed or poled ashore.

Regardless how they came ashore, the first wave of ships would be separated on shore by at least the difference between their length and width. They would need to be separated by at least 3m anyway, in order to make space to unload horses and cargo over the side and/or to deploy oars if they needed to leave in a hurry.

In summary, we think the Norman army had roughly 2,000 cavalry and 4,000 infantry, and that they arrived on 700 longships plus several hundred cargo skiffs and barges. We estimate that the longships had an average 4m beam. So, 700 longships with an average 4m beam separated by a minimum of 3m, means that the Norman battle fleet would have needed at least 4.9km of landing space. Cargo vessels might have needed another 2km.

Here is Figure 4 again. Note that Pevensey Lagoon (now the Pevensey Levels) and Combe Haven were open to the sea in those days and that the estuaries 36 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing were deeper and much wider than they are now. Note also that the Camber shingle spit extended east from , as explained by Pearson and others.

The only estuaries or inlets surrounding the Hastings Peninsula that were big enough to hold the Norman fleet are the Brede, the Ash Bourne, Combe Haven and, at a squeak, Hooe Haven. We are convinced that the landing must have been in one of them. Hooe Haven, at about 4km in length, is marginal. We will give it the benefit of the doubt for now.

Primary source landing and camp descriptions

All the primary sources specify place names and/or geographical descriptions associated with the landing. This is what they say in English but with untranslated place names (except for some v/u substitution):

1. WP says that after leaving St Valery the fleet wait for fear they arrive in England before dawn at a “dangerous or unknown anchorage". It means their destination was a familiar and safe anchorage. 2. CKE says that: “The earl himself first launching from the continent into the deep, awaited the rest, at anchor, nearly in mid-channel. All then assembled round the crimson sail of the admiral’s ship; and, having first dined, they arrived, after a favourable passage, at Hastingas". Malmesbury is saying that they moored off St Valery, sailed, ate breakfast, then arrived at Hastingas. 3. Carmen says that: “the looming rocky coast" did not discourage William’s invasion. 4. Orderic says that, upon hearing of Tostig’s invasion, Harold: “withdrew his ships and troops from Hastingas et Peneuesellum, and the other sea ports opposite Normandy". 5. Carmen (Kathleen Tyson translation) says: “On the open sea you moor offshore; You caution to take in the sails, awaiting the morning to come; But after the dawn spreads red over the land, and the sun casts its rays over the horizon; You order the sails set to the wind to make way.” Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 37

6. CBA says the Normans: “Arrived safely near castrum Peuenesel. The Duke did not remain long in that place, but went away with his men to a port not far distant named Hastinges" 7. CBA (Lower and Searle translations) says that Hechelande, which it describes being northwest of and adjacent to Telham on the ridge, is in the direction of Hastingarum from Battle Abbey. 8. WP says that William’s ship lost contact with the rest of the fleet: “In the morning, a lookout at the top of the mast declared that he could see nothing but sea and sky. They anchored at once.” William had breakfast. By the time he had finished, the rest of the fleet was in sight. 9. Warenne Chronicle says: “without any resistance between the forts of Hastinges and Pevenessullum he entered the land of the English" 10. WP says: “Borne by a favourable breeze to Peneuessellum, he disembarked with ease and without having to fight his way ashore" 11. WP (Foreville translation) says: “The rejoicing Normans, once they had landed, occupied Peneuessellum, where they built their first camp, and built another at Hastingas to provide a refuge for themselves and a shelter for their boats". 12. Brevis Relatio (our translation) says that Duke William and his fleet: "arrived in England, by the favour of God, near the fortress of Pevensel. After a short delay he arrived with his whole army at another port not far away named Hastingas" 13. WJ says that William: “Landed at Peneuessellum where he immediately built a castle with a strong rampart. He left this in charge of some troops and, with others, hurried to Hastingas where he built another". 14. Orderic says: “... and reaching the coast of England, where they met no opposition, joyfully came ashore. They took possession of Peneuesellum and Hastingas, the defence of which was entrusted to a chosen body of soldiers to cover a retreat and to guard the fleet". 15. Benoît de Sainte-Maure says the Normans: “Arrived at Pevenesel, at a port/harbour beneath a fortress handsome and strong"; and later: “The Count came to Hastinges without staying" (i.e. William did not stay at Pevenesel) 38 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

16. Tapestry Panel 38 is captioned: “Duke William in a great ship crossed the sea and came to Pevenesæ" 17. Tapestry Panel 40 is captioned: “The knights hurried to Hestinga" 18. Chronicon says that William: “Had moored his fleet at a place named Pefnesea" 19. ASC-D (Ingram translation) says: “Meantime Earl William came from Normandy to pefnes ea on the eve of St. Michael’s mass; and soon after his landing was effected, they constructed a fortress at the Hæstinga port”. 20. ASC-E says: “Meanwhile Count William landed at Hestingan on Michaelmas Day" 21. Wace says: “The ships steered to one port; all arrived and reached the shore together; together cast anchor, and ran on dry land; and together they discharged themselves. They arrived near Hastingues each ship ranged by the other’s side." 22. Wace says that a messenger tells Harold: “The Normans are come! They have landed at Hastingues" 23. Carmen (Kathleen Tyson’s translation) says: “the happy land owed to you embraced you and yours in a calm basin" 24. Carmen says: “One Englishman kept hidden under the sea cliff". He watches the Normans disembark, then rides off to tell the King. 25. Wace says that an English knight: “posted himself behind a hill" to watch the Normans disembark, then rides off to tell the King. 26. Carmen says: “You restore the strongholds that were lately destroyed" 27. Chronicon says that Harold: “Gave them battle nine miles from Heastinga, where they had built a fort” 28. Wace says: “They [the knights] formed together on the shore, each armed upon his warhorse. All had their swords girded on, and passed into the plain with their lances raised … When they [the carpenters] had reached the spot where the archers stood, and the knights were assembled, they consulted together, and sought for a good spot to place a strong fort upon". They then assembled a kit fortress they had brought with them. It was complete by that evening. 29. Wace says that on their first day after landing they went on a raid. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 39

“They held their course along the coast; and on the morrow came to a fortress named Penevesel", which they plundered. He goes on to say that: “the English were to be seen fleeing before them, driving off their cattle and abandoning their houses. All took shelter in the cemeteries."

There are some post-invasion documentary clues about the landing place names too. Four contemporary accounts describe Odo’s rebellion in 1087 during which he was besieged at Anderitum (). Three refer to it as the fortress of Pefenesea, the other as the fortress of Pevenesel. Norman writs such as A.4171 refer to Anderitum as ‘castrum Peuenesel’. The area around Pevensey castle became known as ‘rap de Peuenesel’. These well- known references suggest that Pefenesea and Peuenesel were cognates, and that both were alternative names for Pevensey.

It is no wonder then that historians interpret the invasion accounts as compelling evidence for a landing at Pevensey. Three of them imply the landing was at Pefenesea, which is thought to be an early name for Pevensey. Two imply it was near the fortress of Peuenesel, which is thought to be another name for Pefenesea. Three more say the landing was at Peneuessellum, which could be a Latin corruption of Peuenesel and therefore yet another name for Pevensey. If so, eight apparently independent references seem to say that the landing was at Pevensey. It sounds conclusive, yet somehow or another, it has to be wrong.

Assuming the contemporary invasion accounts are reasonably accurate – and, with one notable exception we discuss in the Traditional Battlefield section below, there is no reason they would not try to be accurate about place names - they must have been misinterpreted. We explain what we think the place names mean in the blue-grey text below. There is a lot going on. These are all disappointingly long and tedious explanations. We summarise the conclusions afterwards. You will not miss anything crucial if you skip to it. 40 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Resolving some place names

Hastingas

All the contemporary accounts name Hastingas (or somewhere that sounds like it) in the initial or secondary Norman landing. Hastingas also appears in some earlier ASC entries and in several Saxon Charters. Many of them say that it was in Sussex. Only one of them hints at where in Sussex, and it is the least trustworthy. We will try to work it out.

If it were not for the Battle of Hastings, there would be little doubt that Hastingas referred to an area or region on the south coast of England. Saxon Charter S318, dated 857, refers to a gift of coastal land in Hastingas in Sussex, which only makes sense if it is a county like area. The ASC entry for year 1011 says that Vikings overran the land south of the Thames, which it defines as Kent, Hæstingas, Sussex, Hampshire and Surrey. It implies that Hæstingas was a county-sized area on the south coast between Sussex and Kent. It would have included the Hastings Peninsula, although it would not necessarily have been limited to it.

Two related places are mentioned in the ASC before the invasion: ‘Hæstinga port’ and ‘Hæstinga ceastre’. ‘Ceastre’ was the Old English term for a Roman fortification, so these places sound like the major port in the region of Hæstingas and the major Roman fortification in the region of Hæstingas.

Hæstinga ceastre is listed as one of Alfred’s burhs. These were the forerunners of modern boroughs. There were no organisational units between a borough and a county. If Hæstinga ceastre was inside Hæstingas, it also suggests that Hæstingas was a county sized region. Yet Hastingas is never mentioned as a county in Domesday or elsewhere. So, what was it?

Briggs explains that the Old English suffixes -ing and -ingas mean ‘followers of’ or ‘dwellers in’, depending on whether the stem is a person’s name or a landscape feature. Thus, Hæstingas is thought to mean a place inhabited by followers of Hæst or Hæsta. There are many places in East Sussex with -ing Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 41 suffixes that might once have had -ingas names, including and Wilting on the Hastings Peninsula. None of them were bigger than hundreds. If Hæstingas referred to the Hastings Peninsula, it was different somehow.

We guess that Hastings Peninsula was like Dengie Peninsula and Tendring Peninsula in Essex, and the Isle of Wight, all of which took their names from early Anglo-Saxon tribes: the Hæstingas, Dænningas, Tendringas and Wihtwara, respectively. They were all physically isolated. They were all small enough and passive enough to stay under the radar. Their occupants were among the earliest Anglo-Saxon settlers, which perhaps helped them retain racial integrity. The last three left a vestigial geographic term for the peninsula or island upon which they developed. We think the Hæstingas tribe left a vestigial name for the Hastings Peninsula.

John Blair has a theory that might explain why they are different. In early Saxon times, he thinks that -ingas sometimes referred to sub-kingdoms or statelets. The two he researched were ‘Woccingas’ and ‘Godhelmingas’, which became modern Woking and Godalming. There are others. The founding territories of Mercia and East Anglia which were known as Iclingas and Wuffingas. The land occupied by the Dænningas was known as Deningei, meaning ‘the territory of the Dænningas people’. The land occupied by the Wihtwara was known as Wihtland, meaning ‘the state of the Wihtwara people’. Both sound like statelets. It makes no difference if we are wrong, but we guess that Tendringas and Hæstingas were also former statelets that gave their name to their ancestral homeland.

Most of the Battle of accounts tell a different story. WP and WJ say that the Normans built a fortress at Hastingas, as if it were a settlement. CBA says that the Normans constructed a fortress at “a port named Hastinges”. Brevis Relatio says that William: "arrived with his whole army at another port nearby named Hastingas". CKE says that William: “built another monastery near Hastingis, dedicated to St. Martin”, which only makes sense if Hastingis referred to a settlement or place on the Hastings Peninsula. Benoît says that after the battle: “William placed his best knights to guard the fortress 42 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing at Hastinges”, which only makes sense if Hastinges is a settlement. Chronicon says that Harold: “… gave them battle at a place nine miles from Heastingam”, which clearly refers to a location rather than an area. Moreover, it must be a location at the eastern tip of the Hastings Peninsula – and therefore probably a port - because nine Roman miles would otherwise take the battle out into the Andredsweald.

All these accounts say that Hastingas was a settlement or a port, presumably both. We note that they are all written by Normans or in Norman monasteries. Our interpretation is that Saxons used the term Hæstinga to mean the Hastings Peninsula whereas Normans used the term Hastinges – often Latinised as Hastingas - to mean Hæstinga port, at least until the castle was established. It is not unreasonable. Foreigners tend to think in terms of their own experience. So, most Europeans refer to ‘Manhattan’ as ‘New York’ because they never go anywhere else in New York. Normans traded with Hæstinga port. There was nothing else on the Hastings Peninsula that they would care about. It makes sense that they would drop the ‘port’ part of its name. It is the same as their use of the name ‘Douvres’ to mean the ‘port of Dover’, and indeed, ours of the name Calais to mean the port of Calais.

A slight problem with this is that some of the Norman contemporary accounts refer to 'portus Hastingas’ or 'portus Hastinges’. These would be tautologies if Hastinges/Hastingas meant the port. It is tempting to think they are implying that Hastinges/Hastingas is a region, but we guess that they are simply translating Hæstinga port into Latin or Old French. We cannot find any uses of the term Hastinges/Hastingas, or cognates, in Norman accounts that definitively refer to a region. We think they all refer to Hæstinga port.

Wace was not Norman and his references to Hastingues are ambiguous. They could refer to the region or to the port. But Wace is quite pedantic about ports. He uses the term ‘port de Lune’ for Bordeaux, ‘port de Saint-Morin’ for Morin, ‘port de Hantone’ for Southampton, etc. If he wanted to refer to Hæstinga port, he would logically name it ‘port de Hastingues’. We guess that his Hastingues probably referred the Hastings Peninsula. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 43

Six of the primary sources are Anglo-Norman, not necessarily following either convention. Orderic was English but lived and worked in Normandy. He refers to Hastingas as a seaport, following the Norman convention. John of Worcester was English but lived in a Norman monastery. All his references to Hastingas seem to refer to the port. Malmesbury has a Norman father and an English mother. Two of his references to Hastingas, imply it was a settlement, the other that it was an area. CBA has two references to Hastinges. The first specifically says it was a port. We will return to the other in the section about Hæstinga port. Domesday and the Tapestry are debatable.

Domesday lists a place named ‘Hastinges’ in the manor of Rameslie. It looks like a Hastingas cognate and it is in the right vicinity to mean the port, but Domesday says that it had 4 burgesses and 14 bordarers. It is too small to be the port, and there is no obvious reason the port would be broken out from the rest of Rameslie. Indeed, the port was almost certainly Rameslie’s main attraction and the main reason the Abbey of Fécamp coveted it. We guess Hastinges was broken out because it was administered separately, perhaps because it had a military purpose that was inappropriate to be administered by the Abbey of Fécamp. We will return to this below.

Figure 10 : Tapestry Panel 40

Tapestry Panel 40 (Figure 10) is captioned: “ET HIC MILITES FESTINAVERUNT HESTINGA UT CIBUM RAPERENTUR”; [here the knights have hurried to Hestinga to seize food]. This Hestinga cannot mean the port because they needed to feed 10,000. They would not have wasted their time chasing a few goats and hens around a port. They needed to secure a month’s 44 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing worth of food on the first day because, given half a chance, the locals would have driven away their livestock and burned their grain stores. We think they raided the biggest grain stores and rounded up sheep, cattle and poultry from the richest farmland. According to Domesday, the richest farmland in the region was on the Hastings Peninsula. Therefore, we think that the Tapestry’s Hestinga referred to the Hastings Peninsula.

Some resource figures from Domesday might help find exactly where they went to forage. The ten manors between the Brede and the Rother only had 35 acres of meadowland between them; barely enough to sustain the Norman army for a week. The four manors between the Hastings Ridge and the Brede estuary only had 6 acres of meadowland between them. We think the knights headed straight for Hooe, Filsham and Crowhurst, which had 116 acres of meadowland between them; enough food for a month. These manors all lost at least 75% of their value in 1066, so they were all plundered. They covered most of the area south and west of the Hastings Ridge. We think that is where the Normans went foraging.

If we are right, Hæstinga[sn] was the Anglo-Saxon name for the Hastings Peninsula and the Norman name for Hæstinga port. When Frankish and Norman monks came to Sussex with the abbeys of St Denis and Fécamp, we think they adopted the local name and meaning for Hastingas. After the Conquest, the invaders generally adopted local Anglo-Saxon or Norse names for places. Arundel, Colchester, Corfe, Durham and most other early Norman castles took the Anglo-Saxon or Norse names of the town they defended. Hastings castle was not built at an existing settlement. We think Norman settlers adopted the Anglo-Saxon use of Hastingas and named the castle Hastinges after the region it defended.

We mention earlier that the Anglo-Saxon region of Hæstingas might include land beyond the Hastings Peninsula. It cannot extend west of Pevensey, because it was in Sussex. It cannot extend east of the Rother, which was in Kent. The most likely extensions are the adjacent peninsulas of Wartling to the west and the Udimore to the north (Figure 11). Doubtless members of Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 45 the Hæstingas tribe spread from the Hastings Peninsula and established communities outside. Perhaps the Hæstingas statelet included these extensions. But, by the time it only had a geographic meaning, we think Hæstingas was bounded by the Ash Bourne and Pevensey Lagoon to the west, and by the Brede estuary and the Andredsweald to the north.

Figure 11: Hastings and surrounding peninsulas in 1066

Kathleen Tyson has a different theory about Hastingas. She thinks that it was the Frankish name for the Brede basin, which was bounded by the Udimore and Hastings ridges (see Figure 2). She reports it as fact, but then contradicts herself by saying that Hastingas was the cape between Winchelsea, and Fairlight. We could not find her evidence for either argument. Hastingas is an Old English name and it gets mentioned in a Charter that allegedly confirms Bertoald’s gift of land to the Abbey of St Denys (S318), so the name must pre-date Frankish involvement. It seems unlikely that Hastingas referred to the cape because it was too small for the ASC 1011 reference and too big to be the port. We think, as we say earlier, that it was the other way around: that the Frankish monks of St Denys adopted the Old English name Hæstingas to mean the Hastings Peninsula. We stick with our theory that Hæstingas and cognates originally referred to the Hastings Peninsula. 46 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Pefenesea and Peuenesel

Pefenesea is universally understood to have been the Anglo-Saxon name for the place that eventually became modern Pevensey. Historians interpret the ASC, the Tapestry, Chronicon, Brevis Relatio and Benoît to be saying that the Normans landed there. We think that both notions are wrong.

The landing first. We give a list of reasons in the introduction for why it would have been a bad idea for the Normans to land at or near modern Pevensey. And none of the primary sources actually say that they did. ASC-D says that: “Earl William came from Normandy to pefnes ea”. The Tapestry says that Duke William: “came to Pevenesæ”. Benoît says the Normans: “Arrived at Pevenesel”. Chronicon says that William: “moored his fleet at a place named Pefnesea". None of them mention a landing. Brevis Relatio is sometimes translated to say that the Normans landed at Pevenesel but it uses the Latin verb 'appello' which can mean 'landed’ or 'arrived’.

Two other sources agree with Chronicon that the Normans moored off the English coast. Carmen says: “On the open sea you moor offshore”. WP says: “having reached shallow water off the English coast, William drops anchor to wait for the rest of the fleet to catch up”. We believe that the Norman fleet came to Pefenesea and moored nearby but did not land. Kathleen Tyson, who researched this independently, has found an ingenious ‘sea-harbour’ interpretation of Carmen to reach the same conclusion.

Yet the evidence that Pefenesea referred to the place that became modern Pevensey is credible. Saxon Charter S527, dated 963, gifts saltearns at ‘pefenes ea’ and land at ‘hanecan’ (later named ‘hacanan hamme’) near a place named ‘glindlea’. Glindley survives. It is near Hankham and Pevensey. Birch therefore associated Hanecan with Hankham and pefenes ea with Pevensey. ASC, Symeon and Chronicon provide accounts of Odo’s 1087 rebellion in which he was besieged at Anderitum (Pevensey castle). They refer to it as the fortress of Pefenesea (i.e. the contraction of pefenes ea). It looks like they corroborate the earlier Charter, all saying that Pefenesea referred to modern Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 47

Pevensey. It is not as straightforward as it seems.

Roman and medieval castles were built for military reasons at strategically important places. They were not necessarily at settlements. Where this is the case, they tended to take the name of the nearest settlement, even if that settlement was miles away. Windsor castle, for instance, was three miles upstream of Windsor settlement (now Old Windsor). The settlement moved to take advantage of new business opportunities after the castle was built. We think something similar happened at Pevensey.

Firstly, Pefenesea did not refer to Pevensey. The Old English suffix 'ea’ always means 'island’ in this region. Pevensey was never an island in Saxon times because a Roman road connected it to the mainland. The only Saxon reference that indisputably refers to Pevensey before the invasion names it Andredesceastre, which is consistent with references to other Roman fortifications in England. Despite extensive excavation by Dully in the 1960s, Pevensey unveiled no evidence of pre-invasion occupation outside Anderitum.

If pefenes ea was an island, it was not Pevensey. And Pevensey’s founding Charter confirms that pefenes ea was not at the place that became Pevensey. It says:

“We have granted to the barons of Pevensel and confirmed by this our present charter that they shall make one Borough on the coast that lies between the port/harbour of Pevenesel and Langeney, and is within the liberties of the five ports to keep and maintain according which our subjects of the five ports possess.”

Note that the founding charter refers to ‘Pevensel’. We think it is a cognate of Pefenesea. Three accounts of Odo’s rebellion refer to Anderitum as the fortress of Pefenesea. The fourth, CKE, refers to it as the fortress of Pevenesel. Norman Charters, including A.4171, refer to it as Peuenesel too. The area around Anderitum came to be known as ‘rap de Peuenesel’. It looks like Peuenesel and Pefenesea were cognates. 48 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

R G Roberts has a plausible explanation in his 1914 book ‘The Place-Names of Sussex’. He thinks that the ‘el’ at the end of Peuenesel is the Frankish word ‘île’ meaning ‘island’. There are no other Saxon, Latin or Norman place names ending ‘el’ (apart from dells, which would not apply to Peuenesel). The most plausible explanation is that pefenes ea was part of Bertoald’s 8th century gift (attested in Charter S133 and S318) to the Frankish Abbey of St Denys. If they owned pefenes ea, it makes perfect sense that they would refer to by its Frankish translation and transliteration ‘Peuenes el’ and that Normans would adopt their name. Regardless, if the name is Frankish, it was an island.

Modern Pevensey can be traced back through historical documents to the new borough “granted to the barons of Pevenesel” in the Charter above. That new borough was only founded in 1207. It did not exist at the time of the Conquest. By definition then, the old borough of Peuenesel – the one that invasion accounts refer to - was not the place that became Pevensey.

We think we have worked out pefenes ea’s exact location. It had no direct involvement in the invasion, other than perhaps as a reason for why Battle Abbey was built where it is. It is therefore irrelevant if we are wrong. On the other hand, it helps to colour the events described in the primary sources, so we think it is worth running through our reasoning.

Domesday’s entry for Peuenesel describes it as a borough in land that belonged to William’s half-brother Robert, Count of Mortain. That land became known as ‘rap de Peuenesel’ and eventually Pevensey Rape. Its manors were exclusively west of the Hastings Peninsula and east of the Cuckmere River. pefenes ea must have been in this area.

Pevensey’s founding Charter pinpoints the most likely location. It says that the new borough – i.e. the place that became modern Pevensey - was between Langeney and Pevenesel. Langney survives as a suburb of to the southwest of Pevensey. Pevenesel must therefore have been in a semicircle to the east of modern Pevensey. A ‘borough’ in Domesday usually implies a right to take tolls, which means a port, harbour, or bridge. The Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 49 founding Charter says that it was a port or harbour. Brevis Relatio and Benoît confirm that Peuenesel was a harbour. It must have been on the coast.

The 11th century coastline between Eastbourne and Bexhill was formed by a shingle spit known as ‘The Crumbles’ that extended northeast from Eastbourne, roughly along the current coastline. It retained a shallow tidal lagoon, roughly coterminous with modern Pevensey Levels. We refer to it as Pevensey Lagoon.

Pevensey Lagoon was mostly mud flats but dotted with islands that were above high tide. Some of these islands were big enough to be inhabited. The dozen or so that survive are marked by place names ending with ‘ea’ or ‘ey’ or ‘eye’ – check Chivers’ map Figure 6. pefenes ea ends with ‘ea’. We are convinced it was one another of these inhabited islands.

Figure 12: Pevensey Lagoon with location of pefenes ea

There must have been at least one break in The Crumbles, to allow fresh water to drain into the sea. Pevensey Haven (aka Hurst Haven) drained the marshes 50 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing to the north and west. Waller’s Haven drained the land and marshes to the east. Waller’s Haven was redirected in the 16th century. Its original route can be followed along ‘Old Haven’ on OS maps. It makes an inland confluence with Hurst Haven several hundred metres to the east of Pevensey. It had to drain into the sea somewhere to the southeast of that. It is common for silty estuaries to form spits at their mouth. We think pefenes ea was just such a spit (as shown on Figure 12), somewhere around modern Beachlands. Pefenesea is mentioned four times in the ASC as a maritime refuge. The lee side of this spit island would create a perfect harbour and safe haven.

De Viis Maris says that Pevensey castle’s harbour was 8 Roman miles from Hastings castle. That would place it roughly midway between modern Eastbourne and Bexhill, exactly at the location we suggest for pefenes ea. This location would also fit Benoît’s description that the Normans: “Arrived at Pevenesel, at a harbour beneath a fortress handsome and strong”. It would explain why no trace has ever been found of the maritime refuge mentioned in ASC, because it was washed away by coastal changes in the 13th century.

A pefenes ea island at Beachlands does not contradict the traditional evidence. It would have been the biggest and most important settlement in the region in Saxon and early Norman times. It makes sense that the ‘rap’ was named after it. Anderitum was in that rape, so it would be referred to as castrum Peuenesel in A.4171 and in CKE’s Odo rebellion account. It would have had a sheltered tidal shore, so it might have had saltearns to fit S527. It was only three miles from Hankham which also fits S527.

We discuss the international port in the next section. It is just worth noting here that pefenes ea was not it. A port has a wharf to load/unload cargo, whereas a harbour does not. pefenes ea had no natural resources, no hinterland, no roads to distribute goods, and hardly anyone to distribute them to. It was, as ASC suggests, a sheltered harbour rather than a port. We say earlier that there was no port or settlement at Pevensey at the time of the invasion. It is accurate. pefenes ea was not at Pevensey and it was not a port. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 51

This sheds a new light on S133, the Saxon Charter dated 790 which gifts land in East Sussex and elsewhere to the Frankish Abbey of St Denys. The gift included a port: “de portu super mare, Hastingas et Peuenisel" [“the coastal port of Hastingas and Peuenisel"]. Note ‘port’ singular. It is ambiguous. It could be trying to say: “the coastal port of Hastingas et Peuenisel”, with ‘Hastingas et Peuenisel’ as a noun, or “the coastal port of Hastingas, and Peuenisel”, with Peuenisel somewhere other than the port. In the first edition of this book we speculated that that the former was more likely, because we thought that it could be synonymous with the port mentioned by Orderic as Hastingas et Peneuesellum. We have subsequently refined our understanding of Peneuesellum – see below - which makes this unlikely. We now think that the latter is more probable. The attestation in S318 suggests so, in that it refers to the gift as land in/at Hastingas and land in/at Peuenisel.

One source of confusion is that ASC-D, the Tapestry and Chronicon immediately pass from the arrival at Pefenesea (or cognates) to the construction of a fortress or, in the case of Chronicon, to the battle. Historians read into this an implication that there was a landing at Pefenesea. We think the journey to the landing place and the landing itself were redacted. All three of these accounts are heavily abridged, covering the invasion in a few paragraphs. They had to redact uneventful details like the journey to the landing site and the landing.

There are a few puzzles about the Norman Channel crossing and about pefenes ea that we should try to answer.

Why did the Normans moor near pefenes ea if their ultimate destination was the Hastings Peninsula? We guess that it was standard practice for Norman trading ships to moor off pefenes ea before docking at Hæstinga port because the Sussex coast was a treacherous place to sail in boats with no centreboard. WP explains that William wanted to avoid sailing in dangerous or unknown waters. We think they moored near the Royal Sovereign Shoals, several miles off The Crumbles. From there they could safely run or reach into the port on any wind, bar a north-easterly which is rare. Wace says that the fleet steered 52 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing towards a port/harbour, which was presumably well known to his sailors and navigators. We think that that harbour was pefenes ea and that they used as a navigation beacon.

Why did William delay the invasion – as Wace and WP say – to wait for a southerly breeze? We think his main reason was the weatherliness of his ships. Viking style longships had no centreboard. Snekka were long and narrow, which made them fairly weatherly. Karvi, which carried the horses and cargo, were not. They slipped horribly when reaching and were inefficient beating. Moreover, the ships would sail at different speeds, depending on their style, size and load. If they had to beat to hold their line on a prevailing south-westerly breeze, it would have been impossible to prevent the fleet getting separated and there would be a danger of the Karvi slipping east of their target then taking a day or more to beat back against the breeze and tide. William’s only safe option was to run downwind on a southerly breeze. We suspect that a secondary reason is that, having left the sea, they headed west up an estuary and William wanted to sail rather than row which would not be possible on the prevailing south-westerly breeze.

Why did the 13th century barons of Peuenesel want to create a new borough at modern Pevensey? According to the founding Charter, the new borough was a market town and Cinque Port equivalent. The implication is that Pefenesea harbour was silting up and/or that the local Normans barons wanted to drain the marshes and encourage settlement in the area. To do that they needed a full-service port with access to Anderitum’s Roman road.

How did Anderitum and Peuenesel Rape end up being named after Peuenesel? Domesday’s Peuenesel borough was the only significant settlement between the Hastings Peninsula and the Cuckmere River. All the Sussex Rapes took the name of their main settlement. Most of the contemporary Norman accounts and post-Conquest writs refer to Anderitum as ‘castrum Peuenesel’. In other words, it was the major fortification in the region of Peuenesel. At some point before the 14th century, Pefenesea harbour was closed due to storms and longshore drift, then The Crumbles washed away. The new Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 53 borough around Anderitum would have been left as the major settlement in the Rape and the only settlement associated with the name Peuenesel.

In the first edition of this book, and the blogs upon which it was based, we speculated that Peuenisel with an ‘i’ – as mentioned in S133 - might have referred to somewhere other than Peuenesel with an ‘e’. Refinements to our understanding of the name Peneuesellum have persuaded us otherwise. We now think they both referred to pefenes ea.

Kathleen Tyson agrees that the name Peuenesel was coined by the monks of St Denys, but says they were Gallo-Dacians that spoke the ‘coastal Romana’. It seems unlikely. Gallo-Dacian means Norman because they lived in Gaul while their ancestral homeland in modern Denmark was known as Dacia. There cannot have been any Norman monks at St Denys before the 9th century because Normandy was only founded in 911. The only reference we have seen to ‘Romana’ is in Dudo where it refers to the Norman language that is usually named Romanz. If so, the 9th century monks of St Denys cannot have spoken it because it did not exist before 911. If not, it has to be some sort of langue d’oïl. It seems implausible that the monks of St Denys would speak a langue d’oil. Not only was it in the heart of Frankish Ile de France, but Pepin was interred in the abbey. We stick by our belief that the monks of St Denys were mainly Frankish and spoke Frankish or the Frankish dialect of Old French.

Hæstinga port

Locating Hæstinga port is important. One primary source specifically says it was where the Normans landed. Three specifically say it was where the Normans camped. Five more say that the Normans landed and/or camped at Hastinges (or Hastingas in Latin), which we believe to be the Norman name for Hæstinga port.

By tradition, Hæstinga port was in the Bourne and/or Priory valleys below modern Hastings. We have already said why they are unlikely to have been the Norman landing site, which means they are unlikely to have been the 54 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing location of Hæstinga port. They are unlikely to have been the location of Hæstinga port anyway. Access and egress would be too dangerous, with treacherous sea cliffs on both sides of the estuary mouth. There was no local population to draw imports, minimal natural resources to export and no known access roads to get freight up or down the precipitous valley walls. Historians are not discouraged. They believe that this is all outweighed by a locational clue in CBA that seems to say Hastinges was near the castle at Hastings. If that is so, regardless how unlikely, Hæstinga port must have been in the Priory and/or Bourne valleys.

This clue is in the Chronicle of Battle Abbey. First, it says that Hechelande was on the Hastings Ridge, adjacent to and northeast of Telham. Then is implies that Hastingarum (a Hastingas declension) was on a line through Hechelande from Battle Abbey. That line hits the coast midway between modern Hastings and Fairlight, roughly 3km from both. There were no named Saxon settlements within 3km of that point. By the time Brevis Relatio and CBA were written, there was a castle and settlement at modern Hastings. Historians deduce that CBA’s Hastinges, and therefore Hæstinga port, was at modern Hastings.

CBA’s description is odd at best. It says that Hechelande was northeast of Telham, and adjacent to it. It then describes Hechelande’s location as ‘a parte Hastingarum’. Lower translates as ‘in the direction of Hastings’; Searle as ‘towards Hastings’. The translations are just about viable, but the line is 30 degrees from Hastings. The line is, however, exactly in the direction of Baldslow. So why would CBA inaccurately say that Hechelande was in the direction of Hastings when it would be easier and more accurate to say it was in the direction of Baldslow?

One possibility is that CBA has been inexpertly doctored. And this passage is known to have been inexpertly doctored when someone inserted a sentence about William making a vow to build an abbey on the battlefield. But Brevis Relatio has the same description, and it has not been doctored with William’s vow or the reference to Hechelande. Another possibility is that Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 55 the anomaly was caused by an anachronism. CBA was written in the 1170s, long after Hastings Castle and its settlement were established. It is feasible then that CBA’s reference to the “a port named Hastinges” referred to its meaning at the time of the invasion, whereas its description of Hastinges’s location near Hastings Castle referred to its meaning when CBA was written. In other words, the meaning of Hastinges moved from Hæstinga port to Hastinges castle as the castle developed. This is still a viable possibility, but we think there was a more likely explanation.

Lower and Searle’s translations of ‘a parte Hastingarum’ to ‘in the direction of Hastings’ and ‘towards Hastings’ are both valid, but uncommon. CBA has other passages that describe the ‘direction of a place’ and ‘towards a place’ that do not use ‘a parte’. On the other hand, it has 30 or more uses of ‘parte’ where it means ‘side’, as in the ‘south side’, the ‘opposite side’, the ‘side of the church’, and so on. We think the most natural translation of ‘a parte Hastingarum’ is ‘to the side of Hastingarum’. We will return to this in the section about the Norman battle camp. For here, it is just worth noting that CBA is not saying that Hæstinga port was near Hastings castle.

None of the above definitively debunks the traditional location for Hæstinga port in the Bourne and/or Priory valleys below modern Hastings, but we hope it shows that the supporting evidence is less than flimsy, and we have already explained why it makes no sense.

Excluding modern Hastings leaves four Hæstinga port candidates, namely Monkham Wood and in Combe Haven, Northeye at the mouth of Hooe Haven and the Ash Bourne estuary, and Winchelse at the mouth of the Brede estuary. Narrowing them down relies on the argument that the Hastings Peninsula was too small, too sparsely populated, too concentrated in natural resources and too short of a hinterland to have had two or more major international ports.

Hæstinga port’s name suggests it was the major port on or near the Hastings Peninsula. It is the only port in the region that is referred to in the Battle of 56 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Hastings accounts and the only one named in Saxon Charters or the ASC. It is known to have been trading with Normandy and Belgium before the invasion, so it was international. We think it was the one and only major port on the Hastings Peninsula. It cannot have been an import hub, because its local population was too small, so it must have been sustained by natural resource exports. This provides two methods to deduce Hæstinga port’s location: 1) From references to the region’s major port; and 2) From the candidate’s proximity to the major natural resource production centres.

Perhaps the clearest clue in this respect is in De Viis Maris which says that the region’s major port at the start of the second crusade was at Winchelse, at the mouth of the Brede. The Pipe Rolls of 1204 records Winchelse was the biggest port between London and Southampton, and the third biggest overall. It does not necessarily follow that it was the region’s major port in Saxon times, but it is unlikely to have grown exponentially in the 140 years after the Norman invasion for reasons we will return to momentarily.

The Brede basin also had the lion’s share of the region’s natural resource production. Domesday says that Rameslie manor in the Brede basin had 100 saltpans; the greatest concentration in the south of England. The rest of the Hastings Peninsula combined had 35. Cleere reckons that the Brede basin bloomeries at Beauport Park, Chitcombe, Footlands and Oaklands accounted for 80% of the region’s iron output in Roman times. He notes that there is no evidence of Wealden iron smelting during Saxon times, but there is hardly any evidence of Saxon era iron smelting anywhere in Britain, yet there was enormous demand for iron products. The iron came from somewhere. Thomas Birch notes that some was imported. The rest must have come from domestic iron ore deposits, the biggest concentration of which was in the Brede basin. In other words, the Brede basin produced 70% of the region’s salt and probably 100% of the region’s iron in Saxon times.

We devised two methods to deduce Hæstinga port’s location, by references to the region’s major port and by proximity to natural resource production centres. In the case of the first, all the references we can find suggest that the Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 57 major port in the region was at Winchelse or at the mouth of the Brede, which amounts to the same (see Winchelse below). In the case of the second, the Brede basin accounted for perhaps 90% of the region’s natural resource production in Saxon times. Both methods suggest that Hæstinga port was at the mouth of the Brede.

If we are right, the port at the mouth of the Brede should be an order of magnitude bigger than any other in the region. This can be corroborated by the ‘Ship Service’ records. They are an interminable source of confusion, so we will try to explain what they are saying.

King Edward wanted 57 fully manned ships for 15 days a year each. He requisitioned them from local fleets in exchange for liberties, in a process known as ‘Ship Service’. Norman kings reinstated it. The apportionments for 1227 are 21 ships from Dover, 21 from Hastinges, 10 from Winchelse, 5 from Rye, 5 from Romney, 5 from Hithe, 5 from Sandwich. Lots of historians have looked at these figures and inferred that the port of Hastinges was more than double the size of Winchelse and, crucially, that it was somewhere other than at Winchelse. They are not mathematicians. These apportionments add up to 72 ships when the King only wanted 57.

The Cinq Port Charters make it clear what is going on. Hastinges and Dover were ‘Head Ports’, charged with getting their apportionment of ships from ports in their vicinity. The reason why Hastinges is a Head Port has nothing to do with its port, which was too small to get listed. Rather, it was because the Norman castle at Hastings quickly became the administrative hub for the Hastings Peninsula. The Ship Service is really saying that the Count de Hastings has responsibility to supply 21 ships from the manors around him that contained ports.

The sums only work if the 'Ancient Towns' - i.e. Winchelse and Rye - are included in Hastinges’s 21. The 57 are 21 from Dover, 21 from Hastings, 5 from Romney, 5 from Hythe and 5 from Sandwich. Within Hastings’s 21, there were 10 from Winchelse, 5 from Rye and 6 from the other ports which 58 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing are listed as Seaford, Pevensey, Hydney, Northye, Bulverhythe, Iham, Beaksborne and Grench. Iham was the old name for modern Winchelsea, so it must have provided at least 1. Mapping ship service to Hæstinga port candidates, means that the Brede estuary (Winchelse, Rye and Iham) provided 16 ships, Combe Haven (Bulverhythe) provided no more than 1 ship, Hooe Haven/ Ash Bourne estuaries combined (via Hydney and Northye) no more than 1, the Bourne/Priory estuaries 0. Winchelse alone was ten times bigger than any of the other Hæstinga port candidates. Exactly as expected, the combined ports at the mouth of the Brede were 16 times bigger than any other Hæstinga port candidate.

These figures are based on 1227 Ship Service records. It does not necessarily follow that Winchelse was the region’s major port 140 years earlier, at the time of the invasion, but nothing significant had changed. Doubtless England’s new masters required enormously more wine imports but Winchelse was an export hub. Sylvester reports that at the turn of the 14th century the port handled 15 export ships for every import ship. It is difficult to believe that they improved iron and salt productivity ten-fold over the 140 years after the Conquest. Its infrastructure would have needed dozens of Charters, none of which exist. And, even if they did, Winchelse would still have been the biggest port at the time of the invasion.

It is interesting that Hæstinga port is the only coastal port in the ASC or Saxon Charters with a ‘port’ suffix. The other coastal ports – Sup-hanton [Southampton], for instance – were just known by their settlement’s name. Hæstinga port would have needed dozens of stevedores, ship chandlers, sailors, barmen, prostitutes and others. It must have been at a named settlement but seems to have a different toponomy. Assuming it is not just a naming quirk, the most rational explanation is that Hæstinga port was an entrepôt covering two or more named settlements. This would uniquely match Winchelse, Rye and Iham, all within a one-mile radius at the mouth of the Brede.

It is not unreasonable that Hæstinga port was an entrepôt, even though it was Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 59

800 years before the concept existed, because Winchelse left a lot to be desired as a port. It was on a shingle spit that would have had no running water apart from rain, no fresh food apart from fish and chickens, no fuel, no road access and it would have been horribly flood prone. It was presumably adequate for Hæstinga port’s docks and warehouses, but we guess that the administrators and professionals – running the mint, port administration, dry docks, ship repairs, etc - were somewhere more comfortable, presumably modern Winchelsea (then known as Iham). This would explain why Hæstinga port had the look of a modern entrepôt and why, unlike all the other ports in the country, its name did not refer to a specific settlement.

Even though there is no mention of a port at Hastings in the Pipe Rolls or Ship Service records, Hastings did have a port. It is listed in half a dozen Norman Charters as Portus de Hasting. It has to be at Hastings because Winchelse, Rye, Bulverhythe and all the other ports in the region appear on lists alongside Portus de Hasting. Presumably, it was in the Priory valley, as it is often depicted, beside the priory. It never amounted to much. Even when it was servicing Hastings Castle in the 14th century, Sylvester reckons Portus de Hasting only had 15 ships, compared to Winchelsea’s 115.

Rameslie manor

Rameslie was a huge manor in Guestlinges hundred. There is considerable uncertainty about its boundary. Guestlinges hundred also had Guestlinges and Ivet manors. Gueslinges and Ivet have agricultural profiles in Domesday, which means that they had little, if any, estuary frontage. Guestling survives as a settlement south of the fluvial part of the River Panel. Another manor must have filled the gap between the Panel and the Brede. Rameslie has an estuary profile in Domesday and must have been adjacent to Guestlinges manor because they were in the same hundred. It has therefore long been assumed that Rameslie occupied the Winchelsea peninsula, between the Panel and Brede with river frontage on both.

Domesday lists Rameslie with 100 saltpans, 35 ploughlands, 7 acres of 60 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing meadowland, 2 woodland swine renders and 5 churches. The Winchelsea peninsula was nowhere near big enough to hold it all. It must have had a lot of other land, including up to four other settlements.

King Cnut married Emma of Normandy in 1017. As a dowry, presumably at her instigation, he gifted the manor of Rammesleah in Sussex to the Norman Abbey of Fécamp. Rammesleah looks like an alternative spelling of Rameslie, and Rameslie manor was held by the Abbey of Fécamp in Domesday. Its Charter (S949) says that it included an unnamed port. Historians assumed that this port was Hæstinga port below modern Hastings. Therefore, by tradition, Rameslie manor stretched along the coast from Winchelsea to Hastings and perhaps beyond. As far as we know, this is based solely on Hæstinga port being below modern Hastings, which is patently absurd.

The Abbey of Fécamp could have pressed Emma to demand virtually any manor in England as her dowry. Like nearly all monasteries at the time, it was looking for infrastructure concessions that would generate mountains of cash. The land from Pett to modern Hastings was sheep pasture, perhaps with a tiny fishing port at the southern end. It would only have been worth 10 shillings or so a year, whereas Rameslie must have been one of the most valuable assets in England.

S982 attests the gift of Rameslie and its saltpans and its port to the Abbey of Fécamp, then immediately authorises them to raise ‘two parts’ of the tolls at ‘Wincenesel’. Wincenesel looks like a Frankish translation of Winchelse. Winchelse, as we say above, was by far the biggest port between Dover and Southampton. Winchelsea’s founding Charter and Cooper and others reckon that Winchelse was a settlement on the Camber shingle spit. The spit extended 20 miles northeast from Pett (Figure 4) in the 11th century and was therefore adjacent to the Winchelsea Peninsula. It was exactly the sort of infrastructure asset that the Abbey of Fécamp would covet and they built St Giles church there. We are convinced it was part of Rameslie manor and that Winchelse was the site of the docks and warehousing for Hæstinga port. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 61

We have established that Rameslie manor encompassed the Winchelsea peninsula between the Panel and the Brede, and the Camber shingle spit, at least as far east as Winchelse. This was too small and too infertile to contain Rameslie’s farmland, too short and too flood prone for Rameslie’s 100 saltpans, and lacking at least a couple of settlements for churches. There were no estuaries suitable for saltpans to the south, so Rameslie must have extended west or north or both.

Medieval salt evaporation ponds in this region average 35m across. They are best placed on the north strand of a wide east-west estuary, where they get reflected sunlight, no riverbank shade and have no need for deforestation to prevent tree shade. Better on an east flowing river, where they are protected from storm surges or bores that might flood the saltpans. Most estuaries on the south coast are south flowing. The east flowing Brede was the only east-west estuary on the south coast that was long enough to hold 100 saltpans. Thus, most of Rameslie’s saltpans were probably on the north bank of the estuarine Brede. Matthew concludes that Rameslie spanned the Brede. We think it stretched as far west as the village of Brede on the north bank.

It seems likely that the Abbey of Fécamp would want to control distribution of output from the bloomeries at Chitcombe and Footlands. They were west of Brede village. We wondered whether Rameslie might have stretched west beyond Brede village on the north bank. The only other Domesday manors in the vicinity were Sedlescombe, Bretda and Dodimere.

CBA pegs Sedlescombe roughly a mile upstream of the Roman road and south of the river (see Figure 33). Bretda sounds like it was beside the Brede. S982 explains that it was included in the gift to the Abbey of Fécamp. We presume that they merged it into Rameslie manor because it was never heard of again. That leaves Dodimere as the only other manor that might have had estuary frontage on the north bank.

By tradition, Dodimere manor surrounded the settlement of Udimore on the Udimore ridge. East Sussex HER says that Dodimere was a dispersed 62 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing ridgetop hamlet on the Udimore Ridge. This seems unlikely because ‘mere’ is the Old English term for a body of water, which would not apply to a ridgetop settlement. The manor is not listed with any saltpans, which implies it did not have Brede estuary frontage. It was in Babinrerode hundred, whose only other manor was tiny Kitchenham (2 households) on the Rother. If Dodimere was on the Udimore Peninsula, Goldspur hundred would have cut between it and Kitchenham. Something must be wrong.

Dodimere manor is associated with Udimore because Robert Count de Eu was Lord of the manor and Dodimere sounds like Udimore which was named after him. But he was Lord or Tenant-In-Chief of over 100 East Sussex manors any of which might have been named after him. We suspect that Dodimere manor was up near Kitchenham beside the Rother, while Udimore village was on the southern boundary of one of his other manors, perhaps . If we are right, Rameslie manor lined the entire northern bank of the Brede estuary, as far west as the tidal limit at Sedlescombe.

What then of the south bank? The biggest natural resource in the region was at Beauport Park, once the third biggest source of iron in the Roman empire. The WIRG recently found a Roman road from Beauport Park to the Rochester Roman road, with a junction at modern Pestalozzi Childrens Village, south of Sedlescombe bridge. The Abbey of Fécamp would surely want to control (and tax or toll) Beauport Park’s produce. We guess they had jetties below Pestalozzi. Indeed, Kathleen Tyson reports that there was once a low-tide canal there. In either case, Rameslie manor would have to stretch west to the tidal limit on the south bank of the Brede.

One potential issue with this is that Ivet (aka Luet) manor is traditionally associated with Lidham, midway along the south bank of the Brede estuary. It has an agricultural profile in Domesday, so it seems improbable. Dawson and Taylor reckon it is more likely to have centred on Pett.

If we and Taylor are right, Rameslie manor lined both banks of the Brede up to Sedlescombe (Figure 13). It controlled the saltpans, the access roads to Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 63

Beauport Park, Chitcombe and Oaklands bloomeries, and the output from those bloomeries. It controlled the Rochester Roman road along which all road traffic would pass, as well as the iron products coming out of Footlands bloomery. It was bounded to the south by Westfield, Guestling and Ivet, all of which would have had access from the Hastings Ridge ridgeway.

Figure 13: Brede side manors

Cooper must have gone through similar reasoning 170 years ago, because he worked out – without saying how – similar locations for Rameslie’s five churches. He says that one was at Brede village, one in Rye, two in Winchelse (St Thomas and St Giles), and one at Winchelsea (St Leonards). We think he is right, other than that his church at Rye (see Rye below) is more likely to have been at Cadborough in 1066.

We were unsure where Bretda manor might have been on the Brede estuary. Kathleen Tyson told us that she thinks it was only on the north bank. It could 64 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing not have been east of Brede village because the saltpans were included in the original Rameslie gift to the Abbey of Fécamp. We have no evidence to the contrary, so we depict it west of Brede village.

Hæstinga ceastre

Place names ending -ceastre were fortified Roman settlements. The earliest reference to Hæstinga ceastre is as one of Alfred’s 33 'burhs’, which were fortresses to give early warning of Viking raids. Alfred liked to build them at former Roman fortifications. The next reference was in 928 to license a mint. There could hardly be a better place to house Hæstinga port’s mint, toll house and garrison than inside the walls of Hæstinga ceastre.

Chronicon repeats ASC entries about Hæstinga ceastre and Hæstinga port, in which it refers to both as Heastinga. Some coins from the Hæstinga ceastre mint were stamped 'Hestingport’. Presumably, the mint restamped foreign coin and bullion taken as payment for iron and salt from Hæstinga port customers. The ASC 1050 entry says that boats and boatmen from Hæstinga ceastre defeated two of Sweyn’s ships on behalf of the King. All of this suggests that the ceastre and port were either adjacent or coterminous.

Alfred liked to build his coastal burhs on promontories overlooking places that the Vikings had previously raided. The Romans liked to build their fortifications on promontories too. The only promontory adjacent to Winchelse was Iham (modern Winchelsea). If Hæstinga port was at Winchelse, in our opinion, Hæstinga ceastre was on the summit of Winchelsea, on the site now occupied by St Thomas’s church.

Winchelsea would have been chosen as the site of the Roman fortress because it policed and protected the Brede basin’s valuable port and natural resources. It would have been good for an Alfredrian burh too, on a defensively sound bluff at the only place on the Hastings Peninsula that had an uninterrupted view of Old Romney, which was a previous Viking Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 65 incursion point. It was also the only place north of the Hastings Ridge that had a view of the Fire Hills, which from its name, was presumably the location of a medieval messaging beacon.

Hæstinga ceastre’s wall, calculated from the Burghal Hidage, was some 600m long. We guess that it spread 150m north and east from the junction of Back Lane and St Thomas street, incorporating the entire area of St Thomas. HAAG recently discovered the foundations of Winchelsea’s first church (St Leonards) in the NW corner of the hill. We presume the civilians and clerics would have been there too, overlooking the quays and dry docks below.

Keith Foord also worked out that Hæstinga ceastre was adjacent to Hæstinga port. He proposes that it was on the shingle spit next to Winchelse. That would have been the best place to defend the port, but it seems implausible to us. We cannot believe that the Romans would fortify anywhere on a shifting shingle bank. If they did, it is unlikely to have survived 500 years until Alfred needed somewhere for his burh. Even if it survived, Alfred would not have built his burh at sea level because it was supposed to be a lookout. And Tapestry Panel 45 shows William’s camp at ‘Hestenga ceastra’ at a hill, so it could not have been on a shingle spit.

Kathleen Tyson thinks that Hæstinga ceastre was at Icklesham, a few miles upstream of Winchelsea. She notes that it had a Roman bloomery, so the Romans were there. She has a reasonable argument, but we think that there is a better argument for Winchelsea, which was closer to the sea and with a wider field of vision that included the important access point at Old Romney.

We wondered again about Domesday’s Hastinges. Its population listed in Domesday would be about right for a settlement in Hæstinga ceastre burh. And Hæstinga ceastre burh might have been excluded from the land held by St Denys and Fécamp abbeys because of its military importance. It seems plausible that the Normans would Normanise the name of a place that played such a crucial role in the Conquest (see Camps). We guess that it kept a 66 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing separate identity through to the 12th century and that the Normans referred to it as Hastinges. This would explain why it is listed separately in Domesday.

It might also explain the 1192 Pipe Rolls entry for ‘nova Hastings’. This seems to have referred to the settlement that grew up around the new Norman castle at Hastings. Presumably then, they could not refer to it as Hastinges because there was already somewhere nearby that they knew by that name. It could only have been Hæstinga ceastre or Hæstinga port. We guess the former because Anglo-Normans usually referred to Hæstinga port as Winchelse. Hæstinga ceastre would have lost its identity when Winchelse relocated there in the 13th century, presumably freeing up the settlement around Hastings Castle to take the name Hastinges.

Winchelse

Figure 14: Cooper’s coordinates for Winchelse

Winchelsea’s founding Charter and De Viis Maris and S982 say that Winchelse (also known as Old Winchelsea) was a port on the Camber shingle spit. It would have looked rather like the spit part of Pagham Rife, just along the coast. The spit extended 20 miles northeast from Pett (see Figure 4 and Figure 15) in medieval times. No trace of it has ever been found, but Cooper lists some reasonably specific coordinates. He says that it was roughly 6 miles Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 67

NE of Fairlight Cliff, 3 miles ESE of modern Winchelsea, 2 miles SSE from Rye and 7 miles SW of Old Romney. Jeake says that it was more than a mile east of modern Winchelsea (see Figure 14).

Whole number of miles and 11° of error on the directions leaves plenty of room for interpretation. The distances intersect near ; three of the directions intersect one kilometre offshore. Dugdale reckons Winchelse was somewhere under Rye Harbour Nature Reserve; Cooper reckons to the east side of the east pier head, which would put it under Rye Golf Course. The shorter distances from Rye and Winchelsea should give the least room for error, but the distance or directions look rogue. We guess Cooper’s book had a typo. His instructions would perfectly fit his verbal location, allowing for the degrees of error, if he meant that Winchelse was ENE from Winchelsea and SE from Rye.

Winchelse was a thriving place with 300 homes - and its own hospital, two churches and a friary - when it succumbed to the sea in the 13th century. It was not that big in 1086 when the whole of Rameslie had 189 households. Allowing for the farm and salt workers, we guess it had somewhere between 100 and 150 households before the invasion. That is still an enormous number of people to be living on a flood prone shingle spit. But Winchelse was not a normal port.

Pearson hints at Winchelse’s secret in Figure 15, where he marks ‘Possible tidal inlets’ on the Camber spit. Cunliffe and Green analysed the flow of the Brede and Rother from Roman times. One of their investigations is why the Brede had the greatest concentration of saltpans in southern England while the Tillingham and Rother further north had none. It is odd because the main sea water access was through a breach at Old Romney which was north of all of them. Sea water from Old Romney would have had to pass through Guldeford and Walland marshes to get to the Brede, but neither show signs of marine encroachment. Their conclusion is that there must have been at least one other breach in the Camber spit near the mouth of the Brede. It 68 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing would be around what is now Rye Golf Course, which is where Cooper suggests Winchelse was located.

Figure 15: Romney Marsh in medieval times; after Andrew Pearson

.A southern breach would explain Winchelse’s success. Presumably, the settlement grew up to service ships and barges passing through the breach. Why else would anyone build a settlement on a shingle spit with little food and no running fresh water that was prone to flooding and too unstable for building foundations? Cooper reports that Winchelse had bridges. There is no reason for bridges on a shingle spit, other than to cross a channel or canal. Note that if Winchelse was at this breach, Pearson is right to suggest that there was a third breach towards Pett because most of the references we note above that say Winchelse was an island.

Green thinks that the cross-spit breach was narrow and blocked at low tide. If he is right, ships must have docked on both sides, either to be loaded/unloaded or to wait for the tide before making the spit crossing. This was doubtless profitable for bars – of which there were apparently 11 - and brothels, but they cannot account for more than a fifth of the people that lived there.

Even though a channel or canal would be a lot faster than the route via Old Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 69

Romney, it would still be inefficient, requiring a high tide to get in and another to get out. From the number and type of people that are named in the 1288 Charter, we think the Romans developed a better logistics system that was still in use at the time of the invasion, and which employed the balance of Winchelse’s population.

Winchelse seems to have been a rudimentary transhipment hub. The commercially sensible process would be for inshore barges to take iron and salt from jetties on the banks of the Brede to Winchelse where they could be pulled through the channel or canal at high tide. On the seaward side of the spit, the barges could be unloaded directly into sea-going vessels or into warehouses. If the channel was temporarily blocked by storms or longshore drift, perhaps cargo was carried across the spit in carts.

Some of the iron and salt would have been exported to the Continent. Rather than return empty, presumably the freight vessels returned wine, oil, fruit and cloth, most of which would have been destined for London or Winchester on tidal drifters, or to Canterbury and the hinterland on the Rochester Roman road. This would explain how Norman navigators got to know the treacherous and ever-changing offshore sand banks around East Sussex.

Cunliffe explains that the most likely reason for the Camber spit breach at Winchelse to remain open was if freshwater channels were feeding through from the Brede and Tillingham. He still seems a little perplexed that eastward shingle drift did not block the breach or create its own spit. We have a simple explanation: We think it was dredged and had been since Roman times.

Wealden iron ore was a major reason for the Roman invasion of Britain. We think that the Romans, who hated bendy transport systems, cut the breach in the Camber shingle spit to accelerate exports of iron and salt, then established the docks to facilitate loading. Those docks would be within two miles of the location described by Ptolemy – i.e. mid-longitude between what is now Cannon Street in London and South Foreland in Kent – for ‘Portus 70 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Novus’. If we are right, Winchelse was the major port in East Sussex from Roman times right through to the 13th century.

Rye

There is one other enigma in this region’s Domesday entries, which is for ‘novus burgus’ in the manor of Rameslie. Domesday’s boroughs generally refer to somewhere that has liberties and/or rights to toll, typically a port. The obvious candidate is Rye.

Rye has been subject to dozens of excavations without finding any evidence of Saxon era occupation. Yet it had become a major port by the time of the Ship Service in 1227, being charged to provide five ships, as many as established ports like Romney and Hythe, half as many as Winchelse, and five times more than any other port around the Hastings Peninsula.

Rye was an ‘Ancient Town’, like Winchelsea, affiliated with Hastinges in the Ship Service, so it had liberties. That might make it a borough in Domesday. It was clearly a new borough at some point between 1066 and 1227. It cannot have grown to half the size of Winchese in less than 100 years. We think it was founded at sometime soon after 1066 and had become well established by 1086.

In those days, Rye was not on the coast. Like Winchelsea it was separated from the sea by the Camber shingle spit. It is therefore unlikely to have been a trading port. Something must have changed. Perhaps the Abbey of Fécamp simply decided to expand an existing harbour into a dry dock for ship building and ship repairs, which necessitated a standing settlement. Perhaps this was forced upon them because a change in the effective sea level prevented these activities at Winchelsea. Or perhaps glacial rebound and/or silting connected Rye to the mainland via a causeway or ford, which made it easier to be settled. We favour the latter.

Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 71

If you skipped over our place name analysis, here is a summary:

1. Hæstingas was the Old English name for the Hastings Peninsula. This is its meaning in Saxon Charters and Anglo-Saxon accounts (ASC and the Tapestry). Even though the Tapestry was created for Norman viewing, we think its Hestinga and Hestenga referred to the Hastings Peninsula, perhaps because it was embroidered by Saxon nuns under instruction from Normans who could not read. 2. Hæstinga ceastre was the Old English name for a former Roman fortification and probable Alfredian burh on the Hastings Peninsula. Norman accounts do not mention Hæstinga ceastre directly, but lots of them mention a pre-existing fortress in Hastingas. 3. Hæstinga port was the Old English name for the international port on the Hastings Peninsula. Its docks and warehouses were at Winchelse on a shingle spit at the mouth of the Brede. Its harbour, dry docks, maritime supplies, mint and dock administration were at Winchelsea. 4. Hastinges, often Latinised to Hastingas or portus Hastingas, was the Norman name for Hæstinga port. 5. Pefenesea was the contraction of pefenes ea, an island harbour some 2km southeast of modern Pevensey. The term pefenes ea means 'pefen’s isle’ in Old English, referring to a person named pefen. 6. Peuenesel was the Frankish translation and transliteration of pefenes ea (i.e. the contraction of peuenes îles) used by Frank and Normans to refer to the island harbour some 2km southeast of Pevensey. 7. Castrum Peuenesel was the Norman name for the castle at Pevensey, also known as Anderitum by the Romans and Andrades ceastre by the Saxons. 8. Rap de Peuenesel was the Norman name for the area surrounding pefenes ea. It included the newly refurbished castle at Pevensey. 9. When pefenes ea was destroyed by storms in the 12th century, the local population relocated to the castle at Pevensey, taking the name of their settlement with them. This is how the settlement around the castle came to be known as Pefenesea (and ultimately Pevensey). It is exactly analogous to what happened at Winchelsea. 72 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Figure 16: East Sussex medieval place names

This place name schema matches nearly all the landing accounts. It sounds contrived and implausibly complicated. It is not. Hæstinga, Hæstinga port, Hæstinga ceastre, pefenes ea and Andrades ceastre followed the normal Saxon naming convention. Before 1066, most Normans only dealt with Hæstinga port and the harbour at pefenes ea, which they referred to by the Norman translation Portus Hastinges, usually abbreviated to Hastinges or Hastingas, and the Frankish translation Peuenesel, respectively.

Norman ex-pats in England gradually adopted local place names. They must have adopted the name Wincenesel for Winchelse and Iham for Winchelsea because they are listed as ports in the Pipe Rolls and Ship Service. Presumably, they narrowed the meaning of Hastinges from Hæstinga port to some small part of Hæstinga port because it has a separate sub-listing in Domesday. We guess that it was taxed differently from the rest of Rameslie, perhaps because it had a military or government purpose after the Conquest, at least until the stone castle was complete at Hastings. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 73

But the meaning of these place names evolved through the 12th and early 13th centuries with the changing geography and politics of the region. The major geographic change was the gradual erosion and eventual 13th century destruction of the Camber and Crumbles shingle spits. Ports and harbours on those spits were forced to move to the new coast. Among them Winchelse, Pefenesea and Romney, all of which played a part in the Norman landing. They took their occupants, businesses and place names to Winchelsea, Peuenesel (which became Pevensey) and New Romney respectively.

The major political change was that William constructed castles along the East Sussex coast, each controlling a rape. The administrative control of the Hastings Peninsula passed from Hæstinga ceastre to Hastings Castle. When Domesday was compiled, the rapes were known by the name of the Norman baron that controlled them. During the 12th century, those rapes took the name of their castle. The settlement around Hastings castle was known as ‘Nova Hastings’ according to the Pipe Rolls, presumably because the name Hastinges was still being used to refer to part of Hæstinga port. By the 13th century, the castles at Hastings and Pevensey, and the settlements around them, had got the familiar names that have lasted through to the present day.

Place name evolution mainly affects the Anglo-Norman accounts - Historia Anglorum, Chronicon ex Chronicis and the Chronicles of the Kings of England - all of which were written in the early 12th century during the transition. We try to interpret case by case whether place names refer to their meaning at the time of the invasion or at the time they were written. Some of them were mixed. The same is true of CBA and Wace, for which there was a 100-year gap between the invasion and when they were written. We have to be particularly careful about place names in first-hand quotations, which presumably had the place name meanings at the time they were said rather than when their chronicle was written.

The occasional and inconsistent expansion of Hastinges and Hastingas to Portus Hastinges and Portus Hastingas is another source of confusion. As far 74 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing as we can see, it is totally arbitrary. Normans in Normandy had no reason to use the 'port’ suffix because they had no dealings with anywhere on the Hastings Peninsula apart from the port. This is exactly analogous to their use of the name Douvres to mean the port of Dover and to our modern use of the term Calais to mean the port of Calais. We guess that the occasional switch to the formal Portus prefix was for the sake of those that were unfamiliar with English geography.

The major remaining discrepancies between our landing narrative and the orthodox narrative is caused by historians' understandable desire for simplicity. They knew from the most trustworthy accounts that the Normans had an initial and a secondary landing, building a fortress at each. Twenty different place names are used in the landing accounts. They are listed at the beginning of this text, with names including Hæstinga port, Hastingas, Hestinga, Pefenesea, Peuenesel and Peneuesellum. The obvious solution was that the ‘P’ names referred to the first landing site, and the ‘H’ names to the second.

The orthodoxy is wrong because most of the ‘P’ accounts refer to the Norman arrival off the coast of England rather than their initial landing. The real narrative is that the Norman fleet arrived near pefenes ea (often contracted to Pefenesea and known to the Normans by its Frankish translation Peuenesel), an island harbour on the coast about 2km southeast of Pevensey fortress. The Normans waited there for sunlight and the right tide, then sailed on and landed at Peneuesellum. They stayed for just one day, before moving to Hæstinga port on the south bank of the River Brede, where they stayed until a week after their victory.

So, all the primary source landing accounts are accurate, as far as they go. None are complete. This is understandable. The Normans only moored for a few hours near pefenes ea and they only occupied Peneuesellum for one day. Nothing happened at either place. All the accounts that omit the arrival and/or the Peneuesellum landing were heavily abridged. It makes sense that some would redact these events. We liken it to Ellis Island. Nearly all of the Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 75

12 million U.S. immigrants that landed at Ellis Island would naturally have reported that they landed at New York.

Peneuesellum and the first Norman landing

One important place has been omitted from the place name definitions above: Peneuesellum, where three of the earliest and most trusted primary sources specifically say the Normans landed. One of them says that William returned there six months after the invasion, reiterating that it is where the Normans landed. We feel sure they are right, but they provide few clues about where it was.

Historians think that Peneuesellum referred to Pevensey. The only evidence is that they were both in East Sussex and that Peneuesellum looks like a Latinised corruption of Peuenesel, which became the Norman name for Pevensey. We cannot accept it. Franks and Normans consistently referred to pefenes ea as Peuenesel, both before and after the Conquest. There is no obvious reason these three accounts would buck the trend, and the Normans could not have landed near Pevensey for the many reasons we list above.

The first thing to note is that Peneuesellum only appears in Norman accounts. It is a Latin format name but with no obvious Old English place names in the vicinity upon which it might have been based. The only likely reason that the Normans might have their own name for somewhere in Sussex that has no English counterpart is that it was part of the land belonging to the Abbey of Fécamp. In this vicinity, this means that it was part of Rameslie manor.

There are four references to Peneuesellum. WP and WJ say that the Normans landed at Peneuesellum then went to Hastingas, making it sound like they were adjacent. Orderic says that Harold withdrew his ships and troops from “Hastingas et Peneuesellum”. Later he says that the Normans occupied “Peneuesellum et Hastingas” upon landing, leaving a body of men to guard them both. Note the reversal of names, so at least one of them was not a proper noun. Orderic’s statements only make sense if Peneuesellum was 76 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing adjacent to Hastingas. Warenne Chronicle says that the Norman fleet passed between a fortress at Hastingas and a fortress at Pevenesellum. These are all Norman sources (well, Orderic was English but wrote for a Norman audience), so their Hastingas meant Hæstinga port. Warenne Chronicle’s Hastingas fortress was Hæstinga ceastre, which we place at Winchelsea. Assuming its Pevenesellum meant Peneuesellum (note the n/v switch), this only makes sense if Peneuesellum faced Winchelsea across the Brede.

So, Peneuesellum was adjacent to Winchelsea and perhaps faced it across the Brede. In the first edition of this book, we mused that Peneuesellum referred to Rye. There is no evidence of Saxon era occupation of Rye, but 150 years later it had 20% the trading volume of Hæstinga port, which was the busiest port east of Southampton. That is astonishing growth. We think Rye was in Rameslie manor and was therefore a possession of the Abbey of Fécamp. We speculated that Hæstinga port ran out of capacity after the Conquest, because the Normans hugely increased trade with Normandy, so the Abbey of Fécamp had to develop a small Saxon era harbour at Rye. We said that they probably referred to that harbour as Peneuesellum. We still think they developed the harbour at Rye, but we no longer think it was Peneuesellum.

Soon after we published our book, Kathleen Tyson published her Carmen translation, in which she suggests that the name Peneuesellum means ‘fort in the wash’. Her derivation looks good to us. There is no evidence of Saxon era occupation at Rye, let alone a fortress. If Kathleen is right, Peneuesellum was somewhere else.

If Peneuesellum was not Rye, we made another mistake. In the first edition of this book, we suggested that ‘Hastingas et Peneuesellum’ was probably a composite proper noun, referring to a port named ‘Hastingas et Peneuesellum’, which might have been a Norman name for the harbours at Hæstinga port and Rye. It was always a bit tenuous because of Orderic’s later reference to the Normans occupying ‘Peneuesellum et Hastingas’, with the names reversed. Rye was the only feasible harbour adjacent to Winchelsea, Winchelse aside, because there were no natural inlets upstream on either bank. If ‘Hastingas et Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 77

Peneuesellum’ was not a proper noun, then Orderic referred to a place named Hastingas and a place named Peneuesellum.

This means that Orderic was trying to say that Harold withdrew his ships and troops from Hastingas and from Peneuesellum. If Peneuesellum had standing troops, they were probably stationed at a garrison fortress, which would corroborate Peneuesellum referring to a fortress.

Kathleen Tyson thinks Peneuesellum was at modern Udimore village. She notes it was where William built a grand manor house now known as Court Lodge. She speculates that it was built on the ruins of a fortress, and suggests that Udimore would be a 'magnificent’ place for a navigation beacon and an ideal place to tax cargo passing from Hæstinga port to Kent on a causeway across the Brede. We are sceptical. Udimore has shown no archaeological evidence of pre-invasion occupation, let alone a fort. It has a severely restricted sea view pointing to Boulogne in what was Hauts-de-France rather than Normandy. It is difficult to believe that the Saxons had the wherewithal or skills to construct a pioneering 2km tidal causeway, especially when there was a low-water ford and a bridge a few miles upstream. Udimore was 6km from the end of the Udimore peninsula, so it was barely ‘in the wash’.

WP, WJ and Orderic make is clear that Peneuesellum was near to Hæstinga port, probably adjacent. ‘In the wash’ suggests it was somewhere that is lapped by tidal waters on both sides, which means an island or a peninsula. Peneuesellum’s name suggests it was part of the Abbey of Fécamp’s Rameslie manor. So, Peneuesellum was on a peninsula adjacent to the Brede and adjacent to Winchelsea but it was not Rye.

There are only two Peneuesellum candidates: the north bank of the Brede and the south bank upstream of Icklesham. Tapestry Panel 40 says that the knights hurry to Hestinga to forage for food. It would make no sense if the Normans landed on the south bank of the Brede. If its Hestinga referred to Hæstinga port, there is no way that the Norman knights would leave farmland to forage at a port. If, as we think, its Hestinga referred to the Hastings 78 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Peninsula, they were already on it. We are convinced that Peneuesellum, where the Normans first landed, referred to somewhere on the north bank.

It is interesting to speculate why the Abbey of Fécamp coined their own term for part of the Brede’s north bank. We guess that it relates to the Saxon manor of Bretda. Charter S982 clarifies that the manor of Bretda was included in Cnut’s gift the Abbey of Fécamp. The obvious reason for this clarification is that it was previously in dispute. We suspect that Bretda originally contained the salt-pans that were gifted to Abbey of St Denys then to the Abbey of Fécamp. Neither of those Charters mentioned Bretda, perhaps leaving the rest of Bretda manor with its original Tenant in Chief. Therefore, the land that contained the salt-pans needed a new name.

Figure 17: Yeakell & Gardner Cadborough in 1770

Perhaps we can be more specific about Peneuesellum’s location. It makes no difference to our theory if we are wrong but we think that Peneuesellum referred to Cadborough, Yeakell & Gardner (Figure 17) label Cadborough as Caresborough in 1770. The Brythonic term ‘caer’ means fortress. If the name was Brythonic, it must have predated the Saxon invasion, which means it must be Roman. The earliest ‘boroughs’ were Saxon burh fortifications. These burhs were often built at former Roman fortifications on promontories overlooking places that the Vikings had previously raided. Cadborough fits the bill, at the eastern tip of the Udimore peninsula, where it was definitely ‘in the wash’ and it had the widest sea view of anywhere on the Udimore Peninsula.

We are not suggesting that the Normans actually landed below Cadborough. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 79

It had a dangerously narrow shore and steep cliff. Rather we think that it was the closest place to the landing that had a name, at least one that Normans would recognise. Most likely, they landed upstream of Cadborough, between Float Farm and Brede ford. This would be below Court Lodge, so Kathleen Tyson may well be right that Court Lodge commemorated the place where the Normans landed.

Figure 18: Brede estuary medieval place names

A Brede landing

If we are right about place names, the Normans landed near Peneuesellum on the north bank of the River Brede then crossed to Hæstinga port on south bank. What about the non-place name evidence?

Logistics is unhelpful. The Brede was crossed by the only paved Roman road in the region, which would have been ideal for easy plundering and foraging, but the other candidates were close to ancient trackways. If those tracks were well maintained, they might have been almost as good. All four candidates were close to a freshwater stream. Each had at least one nearby hill/ridge on the Hastings Peninsula that would have made a good camp: Hooe Haven 80 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing and the Ash Bourne had Standard Hill; Combe Haven had Upper Wilting or Green Street; the Brede had Cackle Street and Cock Marling to the north, Winchelsea, Snailham, Starlings and Cottage Lane to the south.

Some of the other non-place name clues from the primary accounts are equally unhelpful. William would have seen the “looming rocky coast” of Beachy Head wherever he landed. All the landing site candidates were in a “calm basin". None of the landing site candidates has surviving remains of a fort. No confirmed 11th century mottes have survived. There are sea-level moats at Barnhorne and Wartling, and a side-hill moat at Lower Snailham on the south bank of the Brede, but they are not necessarily mottes and there is no reason to believe they were earlier than 13th century. These clues do not narrow down or preclude any of the landing site candidates.

The rest of the non-place name clues point to a Brede landing. Carmen says that an English spy hid under a sea-cliff to watch the landing. The Brede was the only candidate overlooked by sea cliffs, at Cadborough Cliffs. Warenne Chronicle says that the landing was in an estuary beside Hastinges fortress. The Brede was the only landing site candidate that is likely to have been beside a fortress, because it was the only one beside high ground. It is the only candidate that had a firm dry riverbank which could support mounted horses and long enough to fit the Norman army (Hooe Haven might have had a firm dry river bank, but it was too short). It is the only candidate that is likely to have had an international port at its mouth, because roughly 90% of the region’s natural resources were produced in the Brede basin. It had the only paved road and the only low-tide canal for freight distribution. It had the Norman abbey of Fécamp. Monks from that abbey acted as interpreters on the invasion. As Jo Kirkham pointed out decades ago, William would have been foolish not to tap their expert local knowledge.

Carmen also says that the Norman fleet arrived at 'safe landing grounds’ at the third hour of the day. It cannot be referring to the actual landing grounds, because the word 'safe’ would be extraneous and misleading, being that they Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 81

expected it to be defended. We interpret it to mean safe from natural hazards, which along the East Sussex coast most likely refers to the sea cliffs between Hastings and Fairlight. These cliffs would not jeopardise a landing in the Ash Bourne or Hooe Haven, but they would jeopardise a landing in Combe Haven or the Brede estuary, especially in a southerly breeze.

A possible alternative interpretation of Carmen’s 'safe landing grounds’ is where they became protected from storms. This applies to all four landing site candidates. The Brede was sheltered behind the Camber shingle spit. Hooe Haven and the Ash Bourne were sheltered behind 'The Crumbles’ shingle spit, which enclosed the Pevensey Lagoon. Combe Haven was sheltered behind an island known as Bulverhythe. Assuming the overnight mooring was somewhere between pefenes ea and the Royal Sovereign Shoals, and that the Norman fleet left at dawn, three hours would be about right for the 20-mile reach to Winchelse on a southerly breeze against the tide. It seems improbably long for a ten-mile run on a southerly breeze to Bulverhythe, let alone a six-mile run to The Crumbles.

Figure 19: Romney Marsh in medieval times after Bernard Leeman. 82 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

All the clues point to a Brede estuary landing. This brings us back to the spit crossing. The main entrance to the lagoon was 10 miles up the coast at Old Romney (Figure 15 and Figure 19). We know that the Normans did not use it, because Wace reports that several ships landed there by mistake; their crews were killed by the local inhabitants. If they landed in the Brede, they must have used a channel or canal across the spit. Andrew Pearson, Bernard Leeman and others show the crossing at Winchelse (Leeman refers to it as Old Winchelsea).

It is interesting to check the order of events versus the tides and sunlight. Sunrise on the 28th September was at 5.57, sunset at 17.44, low tide at 09:45, high tide at 16:00. Carmen suggests that the Normans left their mooring place near pefenes ea at sunrise. They would have aimed to disembark simultaneously at high tide when the estuary took them as high as possible up the bank. At any other time, there would have been a risk of horses and armoured men getting stuck in the mud and perhaps drowning. Tapestry Panel 39 depicts some men and horses disembarking. They are high up the riverbank on solid ground. The lead ship would need to get far enough up the Brede estuary - say to Brede Place - before high tide. Do the timings work?

According to Carmen, the Norman fleet reached their 'safe landing place’ at the third hour of the day. Whether it means safe from sea cliffs or safe from storms, it would refer to Winchelse for a Brede landing. The third hour of the day would mean the lead ship arrived at Winchelse around 09:00, 45 minutes before low tide. If they needed a minimum of, say, 30 minutes to organise the midstream anchoring before landing, the lead ship had roughly six hours to get 10km to Brede Place. Their ability to achieve this depends in part upon how long it took to cross the Camber spit, which in turn depends upon its width and when it opened.

If the Normans arrived just before low tide, it suggests that the cross-spit channel was open soon after low tide, presumably because it was dredged. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 83

It seems likely then that the idea was to drift through the channel on the flood tide, steering with a pole. If Chesil Beach is a good model at 200m across, it would have taken around 15 minutes to make the crossing. Pearson and Leeman both depict the spit as roughly 1km wide at Winchelse, which would have taken more like an hour. Worst case, assuming the channel opened soon after low tide, the lead ship had 5 hours to get 10km to Brede Place on a rising tide. The tide had to come through the main lagoon entrance at Old Romney. It would be 30 minutes late and slow; more like a lock rising than a tidal bore. Perhaps it contributed 5km, leaving the lead ship to make 5km in five hours. The Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde, Denmark, told us that a fully manned Snekka could row at 2km per hour for five hours in a neutral wind. Even the Karvi could probably row 5km in five hours. The landing would therefore be achievable in anything other than a westerly breeze.

But five hours of rowing after a sleepless night is far from ideal for a fighting force. As it happened, the English garrisons were empty. William was not to know. He expected the landing site to be defended. He expected to fight ashore and/or face a garrison counterattack. Even though his troops would have been fit and strong, William would surely have hoped for some help from the wind as they made their way up the Brede. Reaching into even a modest southerly breeze or running a gentle easterly breeze, along with the flood tide, would comfortably take the lead ships to Brede Place in five hours without any exertion.

Several primary sources say that the Norman fleet was stuck in Normandy for a month while they waited for a southerly breeze. It worked out well for William because Harald Hardrada dragged the defenders away during the wait. William was not to know. He would surely have wanted to invade earlier if possible, to take advantage of better weather and longer daylight, and to prevent his troops getting restless. Yet they could have crossed the Channel on the prevailing south-westerly breeze at almost any time. 84 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Note that historians often interpret this to mean that the Normans were trapped in port for a month by a constant northerly breeze. They are wrong. There has never been a month of northerly breezes in the Channel in September since records began, and the nature of the weather in our latitudes suggests that there never will be. Moreover, Heimskringla makes it clear that the weather in the middle of September was mild and dry – i.e. not an arctic blast - because it was too warm for the Norse army to wear their armour on the day of the Battle of Stamford Bridge.

A Brede landing explains why the Normans had to wait for a southerly breeze. Any northerly breeze would have scuppered a landing at any of the candidates because the Karvi would have become detached from the fleet on the Channel crossing. Any other breeze would have allowed a landing at Combe Haven, Hooe Haven or the Ash Bourne. But not the Brede. A south-westerly would have forced the close hauled Karvi to beat on the Channel crossing. An easterly breeze would have detached close hauled Karvi on the easterly run to Winchelse. A westerly breeze would have prevented the lead ships from getting far enough up the Brede estuary before high tide. If William intended to land in the Brede, he had to wait for a southerly or south-easterly breeze and a low tide between 08:00 and 12:00.

So, in our opinion, a Brede landing (as shown in Figure 20) best fits the primary source descriptions and it is logistically feasible. There is still the question of why? A mishap in the Winchelse spit crossing might have blocked Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 85

Figure 20: Norman fleet route for Brede landing the entire fleet. The tide timing was stringent and critical in the Brede and it needed a southerly breeze. A landing in Combe Haven, Ash Bourne or Hooe Haven had no such dependences. If William had been prepared to land at any of them, the invasion could have happened several weeks earlier, when his troops were less fractious, daylight longer and weather perhaps more favourable. The Brede must have had at least one compelling attraction as the landing site.

We have already mentioned one of the Brede’s advantages: it was the longest estuary or inlet around the Hastings Peninsula, which made it the best place to implement the midstream anchoring ploy, outlined above and described in the Wargames section. But Combe Haven and the Ash Bourne were nearly as good. It is a modest return for the risk of traversing the shingle spit at Winchelse. There must have been more. We think the Brede had two more unique advantages, both tied to the bank upon which they landed.

Rameslie manor, which we think lined both banks of the Brede (for reasons explained above), is listed in Domesday with 100 saltpans. This is the greatest concentration of saltpans in southern England. Why there? One reason is that the Camber shingle spit protected the Brede estuary from 86 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing storms and flooding. Another is that it has an east-west orientation. Saltpans are ideally placed on a south facing bank of a wide estuary or inlet, where they are never shaded by hills or vegetation, even when the sun is low in the sky. Most, if not all, of Rameslie’s saltpans would have been on the north bank of the Brede.

Figure 21: Salt plain landing upstream of Peneuesellum

We guess that the evaporation ponds were created by the Romans using a levee between Float Farm and Brede Place and by channelling the streams running off the Udimore Ridge. Over the centuries, the ground would level and compact. The ponds behind the levee would be flooded in the Spring and evaporate over the Summer. By the end of September, the concentrated brine would have been harvested to leave a wide flat straight-edged dry plain just above the estuary bank (Figure 21). It would be perfect for a simultaneous mass landing; firm enough underfoot to support mounted horses and level enough to assemble a kit-fortress without a motte. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 87

The Brede’s third advantage was that the Udimore Ridge narrows to a pinch point just 100m across at Sowdens. William was expecting a counterattack from the garrisons at Lympne and/or Pevensey. It would come from the west, either along the ridgeway or along the strand. William had to block both. He had brought a kit fortress but it could not block the ridgeway and the strand. Moreover, there was no time to dig a motte, so it had to be constructed on clear level ground, which means not the ridgeway. We think that William blocked the ridgeway at Sowdens with barricades and the strand with the fortress, as depicted on Figure 26. This would explain why they went to so much effort to bring and assemble a fortress that was only used for one day.

Figure 22: Tapestry Panel 37

Tapestry Panel 41 (Figure 23), at the Norman landing site, offers some corroboration of this theory. Before explaining why, we need to point out that the vast majority of the Tapestry has bobbles on the baseline, like the righthand side of Panel 37 (Figure 22). This happens to be the coast of Normandy, but Pontieu, Mont Saint-Michel and the other coasts and riverbanks are the same.

Presumably then the bobbly base represents fields, meadows, dunes and scrub. The non-bobbly baseline is usually reserved for the areas in and around buildings. But the characters in Panels 40, 41 and 42 (Figure 23) are on the baseline without a foreground building or motte in sight. It is the only riverbank or coast on the baseline. Indeed, it is the only outdoor scene on 88 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing the baseline, apart from the sea camp motte.

Figure 23: Tapestry Panel 40 & 41

We interpret this to mean that the landing site was as flat and smooth as a road or motte. Wace confirms that the landing site was flat: “All had their swords girded on, and passed into the plain with their lances raised”. There were no natural plains around the periphery of the Hastings Peninsula in those days. We think the answer to both puzzles is that the landing site was a smooth plain of dried-out salt evaporation ponds.

Figure 24: Tapestry Panel 41

The huts in the background of Panel 41 (Figure 24) offer some further corroboration. One has a shingle roof, one a plank roof and one a tile roof. This at a time when nearly all dwellings in England had thatched roofs. The two outer huts seem to have chimneys. We think they were evaporation chambers, where they boiled away water from concentrated brine to crystallise salt. If so, they would have been beyond the evaporation ponds, on the lower slopes of the ridge, exactly as depicted. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 89

Kathleen Tyson favours a Brede landing too, through a different argument. She translates Peneuesellum to mean 'fort in the wash’. She independently worked out that the 'wash’ referred to the tidal waters around the Udimore Peninsula, which means the landing must have been in the Brede.

A Brede landing also fits Jo Kirkham’s theory that the invasion was planned by the monks of Fécamp Abbey. They were Norman and therefore probably loyal to their patron William. They may well have resented Harold for having dispossessed and banished Normans from England. Wace tells us that William brought some monks from Fécamp to act as interpreters. The only place they could have learned Old English was at Rameslie, the manor around the Brede (they were not at their other property in for long enough). Having lived there long enough to learn the language, they would have known the area intimately. William would surely have tapped their local knowledge to identify the best landing place and to help develop a battle plan.

If we are right about most of the above, it solves two puzzles and perhaps an enigma. The first puzzle is why serial owners of Hæstinga port would gift such a valuable asset to monasteries: first to St Denys in the 8th century, then to Eynsham Abbey and finally Fécamp. In St Denys’ case, forged charters say that a Saxon baron named Bertoald gave them the port in gratitude for their healing services. Tommyrot. We think the reason was commercial.

The administration of the entrepôt was too complicated and too expensive for normal barons. It needed quays, jetties, wharfs, canals, roads, dredging, ferries, security, warehouses, barges and bridges that were provided as an operational overhead. It was a capital-intensive business before there was an easy way to raise capital. There was no central power to provide these services once the Romans had left. The Church was the nearest substitute. They had the funds and the skills to run major infrastructure projects. Clerics alone could read, write and sum, the essential skills for keeping records and ledgers. We think that the port’s owners had to give it to one abbey or 90 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing another, in exchange for a cut of the tolls, to prevent it decaying into disuse with no revenue.

The second puzzle is Wace’s description of the first raid. He says that the Normans follow the coast, then loot a fortress named Penevesel while the locals drive off their cattle and hide in cemeteries. This has always been interpreted to be ‘castrum Peuenesel’ (i.e. Anderitum at Pevensey). But Pevensey would have been too marshy for cattle and too sparsely populated for loot or cemeteries or even a church. Also, Wace uses the ‘n/u’ spelling Penevesel, as in Peneuesellum, rather than the ‘u/n’ spelling of Peuenesel. He would not have used the Latin -um suffix, because he was writing in Old French. We think he was referring to Peneuesellum, at Cadborough. It was just along the coast from where we think they landed, exactly as Wace describes. We think Cadborough had a dilapidated Roman fortress and a church, and perhaps a burh, so it would have fitted Wace’s description of the first day raid.

After our book was published, a Sowdens resident told us of a local lore that St Mary’s Church was moved to Udimore in the 12th century from somewhere closer to the sea. The oldest part of St Mary’s is indeed 12th century. No older foundations have been found in the vicinity. We guess that the original St Mary’s was at Cadborough. We would love to hear from anyone that knows more.

The enigma concerns the Sedlescombe coin hoard, which was found north of Sedlescombe bridge in 1876. The latest coin in the hoard is dated 1064, which has made some think that it was buried long before the Normans arrived. We guess that the mint had not changed their coin stamp, so these coins might have been minted up to soon before the invasion. Regardless, something traumatic and lasting must have happened to bury such a valuable treasure and not return to collect it. The invasion looks culpable.

The hoard is often said to be Harold’s war chest, but it seems unlikely. There was a mint at Hæstinga ceastre. It produced less than 1% of England’s coins, Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 91 but two-thirds of the coins in what remains of the hoard. We cannot think of a plausible reason why Harold would have brought so many coins minted at Hæstinga ceastre.

We guess that the mint was melting down foreign coins taken as taxes, tolls, and fees by the port, then stamping and re-issuing them. Presumably, some of those coins were used to pay the port’s warehousemen, stevedores, ferrymen, and hauliers. We think the hoard’s collector was taking payments, directly or indirectly, from them. An inn, brothel, or toll house perhaps.

But if the Normans landed anywhere other than the north bank of the Brede, the hoard’s owner had two weeks to move the coins to safety. If, on the other hand, the Normans landed on the north bank of the Brede and immediately rode to the Hastings Peninsula to get food, as we suggest above, they would have ridden across the Brede at Sedlescombe. The hoard’s owner would have been in immediate danger. They might have buried the coins as soon as they saw the Norman knights, then fled.

There is one reference that seems to contradict a Brede landing. It is the Warenne Chronicle which is usually translated: “unopposed he entered the land of the English between the fortresses of Hastinges and Pevenessellum". It uses the u+n spelling which our rule defines as Peuenesel (i.e. Pevensey). If the translation and spelling are right, it is saying that the Normans entered the land of the English in an estuary or inlet between Pevensey and Winchelsea, which is likely to mean Combe Haven. We previously speculated that it had erroneously transposed the u and n. This is still possible, but we now think it more likely that the translation should be: "unopposed between the fortresses of Hastinges and Pevenessellum he entered the land of the English". In other words, the Norman fleet was unopposed as it sailed from pefenes ea to Winchelse, where it entered the land of the English by sailing up the Brede estuary. 92 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

Reconciliation with the contemporary accounts

This then is what the other contemporary accounts are trying to say:

1. WP: William wanted to avoid a “dangerous or unknown anchorage". The Norman fleet moored outside St Valery then ran downwind on a southerly breeze heading for the well-known harbour of pefenes ea. To muster the fleet back together, and perhaps to obfuscate their intended destination, they moored on shoals several miles off the English coast. 2. CKE says of William that: "The earl himself first launching from the continent into the deep, awaited the rest, at anchor, nearly in mid-channel. All then assembled round the crimson sail of the admiral’s ship; and, having first dined, they arrived, after a favourable passage, at Hastingas". The Norman fleet waited mid-channel off St Valery, crossed the Channel, ate breakfast, then eventually arrived at Hæstinga port, which CKE referred to as Hastingas. 3. Carmen: “the looming rocky coast" did not discourage the invasion. The Normans would have seen the sea cliff at Beachy Head as soon as it started to get light. 4. Orderic says that, upon hearing of Tostig’s invasion, Harold: “withdrew his ships and troops from Hastingas et Peneuesellum, and the other seaports opposite Normandy". Harold withdrew his ships from Hæstinga port and his troops from Hæstinga port and Cadborough. 5. Carmen: “On the open sea you moor offshore; You caution to take in the sails, awaiting the morning to come; But after the dawn spreads red over the land, and the sun casts its rays over the horizon; You order the sails set to the wind to make way”. The Norman fleet moored off the English coast, then beam reached on a cross wind to Winchelse. 6. CBA: The Normans “Arrived safely near castrum Peuenesel. The Duke did not remain long in that place, but went away with his men to a port not far distant named Hastinges". The Norman fleet arrived near the island harbour of pefenes ea, within sight of Anderitum, which CBA refers to as castrum Peuenesel [the castle of Peuenesel]. They moored for a few Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 93

hours, then sailed to Winchelse, which CBA referred to as Hastinges. 7. CBA says that Hechelande, which it describes being northwest of and adjacent to Telham on the ridge, is in the direction of Hastingarum from Battle Abbey. CBA is describing Hechelande’s location in respect to the Norman castle of Hastings which existed when it was written although, of course, not when CBA was written. 8. WP describes the scene on William’s ship: “In the morning, a lookout at the top of the mast declared that he could see nothing but sea and sky. They anchored at once.” William was on the newest and biggest Snekka in the fleet, and it carried no horses. His ship would be much faster than the rest. He moored off the English coast and had breakfast while waiting for the fleet to catch up. By the time he had finished, the rest of the ships were in sight. 9. Warenne Chronicle: “without any resistance between the forts of Hastinges and Pevenessullum he entered the land of the English". The Norman fleet was unopposed as it sailed from near the fortress of Pevensey to the fortress as Winchelsea where they drifted into the Brede estuary. 10. WP says: “Borne by a favourable breeze to Peneuessellum, he disembarked with ease and without having to fight his way ashore". The Normans landed unopposed on the north bank of the Brede, which WP refers to as Peneuessellum. 11. Brevis Relatio says that Duke William and his fleet: "arrived in England, by the favour of God, near the fortress of Pevensel. After a short delay he arrived with his whole army at another port not far away named Hastingas". The Norman fleet arrived at the island harbour of pefenes ea, near the fortress of Peuenesel, then sailed to Hæstinga port, which Brevis Relatio refers to as Hastingas. 12. WP says: “The rejoicing Normans, once they had landed, occupied Peneuessellum, where they built their first camp, and built another at Hastingas to provide a refuge for themselves and a shelter for their boats". 13. WJ says that William: “Landed at Peneuessellum where he immediately built a castle with a strong rampart. He left this in charge of some troops and, with others, hurried to Hastingas where he built another". William 94 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

landed on the north bank of the Brede, which WJ refers to as Peneuessellum, where the Normans assembled a fortress. He then hurried to Hæstinga port, where he assembled another. 14. Orderic: “They took possession of Peneuesellum and Hastingas, the defence of which was entrusted to a chosen body of soldiers to cover a retreat and to guard the fleet". The Normans occupied the north bank of the Brede and Winchelsea, which Orderic referred to as Peneuesellum and Hastingas respectively. The fleet moored in the harbours around Winchelsea. Men were stationed at Winchelsea to guard the fleet and to cover a retreat. 15. Benoît: The Normans “Arrived at Pevenesel, at a port/harbour beneath a fortress handsome and strong" and “The Count came to Hastinges without staying". The Normans arrived off the island harbour of pefenes ea, which Benoît refers to as Pevenesel. It was within sight of Anderitum. They sailed to Hæstinga port, which Benoît referred to as Hastinges. 16. Tapestry Panel 38: “Duke William in a great ship crossed the sea and came to Pevenesæ". The Normans arrived off the island of pefenes ea, which the Tapestry referred to as Pevenesæ. 17. Tapestry Panel 40: “The knights hurried to Hestinga". The Normans disembarked on the north bank of the Brede, then the knights rode around the Brede to forage for food on the Hastings Peninsula, which the Tapestry refers to as Hestinga. 18. Chronicon: William “Had moored his fleet at a place named Pefnesea". The Normans moored off the island harbour of pefenes ea, which Chronicon refers to as Pefnesea. 19. ASC-D: “Meantime Earl William came from Normandy to pefnes ea on the eve of St. Michael’s mass; and soon after his landing was effected, they constructed a fortress at the Hæstinga port”. The Normans moored off the island harbour of pefnes ea on Michaelmas Eve, then effected a landing on the north bank of the Brede. Soon after – i.e. the next day - they moved to Winchelsea, part of Hæstinga port, where they constructed a fortress. 20. ASC-E: “Meanwhile Count William landed at Hestingan on Michaelmas Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 95

Day". William landed Winchelsea on the Hastings Peninsula, which ASC-E refers to as Hestinga[n], on Michaelmas Day, having spent the previous day on the north bank of the Brede. 21. Wace: “The ships steered to one port/harbour; all arrived and reached the shore together; together cast anchor, and ran on dry land; and together they discharged themselves. They arrived near Hastingues each ship ranged by the other’s side." The Norman fleet steered towards the port of Hæstinga port, arrived together in the Brede estuary, cast anchor together midstream, then landed and discharged together on the north bank, near Hæstinga port, which Wace refers to as Hastingues. 22. Wace: A messenger tells Harold “The Normans are come! They have landed at Hastingues". The Normans occupied Winchelsea, part of which Hæstinga port which Wace refers to as Hastingues. 23. Carmen (Kathleen Tyson’s translation): “the happy land owed to you embraced you and yours in a calm basin". The Normans landed on the north bank of the Brede, which was in a calm basin and which William might have thought had been illegally stripped from the Norman Abbey of Fécamp by Harold. 24. Carmen: “One Englishman kept hidden under the sea cliff". The spy was at the base of Cadborough Cliff on the north bank of the Brede. 25. Wace: An English knight “posted himself behind a hill" to watch the Normans disembark. The spy posted himself behind the spur at Float Farm on the north bank of the Brede to watch the Normans disembark. 26. Carmen: “You restore the strongholds that were lately destroyed". The Normans patched up the Romain/burh fortresses at Winchelsea and Cadborough that had recently been destroyed by Tostig, as well as constructing their own kit fortresses. 27. Chronicon says that Harold: “Gave them battle nine miles from Heastinga, where they had built a fort”. The Normans assembled a fortress at Winchelsea, part of Hæstinga port which Chronicon refers to as Heastinga. 28. Wace: The knights “Formed together on the shore, each armed up on his warhorse. All had their swords girded on, and passed into the plain with 96 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing

their lances raised … When they [the carpenters] had reached the spot where the archers stood, and the knights were assembled, they consulted together, and sought for a good spot to place a strong fort upon". The Normans assembled a motte-less kit fortress on a plain which was adjacent to the strand. 29. Wace says that on their first day after landing they went on a raid. “They held their course along the coast; and on the morrow came to a fortress named Penevesel", which they plundered. The Norman raiding party followed the north bank of the Brede to its eastern tip, then marched west along the ridgeway to raid Cadborough, which Wace referred to as Penevesel.

Why is all this so difficult to work out?

1. Medieval East Sussex had unusual geography that has subsequently changed out of all recognition 2. Hardly anyone could read or write, so the accounts are based on hearsay 3. There was a long gap between the invasion and the creation of most of the accounts, so first-hand memories might be faulty 4. No literate Saxons would have known where the Normans landed, so there is no unglorified record of events and no English critique of the Norman accounts 5. The Normans used their own names for pefenes ea and Cadborough - Peuenesel and Peneuesellum respectively – which sound similar to each other and to Pevensey 6. Pevensey, Udimore Peninsula and the cape of the Hastings Peninsula all had Roman fortresses at the end of peninsulas 7. The Latin verb 'appello', used by some of the contemporary accounts when describing the fleet’s arrival in England, usually means 'to draw near' or 'to arrive' but Battle of Hastings translators often use a relatively unusual maritime meaning 'to put ashore' 8. This adds to the confusion between the Norman arrival off the coast Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Landing 97 of England, their initial temporary landing and their permanent landing. Some sources mentioning one, two or all three, without making it clear to which they are referring. 98 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

The Camps

Wace mentions only one Norman camp, near where they landed. ASC-D mentions only one camp, at Hæstinga port. Carmen mentions only a ‘sea camp’, which we think to have been within Hæstinga port. WP and WJ mention camps at Peneuesellum and Hæstinga port. The Tapestry depicts two camps, the second of which is captioned at Hestenga or 'Hestenga ceastra'. CBA mentions a camp at the ‘port of Hastinges’ and a battle camp. We think there was a bridgehead camp at Peneuesellum, a sea camp and a battle camp.

The bridgehead camp at Peneuesellum

Figure 25: Tapestry Panel 42

WP and WJ say that the first Norman camp was near where they landed at Peneuesellum. Both say that William did not stay long before moving to Hastingas. How long? Orderic, ASC-D and others say that William came to pefenes ea on Michaelmas Eve, landing later that day, presumably at Peneuesellum. ASC-E says that William landed at Hestingan - referring to the Hastings Peninsula, we think - on Michaelmas Day. It looks like ASC-E simply redacted the temporary landing at Peneuesellum because their stay was short and uneventful. If so, the Normans only stayed one day at Peneuesellum. It was not that William changed his mind about staying at the first camp because he would not otherwise have brought the second fortress. He always planned to move the next day. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 99

Peneuesellum was on the north bank of the Brede, east of Broad Oak. As we mention above, it had some compelling benefits for the Norman landing and bridgehead, not least its long dry salt plain and the Sowdens pinch point, which made it the only inland strand near the Hastings Peninsula that could accommodate the entire Norman fleet, and the easiest bridgehead to defend. Presumably, then, it had some equally compelling drawbacks that made it unsuitable to stay more than a day.

In our opinion, the long-term problem with the Udimore Peninsula was being too small and too short of tactical possibilities. William needed to lure Harold to the vicinity then ambush or trap him. The eastern end of the Udimore Peninsula offered no opportunities. Harold might have been tempted to make his operations centre within Norman striking distance, at Broad Oak or Cackle Street, but the Udimore Peninsula was too small to hide the Norman cavalry. English scouts were almost bound to spot them and warn Harold off. More likely, and almost certainly if he discovered the Norman cavalry, Harold would blockade the Udimore Peninsula and conduct his campaign from Starvecrow Cottage or Pelsham Farm on the north bank of the Tillingham where he was out of reach. William could not take the risk. He had to move.

Tapestry Panel 42 (Figure 25) shows cooks working in front of a towered structure. This is invariably assumed to be the first Norman fortress. It does not look like that to us. Carmen says the Norman fortress was surrounded by palisades. This building has open sides. It could not have come as a kit from Normandy because it has stone towers with windows, foundations and cupolas, whereas a kit would be wood with no foundations or adornments. Also, it is depicted on a bobbly base whereas a motte-less kit fortress would have needed to be on a smooth level base. We reckon the kit fortress is out of shot.

The structure in Panel 42 looks like a simplified version of William’s palace from Panel 35, with the roof being held up by an arch and cross beam. We 100 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps are drawn by the bobbles. It is one of only two buildings on the entire Tapestry that are depicted on bobbles. The other is the Saxon house being burned in Panel 47. Perhaps it was done by mistake, but we suspect that the bobbles indicate that both buildings are far distant, beyond bobbly fields. If so, the building in Panel 42 might be the Roman fortress and burh on the Udimore ridge, at Cadborough we think (see below). Otherwise, perhaps it is a Saxon salt warehouse or fishing net dryer.

In the afternoon and evening of their one day in Peneuesellum, WJ says that the Normans built a fortress with a strong rampart. It might be possible to work out where it was. Wace says they brought the fortress as a kit from Normandy. He goes on to say that the knights and carpenters join the archers on a plain at the edge of the strand where they: “consulted about where would be a good place to build a strong fortress".

It sounds like the fortress was on the plain or close to it. Tapestry Panel 41 (Figure 23) depicts the first camp at a treeless plain. A motte-less kit fortress could only be assembled on flat level ground. It would be most useful on a treeless plain, because there would be no natural shelter. We think it was somewhere on the dried-out salt evaporation ponds.

Wace says that an English spy watches the fortress being constructed from behind a hill. Carmen says that he previously watched the landing from the base of a sea cliff. If the landing was in the Brede estuary, this has to be Cadborough Cliff. He would not have gone too close for fear of getting captured. The obvious observation place was Float Farm, south of Cock Marling, where a spur came close to the water’s edge (eye in Figure 26). We guess that the fortress was at A, B or C, where it would protect the part of the camp to its east.

The only English garrisons in the vicinity - Lympne and Pevensey - were empty on the day of the invasion, but William was not to know. He would have planned to defend against a garrison counterattack in order to buy enough time to unload his ships and establish a strong bridgehead. The Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 101

English troops would have come east along the Udimore ridgeway, shown as a cyan line on Figure 26.

Figure 26: Bridgehead fortress location

In the first edition of this book, we thought the kit fortress was most likely to have been at A, where it would protect an evacuation if the English army turned up before the horses had been unloaded. We have changed our minds. We now think that was more likely to have been at C, where it worked in conjunction with a blockade of the Sowdens pinch point (x) to protect the landing site. It would have been positioned midway across the salt-plain and east a stream that drained runoff from Sowdens. Even if the fortress were only 30m square, it would have been horribly difficult to get past with perhaps only 50m either side for the Normans to defend.

One other interesting point here is that, before their arrival at the second camp, CBA says that William “burned the greatest part of his ships" in order to get his more lily-livered supporters to focus on their goal. Wace says that William: “commanded the sailors that the ships should be dismantled, and drawn ashore and pierced, that the cowards might not have the ships to flee to". Both statements are usually dismissed as poetic license. After all, WP says that an English messenger finds William inspecting his fleet, which would be pretty pointless if it was burned or holed.

In our opinion, William almost certainly did burn the greatest part of his fleet 102 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps at Peneuesellum. We guess that: 1) There was not enough space for the entire fleet at their second camp; 2) The horse carriers and cargo ships - which comprised more than half the fleet - were no longer needed because William had no intention of ever returning the horses, fortifications or provisions to his ships; and 3) Harold might have found the cargo ships useful in a blockade, so William wanted to ensure those left behind were not seaworthy.

It also makes sense that William ordered the bungs to be removed from the ships that went to the second camp, in order to discourage deserters. However, we think the bungs were readily available and could be used at short notice if William ordered the ships to leave quickly. We will return to why it might be relevant when discussing William’s plans.

The sea camp

Carmen says that, after the battle, William “returned to his sea camp", hence we refer to it as the ‘sea camp’. ASC-D says that: “soon after his landing was effected, they built a fortress at Hæstinga port". Carmen says that after the battle William spent five days in his “camp at Hastinges portus". CBA says that William went away with his men to a port named Hastinges where, “having secured an appropriate place ... he built a fortress of wood". WJ says the Normans assemble a second fortress at Hastingas. Chronicon says it was at Heastingam, then that: “William, however, returned to Heastingam” after the battle. We explain in the place name section why CBA’s Hastinges, WJ’s Hastingas and Chronicon’s Heastinga also referred to Hæstinga port.

Thus, all the sources that mention the second Norman camp say it was at Hæstinga port. We explain earlier why we think that Hæstinga port comprised Winchelse on the Camber shingle spit and Winchelsea, then known as Iham. Panel 45 (Figure 27) depicts the second camp. It shows a fortress on top of a hill. It cannot be on a shingle spit, so it must be at Winchelsea. This makes sense anyway. The Normans were hardly likely to make their camp on a flat, flood prone, siege prone shingle spit with only rain for water, and a few hens Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 103 and goats to eat. Winchelsea is close enough to the coast to be a ‘sea camp’.

Figure 27: Tapestry Panel 45

Panel 45 is captioned: “He ordered that a motte should be dug at Hestenga ceastra", which is usually interpreted to mean ‘at their Hastings camp’. This cannot be right for the same old reason that Hastings did not exist at the time. It might mean 'at their Hastings Peninsula camp’, on the basis that the Tapestry’s other reference to Hestenga referred to the Hastings Peninsula. But the caption is odd.

'AT HESTENGA CEASTRA’ is Old English whereas the rest of the Tapestry captions are in Latin. The traditional explanation is that the embroiderers were Saxon nuns, so they used the Old English term by mistake. It would be an uncharacteristic error considering how fastidious they were. We believe that they used Hestenga ceastra as a proper noun and indicated it by prefixing Old English ‘at’. Thus, it seems to us that the Tapestry is saying that the Norman sea camp was at Hæstinga ceastra, on the summit of Winchelsea. If so, the Tapestry is corroborating and narrowing the description given by the other contemporary accounts.

Winchelsea was very different in the 11th century, a narrow-necked steep- sided peninsula, sitting in a tidal lagoon. It was as good a defensive location as there is in the region. It had sea cliffs to the north and east, a steep slope down to the sea to west and a narrow causeway entrance to the south. As 104 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps we said earlier about Sowdens, pinch points are double edged. They are good for defence but siege-prone. In this particular case, we suspect that is exactly what William wanted. He needed to lure Harold to the Hastings Peninsula in person. Placing himself somewhere distant, passive and siege prone might have given Harold the confidence to come in person. On the other hand, an actual siege would have been disastrous for William and Normandy.

William and his barons and his guard would have been ensconced at Winchelsea. Most of his infantry would have been spread around the eastern cape of the Hastings Peninsula, guarding the fleet and ready for a counterattack. We guess that he had one division at Hog Hill to protect the causeway, a second at Winchelsea harbour to guard the fleet, and a third at Icklesham to block the ridgeway. Kathleen Tyson, who thinks the Norman sea camp was at Icklesham, is therefore probably right: Part of the sea camp probably was at Icklesham, although we think its focus was at Winchelsea.

Carmen describes William restoring ‘dilapidated strongholds’. Quedam Exceptiones, an epitome of WJ written in the early 12th century, says that William: “restored the most strongly entrenched fortification” (Kathleen Tyson’s translation) on Peneuesellum.

We think these fortresses were at Winchelsea (Hæstinga Ceastre) and Cadborough (Peneuesellum). Both fortresses could have been damaged when Harold raided the area 1052 or when Tostig raided it earlier in 1066. Indeed, they might have been prime targets since at least one of them had a mint that would have held gold. None of this would contradict any primary sources if, as we think, the Norman kit fortresses were in addition to dilapidated burh fortresses that already existed at Winchelsea and Cadborough.

The exact location of the Norman sea camp fortress

There is a lot of confusion about Panel 45 (Figure 22). It is captioned: “He ordered that a motte should be dug at Hestenga ceastra". Nearly everyone Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 105 assumes that the Normans had already assembled their kit fortress on the top of the hill and that they are digging a moat or ditch around the bottom of the hill. This is often based on the mistaken belief that ‘motte’ is another word for 'moat'.

A motte is the raised level ground upon which to build a keep. William is therefore ordering his men to raise and level the ground as a foundation for his kit fortress. They are still digging. Clearly then, they had not yet started to assemble the kit fortress. Yet there is already a fortress on the top of the hill. It must have been there before the Normans arrived. It has the word ‘CEASTRA’ embroidered right in the middle of it. We think that the hill-top fortress is Alfred’s burh at Hæstinga ceastre. If so, the burh fortress, William’s kit fortress and William’s sea camp were all at Winchelsea.

If the hill-top fortress on Panel 45 was Alfred’s burh fortress, why did William need a kit fortress? Carmen says that the pre-invasion fortresses had recently been damaged. Perhaps it was too dilapidated to offer a good defence, although Carmen goes on to say that William had it restored. Even if it was too damaged to be fully restored, why did William not build the kit fortress at the top of the hill inside the old burh wall? The answer is that the kit fortress had another purpose, to guard the only weak point of Winchelsea’s defence.

Alfred’s burh fortress would have been on the top of the hill, where the graveyard of St Thomas now lies. It is shown as a green square in Figure 24. It would have been inside the burh wall, which was roughly 600m long. As we say earlier, there were sea cliffs on the east and north sides of Winchelsea and a steep slope leading down to the sea to the west. The south slope was shallow and vulnerable. William’s fortress, shown as a red square, would 106 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps have controlled the narrow neck – 150m across – that provided the only easy point of attack. The Tapestry’s viewpoint is looking north from the magenta arrow.

Figure 28: Artist’s view for Tapestry Panel 45

The Tapestry’s tower

What about the tall thin tower to the fortress’ right? It is square. It has a polygonal pyramid roof and a small window either side of the middle beam. There are no windows at the top, at least on the visible side. It seems to have a load-bearing timber frame; the middle crossbar protrudes at the side. Apart from the first Tapestry Panel, which is usually thought to represent Westminster, all the other towers in the Tapestry are stone. This makes some sense, because the Panel 45 tower and Westminster would be Saxon whereas the others were Norman or Carolingian.

Towers were rare in pre-invasion England. There were probably only a hundred or so in the entire country. Most of them were bell towers attached to monasteries. The only surviving record of what Saxon timber towers might have looked like is Greensted Church in Essex. It is a broad-based boxlike Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 107 affair. There were some Saxon stone bell towers, a dozen or so of which survive, but they are broad based too. Moreover, a bell tower should have big windows evenly spaced around the bell stage, to let out the sound, whereas the highest window on the Tapestry tower is not much above the middle. And if it was a bell tower, there is no sign of its monastery. Not a bell tower then.

There are only four other types of building it could be: a watch tower, a message tower, a stair turret or a lighthouse. Tall thin stair turrets were exceedingly rare in Saxon times, but they do exist. Two examples survive at Brigstock and Hough-on-the-Hill. They are both stone, which makes sense because they were attached to monastery bell towers which had been designed and built by European stonemasons. There are no known timber stair turrets, although this does not mean that they never existed. Never-the- less, we think the Tapestry tower was not one of them because it has no adjacent bell tower or monastery.

There are no known Saxon lighthouses, so this possibility does not seem promising either. But Winchelsea would have been an obvious place to build a lighthouse cum navigation beacon. Winchelse was a busier port than Dover in Roman times and the Romans built two pharos there. One survives. There was a dishevelled lighthouse at Winchelsea that was already old in the 13th century, because Nicolas reports that a tax was levied on ships using the port to pay for its renovation. By 1300 a snazzy new stone lighthouse tower featured on Winchelsea’s seal (Figure 29), standing between its two churches. It is possible then that the seal lighthouse replaced a 12th century stone lighthouse that had replaced the Tapestry’s timber lighthouse that might have replaced a Roman pharos. 108 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

Figure 29: 1300 Winchelsea seal showing two churches and a lighthouse tower

Saxon watchtowers were rare too, but each of Alfred’s burhs would have had one. Burhs are often said to be fortifications to defend against Viking attacks. It was presumably more important to provide an early warning because if the locals hid themselves and their valuables, the Vikings would go away. It would therefore be helpful if the burhs sent early warnings to each other. They were too far apart to have had line of sight, so it is widely believed they were augmented by a network of message relay beacons or message relay towers.

If the Panel 45 fortress is indeed Alfred’s burh at Hæstinga ceastre, we are pretty sure it would have had a watchtower. The one depicted is not it. It is outside the burh and too low down the slope. It looks like the burh tower got lopped off the Panel 45 by the Tapestry’s top banner.

We think that the Tapestry tower had a commercial purpose. Assuming the tower was 10m high, the pole on the top would be visible from roughly 25km. The Udimore ridge to its west was 25m higher than the pole and 3km further away from the sea, so it was also visible from roughly 25km. A coincidence? We think not. We guess that the idea was to line up the pole Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 109

Figure 30: Greyfriars, Winchelsea in 18th century and now with a landmark on the Udimore ridge to guide ships into Hæstinga port at Winchelse. Presumably, the navigator would pick different landmarks depending on the wind.

This would explain one of the many perplexing features of the Tapestry, 110 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps which is why they built a tower so far down the slope that its viewing position was below the level of the fortress. Under any other circumstance, the Tapestry tower would be pointless; they might as well look out from the fortress rampart. But in this case, we guess that the additional elevation and the fortress walls were high enough to block the view of the Udimore Ridge beyond, so the navigation tower had to be built down the slope.

This would also explain Winchelsea’s enthusiasm for towers. After the Tapestry tower, Nicolas’s dilapidated tower and the Winchelsea seal tower, another one was built at Greyfriars monastery (Figure 26). They were all similar dimensions and similar heights. They all had poles on the top. We guess they all served the same navigation purpose and that they were all in the same place. That place is 50.921802, 0.710274, which we know because the remains of the Greyfriars monastery tower are still there. It is marked with a yellow dot on Figure 24, in exactly the right place for the tower depicted in Panel 45.

Figure 31: Monastery from Panel 48 (L); Sea camp from Panel 45 (R)

If the tapestry tower was only for navigation purposes, there would be no point giving it stairs or windows. We think it had another important purpose, which was to watch for incoming commercial vessels. Its position 8m down Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 111 the slope only makes 2km viewing difference to the horizon - 22.6km vs 24.7km - which was presumably less important than its line of sight to the docks at Winchelse. The idea would have been to send signals down to the docks, instructing them to prepare outbound cargo, to get stevedores out of the pub, to clear the cross spit channel, to make space in the warehouse, or to prepare the inshore barges. This could not be done from the burh tower because the higher cliff, greater distance from the cliff edge and the burh walls would have blocked the view between it and the docks.

Panel 48 depicts a monastery from where the Normans launch their attack. It is so grand that it is surely where the senior Fécamp Abbey clerics lived and where the port administrators worked. We think it was near the Sedlescombe crossing. Next door is a cigarette shaped tower (Figure 27 left). Being adjacent to a monastery, it seems likely to have been a belltower, but it is too thin and it lacks bell stage windows at the top.

A monastery tower at Sedlescombe would have had line of sight to the sea camp tower at Winchelsea. A close up of the tower in Panel 45 (Figure 27 right) is therefore of great interest. At a distance, the top left infill appears to be stone or shingle. On closer inspection, it is obviously a wall of crosses. There are too many for them to be structural or to be holding up bells. They would be too high to have had a defensive purpose. When we first saw the Tapestry, we guessed they were wall anchors, but we never came up with a plausible explanation why a timber tower would need so many, and only on one part of one side. One possibility is that top left nearside wall has fallen off, leaving wattle fixings visible on the inside of the far wall. Another possibility is that they were simply for artistic effect. We think not. We think the real answer is more impressive.

We guess that the sea camp tower crosses are some sort of messaging system. Hardly anyone could read in those days. We think the crosses are pictorial representations of coloured symbols that carried some sort of coded message, like naval flags. The window would be where the operator views responses 112 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps and new messages from other towers. We guess that the sea camp tower sent messages to the port administrators at Sedlescombe about incoming vessels, warehouse space, the need for barges and the like. We would love to hear from anyone that knows more about this.

Harold’s plan

Before moving on to the Norman battle camp, it might help to think about the leaders’ plans. Harold was doubtless incensed that William had invaded his realm, threatened his monarchy, questioned his integrity, ransacked his ancestral land and attacked his personal manor. All the primary sources that mention his frame of mind say that he wanted to get to the Hastings Peninsula as quickly as possible to destroy the invaders in an immediate nocturnal or surprise attack.

In our opinion, Harold would only have gone to Sussex if he thought he was safe; he would only have tried a surprise attack if he thought the Normans were unprepared; he would only attack at all if he felt certain of victory. If the Normans had any chance of surviving a battle, Harold would have worn them down by a scorch-earth siege. Wace specifically says that he heard tell that Harold ruled this out in a discussion with his family, saying that he could not plunder his own subjects. Dodgy provenance again. This one is plainly bunkum.

Harold’s family and advisors would surely have recommended a scorch- earth siege. It is clearly the right strategy. If Harold rejected their recommendation, we cannot believe it was because he feared plundering his own subjects. This was his ancestral homeland. He kept it in his own name. There were only 300 or so families living on the Hastings Peninsula at the time and they nearly all worked on Harold’s manors. They would all have fled. The only person that could be plundered was Harold himself, by the Normans.

Sure, Harold was indignant, but why would he even leave London? True, Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 113 warrior Kings were expected to lead their army in those days. True, Harold was the best person to repel the invasion. He knew Norman battle tactics and he knew William intimately after having fought with him in Normandy. Also, he was the most experienced English commander, and this was his home, so he knew the terrain better than anyone. But why take the risk? According to Wace, Harold’s family recommended that brother Gyrth should lead the army. It would have been so much more logical. William might even have gone home if the English army arrived without Harold.

We are convinced that Harold wanted to move quickly and in person because he planned to invade Normandy. He knew that William had made a disastrous error; that William’s chances of victory were minuscule. The overwhelming odds were on the invaders getting annihilated. William had brought contingents from all the surrounding Dukedoms. Normandy was virtually undefended. Anjou, Maine and the part of Brittany controlled by Count Eozen had lost roughly half of their barons and knights. We think Harold was expecting to annihilate the invaders and then to annex Normandy, and perhaps Anjou and Maine. William had even brought the ships that Harold needed to transport his army across the Channel.

Having decided to lead the army in person, Wace, Carmen and CKE say that Harold did what anyone sensible would have done in his shoes: To get an idea of the size, composition and position of the enemy by sending spies and messengers to scout the enemy camp. This suggests to us that he was still open minded about an attack or siege.

Wace reports that the Count of Flanders was Harold’s most trusted court spy. Unfortunately, it seems that the Count was poorly informed – or perhaps duplicitous - because Wace says that the Count repeatedly told Harold that William could only bring a feeble army with few horses. From Harold’s subsequent actions, his messengers must have told him much the same because he expected a quick crushing victory. 114 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

Harold’s route to Hastings

Figure 1: Roman road on map of medieval southeast England

One important early choice was whether the English army should head south down the Margary 13 Roman road from Rochester to the Hastings Peninsula or use Margary 14 from Peckham to then cut across the Andredsweald on the LIN-129 ridgeway from Uckfield – these are shown on Figure 1. Margary 13 would have been quicker and easier, but Simon Mansfield, Simon Coleman and others think Harold used Margary 14 and LIN-129.

Mansfield cites two main reasons that Harold would not have used the Rochester road: 1) That it would remove the element of surprise because William’s scouts would see the English coming; 2) That Harold would be delayed by the ferry across the Rother. Both points are valid, but we think Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 115 they are incidental.

True, Harold wanted to catch William by surprise, but they had been exchanging messages. William knew Harold was coming, knew where he was coming from and had been preparing his defences for two weeks. There was no chance of William being taken by surprise and Harold knew it. He arrived in the battle theatre on the 12th October. A third of his troops were not due until the 15th at the earliest (otherwise they would have arrived in time to turn the tide of battle). He would have wanted to act quickly and decisively as soon as they arrived. His haste is most likely to have been because the earlier he arrived in the battle theatre, the more time he had to scout the enemy position and devise his plan.

True, the English army would be delayed at the Rother, but the alternative route through the Andredsweald on LIN-129 would not have been quick. A typical medieval chain/rope ferry might carry 100 troops. The Rother crossing and return might take 15 minutes. At that rate it would take 16 hours to get the army and supplies across the Rother. It is a worst case. Harold or his delegate could requisition every boat on the river to ferry the English army across the Rother. If pushed, we guess the Rother delay is unlikely to have been more than 8 hours, which is considerably less than the time it would take to get an army of supply carts 30km through the Andredsweald on a narrow rutted track. As a reference, a coach took 14 days to make the 600km from London to Edinburgh on partly maintained pre-turnpike roads. It would have taken two days at best to get through the Andredsweald on LIN 129. If, as seems probable, the track was only one cart wide, the entire train would get blocked every time a cart had a mechanical failure. It might have taken a week.

It is not even obvious that the LIN-129 trackway across the Andredsweald from Uckfield to Netherfield was still usable in the 11th century. It does not appear in any court or Church travel records. There was no farmland and no active bloomeries in Saxon times, which removes two reasons the trackway 116 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps might have been maintained. There are no Saxon Charters charging anyone to keep it clear. There were no settlements where broken carts could be fixed, which would discourage freight. The Andredsweald was infested with wolves and bears, which would discourage individual travellers. Unless it had some otherwise unknown military purpose, we suspect that it had become overgrown by the 11th century.

Even if LIN-129 was still usable, there are several good reasons why Harold would not have used it. It would be impossible to protect him from snipers, blockades and ambushes on 30km of narrow woodland trackway. There were no farms to provide food for the troops. The Kentish troops would arrive on the Rochester road. The huscarls would arrive by ship where the Rother met the Rochester road. If they had to muster with the rest of the army at Netherfield, they would be vulnerable as they headed west from Cripps Corner. Harold would again be vulnerable to snipers, ambushes and blockades if the English army then headed southeast on the narrow LIN-130 ridgeway to Battle, especially as it crossed the isthmus at Sprays Wood.

If the English army did cross the Andredsweald on LIN-129, an easier and safer alternative would have been for the main English army to continue east through Netherfield to muster with the Kentish troops and huscarls at Cripps Corner, where the Udimore ridgeway crossed the Rochester road. But if the plan was to muster at Cripps Corner, it would have been be quicker and safer to for the main English army to use the Rochester road in the first place.

By tradition, ASC says that Harold went to meet William at the “hoary apple tree", long thought to be a hundred marker on Caldbec Hill. Ingram and Giles translate ASC to say that Harold went to meet William at the “estuary of Appledore" which means the Rother. This makes more sense. Most of the huscarls would have arrived by ship on the Rother. Kentish troops would have arrived via the Rochester road. The supply carts might have taken a week to arrive on any route other than on the Rochester road. The obvious place to muster was at the junction of the Rochester road and the Rother, Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 117 near modern .

William of Jumièges says that Harold rode through the night to meet his troops at the English camp. It is plausible, but he would not have ridden through the Andredsweald at night on LIN-129. If Jumièges is right, he too arrived on the Rochester road.

We feel confident that Harold and the English army arrived at the battle theatre on the Rochester Roman road. It seems likely to us that Jumièges is right that Harold did not arrive until the English camp had been established and fortified. Otherwise, the Normans might have attacked Harold in the English camp before it had been fortified. It does not impact our theory if we are wrong about both. But the route the English army took is crucial to us.

Our entire battle scenario depends on the English camp being beside the Rochester Roman road. If the English army came through the Andredsweald on LIN-129, then branched off to Battle on the LIN-130, they would have bypassed the Rochester road and would not have camped beside it. We remain confident. There are only two possibilities. If Harold was with the English army before they camped, he would not have risked the sniper prone and ambush prone LIN-130 between Netherfield and Battle. If Harold arrived later, as Jumièges suggests, he would not have ridden through the Andredsweald, especially at night. In either case, the English army would have ended up at Cripps Corner on the Rochester road. From there, they had to choose a camp location which is likely to have been beside the Rochester road. We will return to this momentarily.

William’s Plan

William needed to kill Harold quickly. He would have hoped and prayed that Harold would arrive with a powderpuff army and attack a place of William’s choosing. He cannot have expected it. His Plan ‘A’ was surely to lure Harold to the Hastings Peninsula then ambush or trap him. We will explain what we think this means momentarily. First it is worth considering 118 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps what William would have done if the English army turned up without Harold. If, for instance, Harold had delegated Gyrth to be commander.

William had six months to prepare. He did so meticulously. We cannot believe that the best military plan he could come up with was to wait on the Hastings Peninsula in the hope that Harold would come in person with an understrength army, then walk into an ambush on land he knew well, or recklessly attack on disadvantageous terrain and fight a hopeless battle to the death. The chances of success were negligible. Conversely, the chance that William and the entire Norman army would get besieged and starve were huge. Normandy, shorn of its leaders and fighting age men, would have been subjugated by someone. Even though the potential rewards in England were huge, so were the risks. William must have had a better ‘Plan B’.

William’s easy options were out of the question. England had four times the population of Normandy with hardly any disloyal barons. The Normans had an impossibly long supply chain. They stood no chance in a prolonged campaign against a determined defence. They stood no chance if Harold adopted a Fabian strategy. They could not catch Harold if he chose to be elusive. They stood little chance of a successful siege on London or Winchester. Defeating the English army without killing Harold could easily backfire if Harold switched to a Fabian strategy.

The Normans’ only advantage was mobility. The fyrds, which comprised the majority of Harold’s armed forces, were part-time infantry who plodded around on foot and whose fighting skills were honed for repelling Viking axemen. Normans on the other hand, fought mainly on horseback and had boats to get around. William’s best chance was to out-manoeuvre or outsmart the defence.

If we were in William’s shoes and the English army arrived without Harold, we would quickly withdraw and ride/sail around to the Thames, hoping to trap him at Westminster (which was outside the city walls). If Harold was Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 119 not there, we would lay siege to Winchester, hoping to draw him out before he raised an overwhelming army. If the English army turned up at either place without Harold, we would raid coastal settlements - just as Harold himself had done after his exile and as Tostig had done a few months previously – in the hope of humiliating Harold into premature battle.

There is one small clue in the primary sources that this was William’s backup plan. Orderic and WP say that he leaves a body of soldiers to guard the fleet and to cover a retreat. The only obvious reasons for an organised retreat are if Harold turned up with an overwhelming force or the English army turned up without Harold.

Figure 32: East Sussex topography, roads and trackways

So much for Plan B. Plan A was to lure Harold to the Hastings Peninsula then ambush or trap him. Harold was in danger from the moment he crossed the Rother. The Rother peninsula isthmus at Vinehall Street was barely 1km long. If the Normans occupied the isthmus ridge and the Rother, Harold would be trapped with no easy way to get reinforcements. The stretch of Roman road between the Rother and Cripps Corner (C on Figure 32) went through 120 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

Lordship Wood, which could harbour snipers. Cripps Corner was at the junction of the Roman road and the Udimore/isthmus ridges, which was a good place for a blockade and/or ambush. There was another ambush/blockade opportunity where the Roman road intersected with the Great Sanders ridge (G) and the best of all where it crossed the Brede at Sedlescombe (S).

The further Harold ventured south, the greater the danger he was in. If we were in William’s shoes, we would let Harold venture as far south as he wanted to go, hoping that he eventually tried to cross onto the Hastings Peninsula. If Harold did try to cross onto the Hastings Peninsula, William would have had the choice of whether to ambush him at the crossing point or to allow him across.

One possible drawback of allowing the English army onto the Hastings Peninsula was that defensively sound hills at Cottage Lane ridge, Starlings hill and Doleham hill (labelled in magenta as O, T and D on Figure 32) were within a few hundred metres of the Brede crossing points. If the English chose to camp at any of them, they would be difficult to defeat before their reinforcements arrived. William would have fancied his chances of blocking the English reinforcements at any of the crossing points, but there was a level of uncertainty. They might have landed on the coast or come through an unknown forest path, for instance.

Another is that the north slope of the Hasting Ridge was lined by dense woodland all the way down to the coast, and there was virtually nothing but dense woodland to the northwest for 80 miles. If the English were allowed to get more than a mile from any of the Hastings Peninsula crossing points, they might have melted away into the woods where Norman armour, lances, horses and archers would be worse than useless. If this happened, the invasion would almost certainly have failed.

On the other hand, the three Brede crossing points – Sedlescombe (S), Brede Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 121 ford (BF) and Whatlington ford (W) – were ideal for an ambush; low lying, boggy and backing onto a bottleneck bridge or ford. The LIN-130 ridgeway from Netherfield to Caldbec Hill – whether Harold arrived there from Uckfield or from Cripps Corner – was almost as good. It was ambush prone along most of its length and ideal for entrapment. The isthmus between the Brede basin and the Ash Bourne basin is barely 500m across. William could have waited for Harold to pass, then sent half of his troops up to Cripps Corner, west to Netherfield, then south to block the ridgeway. Harold would have been trapped on the isthmus ridge (IR) with nowhere good to defend.

By tradition Harold immediately crossed onto the Hastings Peninsula and camped at Caldbec Hill (CH). The tradition starts with five primary sources that imply that Battle Abbey was built on the battlefield. If the battlefield was at Battle Abbey and the English army had moved south from their camp less than hour earlier, as specified in several contemporary accounts, then their camp must have been a kilometre or so to the north. Caldbec Hill is the only candidate. But, as we explain in the Traditional Battlefield section of this book, we think that the 'Battle Abbey on the battlefield' accounts are unsound, so the argument chain is faulty. Even if this were not so, it seems implausible to us that Harold would camp at Caldbec Hill. To get there, the English would have had to cross onto the Hastings Peninsula and then head 5km in the wrong direction by an unfathomably circuitous route to make a defensively poor camp.

We do not believe that Harold ever tried to cross the Brede. This was his ancestral land. He would have known the ambush risk better than anyone. In our opinion, he would not have crossed or circumvented the Brede before the far side had been thoroughly scouted. That would have taken at least a day. In the meantime, the English had to camp somewhere north of the Brede. William’s only chance of victory in this eventuality would have been an early attack on the English camp, in which case the English would not have had the chance to cross the Brede. 122 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

One interesting question is why Harold ventured close enough to the Norman army to jeopardise his campaign and his life. The only plausible answer is that he thought he was safe. Wace says that Harold only discovers the enormous size of the Norman cavalry on the morning of the day of battle. This would explain it. If Harold believed that the Normans were mainly footbound and they tried to sortie over the Brede at Sedlescombe or Whatlington, he would have thought that the English could swoop down to trap them on boggy ground against the Brede. If they tried to loop around via Netherfield, he could blockade the isthmus. Harold would have thought himself safe behind the front lines. But none of this was possible because the Norman cavalry would catch the English in the open and cut them down if they tried to move anywhere away from their camp.

The real puzzle then is why Harold did not realise the Normans had brought so many war horses. It is odd because most of the contemporary accounts describe their exchange of messages. Wace says they had been communicating by “messengers, clerks and knights" while Harold was still in London. At dawn on the day before battle, according to Wace, Harold and brother Gyrth scout the Norman camp. They hear Norman horses, see the knights’ armour and look down on the enemy huts and tents. The strength of the Norman army comes as a shock, so Harold dispatches two spies to get more details. They were captured, again according to Wace, taken on a tour of the Norman camp and sent back to Harold. Yet Harold is still shocked by the size of the Norman cavalry on the day of battle.

Harold blames the Count of Flanders: “The Count of Flanders hath betrayed me: I was a fool to trust him when he sent me word by letter and assured me by messages that William could never collect so great a chivalry”, according to Wace. But had heard the Norman horses himself. He must have thought they were not too numerous. His messengers and spies must also have reported that the Normans had few horses. Two of them were taken on a tour of the Norman camp. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 123

It seems to us that, until the day before battle, William deliberately enticed Harold close by giving the impression that his army was puny, toothless and siege prone. Then on the day before battle, he seems to have tried to intimidate Harold with a show of strength, still without revealing his cavalry. Our interpretation of this is that William was sandbagging, trying to lure Harold into a trap. Then on the day before battle he tried to scare Harold into fleeing, presumably having positioned his cavalry to intercept anyone trying to flee.

WP reports that one of Harold’s messengers finds William inspecting his fleet. He must have been at his sea camp, at Winchelsea we think. This sounds like the one leg of his sandbagging ruse. If William and some barons, a few horses and perhaps half his infantry positioned themselves at the sea camp, they would seem unthreatening to Harold. Not only would they be at least eight miles away from the Brede crossing points, but Harold’s scouts on the Udimore ridge would see them leave and give Harold plenty of warning. The second leg would have been to conceal his cavalry and the rest of his infantry somewhere near the Hastings Peninsula crossing points, where they could ambush Harold if he tried to get onto the Hastings Peninsula. This would explain why Harold’s messengers and spies did not see the Norman cavalry and why Harold expected a crushing victory.

Perhaps we are giving William too much credit. WP says that the Norman cavalry were out foraging when the English army entered the battle theatre. If they were out foraging every day, it would also explain why Harold’s messengers and scouts did not see them. Perhaps it was just luck. We doubt it. It seems more likely that the Normans did all the foraging they needed on the first day because they would have expected the locals to drive off their livestock and burn their grain stores as soon as they knew the Normans were there. We think that William deliberately sent his knights out foraging every day, even though they probably found meagre pickings, in order to conceal their existence. 124 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

We will return to the land scenarios momentarily. William could not be sure that Harold’s arrival at the battle theatre was not a diversionary tactic to take his attention away from a sea borne attack. Harold might have landed his main army at Fairlight Cove, marched up through Pett and Guestling to attack or besiege William at Winchelsea. William had it covered. In this scenario, the Norman cavalry, positioned out beyond Westfield, would have coalesced to occupy the ridgeway at Guestling Thorn, thereby trapping the English army on the Winchelsea Peninsula.

Norman battle camp

Given what Harold thought at the time - i.e. that the Norman army was half its real size, footbound and based at Winchelsea - he had three options: 1) To enter the Hastings Peninsula to affect a siege; 2) To send saboteurs across the Brede to scorch-earth around the Norman camp; or 3) To stand off the Hasting Peninsula, scouting the enemy position while awaiting reinforcements. Wace and Carmen tell us that Harold did the last. The other contemporary accounts, bar CBA, redact the events between Harold arriving at the battle theatre and the start of the battle.

William would have been prepared for all Harold’s contingencies. He needed the ability to ambush Harold at any of the four possible entry points; the ability to intercept scouts and saboteurs; and the ability to cut off an English retreat, then attack the English camp. Troops at the sea camp (2) would be too far distant and too slow. English spies on the Udimore Ridge would see them leave, giving Harold ample time to respond.

In our opinion, as soon as Harold entered the battle theatre, William’s army coalesced up near the Brede crossing points, at a battle camp. CBA specifically says that the Normans had a battle camp, although it is less than trustworthy on this subject. We will return to it momentarily. Some of the other primary sources hint at a battle camp:

• The term 'sea camp’ comes from Carmen, which says that William returns Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 125

there after the battle. The fact that it needed the 'sea’ adjective implies that he had another camp which was not by the sea. Carmen does not mention the temporary camp near Peneuesellum, so this other camp was probably somewhere else on the Hastings Peninsula, further inland. • When Harold and Gyrth go to scout the Norman camp at dawn on the day before battle, Wace says that they see huts, tents, pavilions and gonfanons. If they had been scouting the sea camp, they would surely have taken more note of the burh fortress and William’s kit fortress and the sea. • According to Orderic, William took possession of Peneuesellum and Hastingas on landing. He says that William left a body of men to cover a retreat and to guard to the fleet. It sounds as if they were at the sea camp. If they were at the sea camp and got left, the rest of William’s army must have gone to another camp elsewhere. • According to WP, the place where they build the second fortress was a refuge and shelter for their boats. A refuge is a safe place to retreat. Orderic says the men at the sea camp were there to cover a retreat. We interpret this to mean that most of the Norman army moved onto another camp that was less safe and from which they might have to retreat.

CBA names the location of the battle camp: “The Duke came to meet him [Harold], surrounded by units of cavalry. Arriving at the hill named Hechelande, which lies towards Hastingarum, while donning their armour ...”. In other words, William and some of his knights came from their sea camp to a hill named Hechelande where they dressed for battle: i.e. the battle camp was at Hechelande. CBA then provides enough information to work out where it was.

The monks of Battle Abbey referred to the land within 1½ miles of the abbey as their ‘Leuga’. It had been gifted to them by William. CBA lists the settlements around the Leuga in a clockwise direction starting with Bodeherste, which it says was due east from the Abbey. It says they were all outside the Leuga apart from Hecilande which was inside. Figure 33 shows 126 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps our calculation of the Leuga and its boundary settlements.

Figure 33: Leuga around Battle Abbey

CBA has three spellings of a name like Hechilande. The others are Hechelande and Hecilande. Latin i and e can be interchangeable in place name transcriptions, so there are really two spellings; with and without an 'h’. Both the references without an 'h' are in the description of the Leuga boundary, which pinpoints it as a settlement 1.4 miles southeast of Battle Abbey, on the ridge and immediately to the northwest of Telham. One of the references with an 'h’ says that Hechelande is adjacent to Bodeherste, another that it is adjacent to Telleham. This pinpoints Hechelande in the same place. We can therefore be pretty sure that all spellings refer to the same place.

There are a few inconsistencies in CBA’s descriptions. All the Leuga boundary markers are outside the Leuga, apart from Hecilande. Logically it should have used Telleham outside the Leuga as the southeast boundary marker, like all the others. CBA implies that Hechelande is in the direction of Hastings but is 30 degrees off. Hechelande means 'heathland estate’ whereas CBA says that it was a wood. CBA says that Hechelande was a hill but places it on a level part Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 127 of the ridge. Moreover, CBA says that the land either side of the ridgeway was cultivated, so Hecilande cannot have been a wood. CBA initially says that Bodeherste is outside the Leuga, then later that it is a wood inside the Leuga. We interpret this to mean that its manor house was outside the Leuga while its wood was partially inside the Leuga. It is possible that something similar applied to Hechelande; that its manor house was on the Hastings Ridge, with Hechelande Wood stretching west.

Figure 34: CBA land holdings in its Leuga

Some orientation might help - see Figure 34. CBA says that Battle Abbey held four woods inside its Leuga: Bodeherste, Hechelande, Petley and Duniford. Petley Wood survives. It says that Bodeherste is due east of Battle Abbey. A place named Bothurst Wood - a Bodeherste cognate according to Lower - is shown on the 1770 Yeakell and Gardener map to be coterminous with modern Great Wood. Chevalier reckons that Duniford Wood was north of Caldbec Hill. We cannot understand his reasoning, but we think he is partly right. It must have been west of the Whatlington Road, because CBA says that Uccheham was to the east of the Whatlington Road and south of Petley 128 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

Wood. Presumably, Duniford Wood spanned the Line in order to get the 'ford' part of its name. It was therefore north and northeast of Caldbec Hill.

CBA claims that Battle Abbey held a wist and 37 acres that are between Bodeherste Wood and Hechilande Wood and between the infirmary and Chapenore. We interpret this to mean that it was either side of the ridgeway from Telham to Battle Abbey. Finally, CBA says that Battle Abbey held a huge uncultivated plain between Bodeherstegate and the road adjacent to Hechelande. The only road known to be adjacent to Hechelande was the ridgeway, although Nick Austin reckons the Old London Road ran through the middle of the Hechelande depicted on Figure 34.

Figure 34 brings together the CBA descriptions. Duniford Wood is shown in green, Petley Wood in blue, Bodeherste Wood in teal, Hechelande in orange. The 37 acres are shown in purple. The wist between Bodeherste Wood and Hechelande is shown in cyan. The huge uncultivated plain is shown in yellow. Battle Abbey, Bodeherste manor house and Hechelande manor house are labelled A, B and H respectively.

Our conclusion, assuming we are right about the location of the English camp or the Norman sea camp, is that CBA’s Hechelande cannot have been the Norman battle camp. It is too far south. It has no view of the Brede, or the English camp or the Roman road. It is not on the route from Winchelsea. It would not prevent a blockade of the Roman road at Sedlescombe.

Why would CBA say that William dressed for battle at Hechelande if it is not true? We discuss this in the Traditional Battlefield section. The claim is in the same paragraph that describes William’s vow to build a monastery on the battlefield if God grants him victory. It has obviously been doctored because the narrative context locates him at the Norman battle camp while his vow says that he is on the battlefield. We conclude in the Traditional Battlefield section that CBA invented the vow in order to support their claim that Battle Abbey is on the battlefield. The whole story might be a bit more complicated. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 129

CBA says that the battle was fought at a place named Herste. Later, they explain that Herste is adjacent to the Abbey. Nick Austin speculates that some people who fought in the battle would remember that the battle was fought at Herste, so the monks of Battle Abbey created somewhere named Herste close to the Abbey to support their claim that the Abbey was built on the battlefield. We agree. This opens the possibility that the Norman battle camp really was at a place named Hechelande. Once again, perhaps the monks thought that some people that fought in the battle might remember that the battle camp was at Hechelande, so they invented somewhere inside their Leuga with the same name. This would explain all the inconsistencies listed above. Alas, if so, the only clue to the Hechelande battle camp is that it was a heathland hill.

Back to the battle camp. We are convinced that William had a battle camp and that it was near the Brede crossing points. It also had to be close to the Roman road between Sedlescombe and Westfield (black line on Figure 35). Not only was this road the most likely way for Harold to try to enter the Hastings Peninsula, but it was also the quickest route to the other crossing points and to the ridgeways that circumvented the Brede and to the Norman sea camp. Carmen says that William’s monk emissary leaves the Norman camp on a road (Latin 'iter'). Latin 'iter' usually means a paved road: the Roman manuscript which listed the paved roads in Britain, was known as the Iter Britanniarum. The road between Sedlescombe and Westfield was the only paved road on the Hastings Peninsula (although there were other metalled roads).

CBA and Brevis Relatio describe the Norman battle camp being ‘a parte Hastingarum’, which Lower and Searle translate to mean ‘in the direction of Hastings’ or ‘towards Hastings’, respectively. We mention in our place name description for Hæstinga port that we disagree. It is not so much that they are wrong, although they are 30 degrees off, but that they are unusual. It is as if they were coerced to fit a Norman landing and camp at modern Hastings. We feel that a more natural translation is ‘to the side of Hastingarum’. We 130 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps think this Hastingarum referred to Hæstinga port at Winchelsea, although it might refer to the Hastings Peninsula. In either case, ‘to the side’ implies to us that the Norman battle camp was west of Winchelsea on the edge of the Hastings Peninsula, which means near the south bank of the Brede.

One place stands head and shoulders above any other battle camp candidates. It is the ridge above Pestalozzi International Village, along which Cottage Lane now runs (shown in magenta on Figure 34). It probably was a heathland hill, so it might have been known as Hechelande. Once again, we think William planned meticulously with expert local advice from the monks of Fécamp. They would have told him that this ridge had these advantages:

• It overlooked the Rochester-Sedlescombe Roman road along which Harold and his troops would arrive • It was midway between Whatlington and Brede village where there were ford crossing points • It had a fast metalled track to the Hastings Ridge via Beauport Park, which could be used to intercept Harold if he tried to enter the Hastings Peninsula using ridgeways via Netherfield • It gave the opportunity to attack/ambush Harold or his reinforcements on the Roman road before they reached the Hastings Peninsula • It was ideal for spying on English troop movements, including scouts or saboteurs trying to cross onto the Hastings Peninsula • It would have allowed the Normans to cut off an English retreat along the Roman road back to Bodiam • It was adjacent to Oaklands Roman iron bloomery, with everything needed to make and repair weapons, armour and saddlery • It was at the crossroads of the Sedlescombe to Westfield Roman road and the Oaklands to Beauport Park trackway, which would have made it the best place on the peninsula for raiding, foraging and driving rustled livestock • It had a view all the way down the Brede to where the Norman fleet had been beached Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 131

• A branch off the Sedlescombe to Westfield Roman road went to Winchelsea, linking the two Norman camps.

If most of this is right, the sequence of events is straightforward. As soon as the Norman scouts spot the English crossing the Rother, William and his barons from the sea camp muster with the rest of his army at the Cottage Lane battle camp (O). It is a 4½ mile march for the English to Sedlescombe, an 8 mile ride for William to Cottage Lane – see Figure 35. If Harold had wanted the English to keep marching onto the Hastings Peninsula, they would have arrived at the Sedlescombe crossing about the same time that William arrived at Cottage Lane. But the English then had to stream over the Brede single file, which might have taken an hour, so William would have had plenty of time to get dressed for battle and issue his battle orders.

Figure 35: Battle theatre showing topography and roads 132 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

In practice, we think Harold feared an ambush, so he set camp north of the Brede and dispatched scouts to check the Norman deployment. The Normans were not to know whether Harold had stopped to camp or whether he was pausing before crossing the Brede. They dress for battle anyway, pray and receive William’s pep talk. In time, they realise that the English are camping overnight and stand down.

There are four points to clear up. First, CBA is the only primary source that specifically mentions a battle camp and none of them mention a possible Norman ambush. They would not. They are written from William’s point of view and he only got dressed at the battle camp. They only reported events, not contingencies. The battle camp played no direct role in the battle and nothing happened there. We think it was redacted, even from Wace. The only reason it was reported in CBA was to support their ‘Abbey on battlefield’ claim.

Second, why did William not attack as soon as the English crossed the Rother? The Norman cavalry could get to the south bank of the Rother in 30 minutes without breaking sweat. The English army would have been demolished if they chose to fight cavalry on flat dry open ground. We guess that William was swayed by two potential issues. One is that the ground would have been boggy near the riverbank. The English army might have scattered where horses could not chase. The other is that Harold might have got back into a ferry and rowed to safety over the Rother. William might have won the battle, but it was no use if Harold escaped.

Third, some people, Simon Mansfield for one, think the English could not have come down the Rochester road, because the manors between Cripps Corner and the Rother are flagged as ‘wasted’ in Domesday. They presume that the Normans had been foraging there before the battle. If this was so, they reason, the battle would have happened somewhere north of the Brede. It makes no difference to our theory, because we think the battle did happen north of the Brede. Anyway, we think it was the English army that wasted Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 133 those manors to feed themselves at their camp.

Fourth, why did William not attack the English camp at dawn on Friday the 13th? Wace says that the Norman barons urge William to attack as soon as possible because English reinforcements were arriving constantly. William delays by a day. As we have hinted several times before, we think the English were effectively trapped. We guess that Norman scouts at the Rother reported that no large contingent of English reinforcements was imminent. We think William tried to scare Harold into fleeing, having set a trap along the route away from the English camp. It was worth a try. If Harold had been killed fleeing, the Godwinsons might have lost support through his apparent cowardice and William might have taken the crown without a fight.

A Battle of Hastings not on the Hastings Peninsula?

It is natural to assume that the Battle of Hastings must have been fought on the Hastings Peninsula because of its name. But if William had a battle camp at Cottage Lane, as we propose above, it would be virtually impossible. Either Harold tried to get onto the Hastings Peninsula, in which case William would have ambushed him at the crossing point; or he did not try to get onto the Hastings Peninsula, in which case William would have attacked the English camp. In either case, the battle did not happen on the Hastings Peninsula. This is a major departure from orthodoxy and seems to contradict the battle’s name.

Yet the battle’s name cannot mean what it implies. There was no fighting at Hastings because it did not exist at the time. Up to and including the time of the invasion, Normans used the term Hastinges to refer to Hæstinga port. There was no fighting there either, or the sea would have been a major factor. Up to and including the time of the invasion, Anglo-Saxons used the term Hæstingas to refer to the Hastings Peninsula, but the Old English accounts do not use the term 'Battle of Hastings’. Indeed, there is only one early reference to the Battle of Hastings: Domesday mentions it three times, once each for 134 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

Ælfwig, Ælfric and Breme who it says died in the ‘bello de Hastinges’. There is no clue to what it meant by the term, and it looks like all the subsequent references to the Battle of Hastings took their lead from Domesday.

One possible origin for Domesday’s bello de Hastinges is that it referred to Hastings Rape, which covered the entire Rother Peninsula and therefore anywhere that the battle could possibly have been fought. Rapes almost certainly date back to early Anglo-Saxon times, probably having had some military purpose. They became important military divisions after the Conquest, each controlled by a castle. But Domesday refers to the Sussex Rapes by the lord that controlled them, 'Terra Comitis de Ow’ in the case of Hastings Rape, rather than to their castle. It is therefore unlikely to have invented the term bello de Hastinges to mean the Rape. It probably took the term from common parlance, but that is unlikely to mean the Rape either because there are no known Norman references to Sussex Rapes that predate Domesday.

The other likely origin is that bello de Hastinges referred to the place the Normans knew as Hastinges (i.e. Hæstinga port). Perhaps it was named after the Norman camp at Hastinges where William and his barons spent all but three days of the campaign (the exceptions being one day in Peneuesselum, one at their battle camp and one at the battlefield). Or, most likely in our opinion, Hastinges was the nearest named place to the battlefield that William and other Norman aristocrats would recognise. All three of these possibilities are plausible. None of them fix the battlefield on the Hastings Peninsula. Each of them could mean anywhere south of the Rother, which might be up to four miles from the Hastings Peninsula.

Historians put more faith in two traditional clues. Above all, the primary sources that imply Battle Abbey was built on the battlefield. We explain in the Traditional Battlefield section below why we think these references were all fabricated by monks of Battle Abbey to defend their wealth and liberties. The other traditional clue is the list of 'wasted manors’ - i.e. those manors Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 135 that lost most of their value - in Domesday. The argument is that the manors near the battlefield would have been destroyed and most of those that were wasted were on the Hastings Peninsula. The only significant exceptions - Drigsell, Higham and - were too low lying to have been the battlefield. We are unconvinced. This was not a WWII artillery battle. The greatest damage would have been close to the Norman camp and wherever they raided rather than at the battlefield, and there is no doubt that the Norman camp was on the Hastings Peninsula.

On the contrary, there are four clues that hint the battlefield was close to the Hastings Peninsula but not on it: Chronicon, Brevis Relatio, ASC-D and Tapestry Panel 48 (Figure 36).

Chronicon is the most straightforward. It says that Harold: “Gave them battle nine miles from Heastinga, where they had built a fort”. As we explain in the Place Names section above, we think that Chronicon’s Heastinga referred to Hæstinga port at modern Winchelsea. We assume Chronicon meant Roman miles, which equates to about 8 modern miles. No battlefield candidates on the Hastings Peninsula were less than 11 Roman miles from Winchelsea. The other Norman camp candidates are at Hastings and Wilting but everywhere on the Hastings Peninsula bar Winchelsea is within 7 Roman miles of Hastings or within 6 Roman miles of Wilting. Indeed, 9 Roman miles from either of them would push the battle beyond the Tillingham estuary or out into the Andredsweald, which is a pretty good argument against either of them being the location of the Norman camp.

Brevis Relatio (our translation, which is similar to Dawson’s) says: “Accordingly, coming to a hill which was to the side of Hastingas, opposite that hill upon which Harold with his army was, there under arms, they halted for a short time, surveying the army of the English." Admittedly, this passage is unclear in English and the Latin original could have many meanings. What though does it mean by “a hill which was to [Dawson says ‘on’] the side of Hastingas"? It cannot mean a hill to/on the side of Hæstinga port because Hæstinga port was 136 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps on a hill. Given the lack of alternatives, we think it has to mean that the hill was to/on the side of Hæstinga port or to/on the side of the Hastings Peninsula. Both suggest the Norman camp was on the south bank of the Brede. They surveyed the English army across the Brede, which means that the English army was not on the Hastings Peninsula when they were attacked.

ASC-D, in the Ingram and Giles translations, says that “[Harold] came against him at the estuary of Appledore”. We interpret this to mean that the estuary of Appledore – i.e. the Rother – was the closest named place to the battle with which ASC readers would be familiar. They were presumably familiar with Hæstinga port, which is mentioned in ASC, and Crowhurst, which held one of Harold’s personal manors. The Brede was midway between Crowhurst and the Rother, roughly 6km from each. It implies to us that the battle happened north of the Brede and therefore not on the Hastings Peninsula. If the battle had happened south of the Brede - i.e. on the Hastings Peninsula -

Figure 36: Tapestry Panel 48 we think it would have said that “Harold came against him near Hæstinga port", or similar.

Tapestry Panel 48 is captioned: “Here the knights have left Hestenga and have come to the battle against King Harold". Panel 40 also mentions Hestenga, albeit spelled with an i rather than an e. It says that the Norman knights go foraging for food at Hestinga. As we explain above, they would not have gone foraging for a few hens and goats at Hæstinga port. They would have gone to the Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 137 richest farmland in the vicinity, which was south of the ridge on the Hastings Peninsula. For this and other reasons, we think the Tapestry’s Hest[i]enga meant the Hastings Peninsula. If it is being consistent, Panel 48 is saying that the knights left the Hastings Peninsula to attack Harold.

This argument could be corroborated (or debunked) by the likely location of the building on Panel 48. It looks like a stone church or abbey with a rounded apse, clerestory, single storey lateral aisles and a thin stone tower. It could be an invention of the artist, but it is difficult to imagine why they would invent somewhere so elaborate. Perhaps they just copied an abbey that was familiar to them. If it is even an approximation of the abbey that was there, it is not Saxon and it is not modest.

The building on Panel 48 looks like it was built by a rich foreign abbey, which in this area can only mean St Denys or Fécamp. The architecture is unhelpful. It is reminiscent of the late 8th century Benedictine Abbey of St John in Val Müstair, which was contemporaneous with the Romanesque Carolingian architecture of Frankish St Denys but early Norman monasteries were of similar design.

We have spent 40 years examining the ‘door’ next to the Norman soldier. If it is a door attached to the monastery, why is it so big? On the other hand, if it is part of the next panel, why is it so small? Is it even a door? Note that it is behind the tower’s foundations. We guess it is the monks' dormitory, stepped back from the monastery which makes it look small. The horizontal bars make it look like a door. We suspect that the nuns who embroidered the Tapestry were working from a sketch and got confused. We would love to hear from anyone that has other ideas about it.

Considering the Brede side settlements at the time, the only likely candidates for its location are Winchelsea, Sedlescombe and Cadborough. Cadborough is on the north bank of the Brede which would be well placed for the salt pans, but 10 miles from the Rochester road, 12 miles from the bloomeries and 20 miles from the port. Moreover, as far as we know, Fécamp Abbey 138 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps only held Rameslie for 30 years. We think the monastery was probably built by St Denys Abbey at Winchelsea or Sedlescombe, then occupied by the monks of Fécamp when they acquired the land.

Kathleen Tyson thinks this building is the main Fécamp monastery on the site subsequently occupied by St Leonard’s at modern Winchelsea, thereby substantiating her theory that the Normans were leaving their sea camp at Icklesham. Her only evidence, as far as we know, is that Fécamp Abbey once held this land in Winchelsea. They still held it at the ‘Dissolution of Alien Priories’ during the reign of Henry V. They must have had a building in Winchelsea to administer tolls. But we doubt it was the building shown in Panel 48.

For one thing, if Panel 48 is depicting Winchelsea and Icklesham, we would expect it to show a fortress or two, the tower, hill and/or the sea. The over-excited horse is on the baseline rather than on bobbles, which suggests it is on a riverbank or road. Then there is the nature of medieval foreign cells. Outposts of St Denys and Fécamp abbeys were primarily revenue generating businesses. They were operated by businessmen rather than religious zealots. Businessmen, unless they have changed a lot over the intervening centuries, would want to live somewhere sheltered, comfortable, well connected, safe from Viking raids and close to lots of peasant girls, which would disfavour Winchelsea.

Fécamp Abbey held land on both sides of the Brede estuary, and at Horse Eye, Eastbourne and Steyning. St Denys held land south of the Brede and at Rotherfield, Peuenisel (near Pevensey) and London. In either case, if we were the first abbot, we would commission our HQ beside the Rochester Roman road, south of Brede at Sedlescombe, where it would be well connected to the port and to our other lands. That would put it on farmland close to the fluvial Brede for food and water. Perhaps most importantly, it would be at the end of the road down from Beauport Park, the biggest iron bloomery in the country, where the output could be taxed. We think it offered the best Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 139 place in the region to minimise theft, smuggling and toll avoidance.

We have no evidence to support this theory, but we wonder about the tower in Panel 48. It looks too thin for a bell tower and it has no windows at the top. We guess it was a watchtower used to communicate with other outposts. This makes it unlikely to have been at Wincheslea, assuming the tower in Panel 45 is also a watchtower used to communicate with other outposts. It could be at Sedlescombe, where it would have had line of sight to the tower in Panel 45, perhaps to receive early warnings of incoming trading vessels or of Viking raids.

We are reminded of Frank Johnson’s discovery of huge timber foundations at Old Orchard, south of Sedlescombe bridge. He thought they were from a wharf, but they were 50m from the river. We wonder whether they were the monastery’s foundations.

And the point of all this is that if the building behind the Norman knights on Panel 48 was at Sedlescombe, the knights were leaving the Hastings Peninsula.

The English Camp

By tradition, the English camped on Caldbec Hill (CH on Figure 37). English Heritage have a plaque at the park entrance that provides some details. The tradition is based on some translations of ASC-D (Dorothy Whitelock, for instance) that say: “[Harold] assembled a large force and came against him [William] at the hoary apple tree". Historians think this tree was a hundred junction marker on Caldbec Hill. We dispute the translation and we do not think the English could have camped at Caldbec Hill anyway. We discuss this in the Alternative Battlefield Theories section.

Harold seems to have deduced from court spies and messengers that the Normans were weak, footbound and too far distant to pose a threat outside the Hastings Peninsula. Having crossed the Rother by ferry, he probably 140 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps scooted through to Cripps Corner (C on Figure 37), just in case Lordship Wood harboured Norman snipers. What then?

Figure 37: East Sussex topography, roads and trackways

Two early and trusted accounts are traditionally interpreted to be saying that the English were attacked as they approached the battle theatre, perhaps trying a surprise attack. WP says that Norman scouts: “announced the imminent arrival of the enemy, because the King in his fury had hastened his march … He intended to crush them in a surprise or nocturnal attack … The Duke put on his hauberk reversed to the left … The speech with which he rallied the courage of his troops, though brief due to the circumstances, …”. WJ says that: “Hastening to take the Duke by surprise, Harold rode through the night and arrived at the battlefield at dawn. But the Duke had taken precautions against a night attack. He had ordered his men to stand by until dawn. At first light, having disposed his troops into three lines of battle, William advanced undaunted against the terrible enemy”. CKE, Chronicon, Orderic, Benoît and CBA do not mention anything happening between the English march and the battle, which gives the impression that the events were contiguous. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 141

Wace and Carmen, on the other hand, say that the English arrived at the battle theatre on Thursday and camped there for two nights. Both give detailed accounts of negotiations between William and Harold on Friday. Wace describes both sides’ scouting activities and tactical planning, as well as a detailed description of the English camp.

WJ is not saying what it seems. He says that Harold arrived at dawn, then that William had set a night guard to be ready for a nocturnal attack, then that William deployed his troops to attack at first light. The narrative sounds like the events were contiguous, but they cannot have been. Harold arrived at dawn. There would be no point mentioning the Duke’s night guard precautions for the night Harold arrived because the night was over. There would be no point mentioning that the Normans attacked ‘at first light’ if they attacked as soon as Harold arrived because it had just said that he arrived at dawn. The night guard must have been for a subsequent night. The Norman attack must have been on a subsequent dawn.

WJ, ASC, CKE, Chronicon, Orderic, Benoît and CBA are histories or chronicles that cover hundreds of years. Each allots just a few paragraphs to the battle. WP is about William’s life. It has a few pages on the battle. Wace and Carmen are dedicated to the conquest. They have far more detail. Admittedly, they are less than scrupulous, but they had no incentive to invent events that did not glorify Norman culture or denigrate Saxon culture. Which is more likely, we reason? That Wace and Carmen invented the English camp, scouts and messengers, or that the others redacted details that are not relevant to their narrative? We believe Wace and Carmen.

As for WJ and WP, we guess their term ‘battlefield’ meant what we would now refer to as the ‘battle theatre’. If so, they are not wrong. They are trying to say that the Normans did indeed prepare for battle as Harold approached the battle theatre, in case he kept marching onto the Hastings Peninsula. Only he did not. He camped somewhere north of the Brede, so the Normans stood down. William set a night guard on Thursday night. The Normans prepared 142 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps again for battle on Friday, but Harold did not attack, so they spent the day scouting the English camp. The Normans set another night guard expecting a nocturnal attack on Friday night. Again, it did not come, so they prepared yet again for battle on Saturday and attacked at first light.

By tradition, the English were on the march when they were attacked. Carmen provides some details. It says that as the Normans approached, the English emerged from a wood: “Suddenly the forest poured forth troops of men, and from the hiding places of the woods a host dashed forward ... there was a hill near to the forest ... they seized possession of this place for the battle."

But WP and Wace give the impression that the English were attacked in their camp. WP says that when the Normans attacked: “... the English were camped on higher ground, on a hill close to the forest through which they had come". Wace says that Harold marched from Westminster to: “where the abbey of the battle is now built. There he said he would defend himself”.

Wace confuses matters with his reference to Battle Abbey. Stent explains that a medieval commander’s most important task, and the greatest factor in a battle’s outcome, was choosing the battlefield location. Harold would not have chosen to fight where the Abbey now stands. It was a miserable defensive position. In the unlikely event that he crossed onto the Hastings Peninsula, he would have headed for Cottage Lane or Lower Snailham. We explain in the Traditional Battlefield section how we think Wace was misled. A brief summary. Roman de Rou is based on first-hand accounts taken by Wace’s father. We think that Wace Senior recorded first-hand accounts that the Normans attacked the English camp. He could not have recorded any first-hand reports that it was where the Abbey would be built because the Abbey was not started until seven years after they left. We guess that Wace Junior read that the Abbey was built on the battlefield and linked the two, wrongly deducing that the English camped at Battle, where they were attacked and defeated. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 143

Having arrived at Cripps Corner, we are pretty sure that Harold would have done what anyone sensible would have done in his shoes: to send scouts to check the Norman strength, deployment and food availability. At this time, still ignorant of the Norman cavalry, he was probably thinking of an attack on the Norman camp as soon as his reinforcements arrived a couple of days hence. Meanwhile Harold needed a camp that could be used as a forward operations base. The contemporary accounts give us some clues:

• Carmen says that William’s monk messenger goes to the English camp on a road; Latin 'iter', which usually means a paved road. The only paved road in the region was the Rochester Roman road. The English camp is likely to have been near it anyway. It was whence the English reinforcements would arrive: He would not want them getting lost or ambushed when they left the road. It was the only route to safety. It was the only easy or dry way to get on or off the Hastings Peninsula. It was both Harold’s best route of attack and the best place to ambush a Norman infantry sortie. • Carmen reports a conversation between William and his returning messenger. William asks: “Where is the King?" The messenger replies: “Not far, you can see his standards". The Norman and English camps cannot have been more than two miles apart, probably less, with a treeless valley between. • Wace says that Harold and Gyrth reconnoitre the Norman camp at dawn on the day before battle. Leofwine wakes early, spots they are missing, and goes to find them. He meets them on their way back to camp. It is still early. Harold and Gyrth cannot have ridden more than a few kilometres. • Wace says that Harold and Gyrth can see the Norman huts, tents, gonfanon and armour from their scouting location. They can hear the Norman horses. They were unguarded and cannot have been more than one kilometre from the Norman camp. The geography must have given them some sort of protection to feel safe that close to the Norman camp. 144 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

• Brevis Relatio talks about the initial encounter (Dawson translation). “Accordingly, coming to a hill which was on [or ’to’] the side of Hastingas, opposite that hill upon which Harold with his army was, there under arms, they halted for a short time, surveying the army of the English." The English and Norman camps were both on hills with treeless slopes facing each other. The Latin is ambiguous but “side of Hastings" sounds like the Norman camp was on a hill on the south bank of the Brede, facing the English camp no more than two miles away. • Just before the Normans leave their camp to launch their attack, Brevis Relatio says that William asks a nearby soldier where he thinks the King might be. The soldier replies that he thinks the King: “was in the midst of that dense array, which was before them on the top of the hill, for as he was thinking, he saw Harold’s standard there". It sounds like the entire English deployment is visible from the Norman camp and not much more than a mile away. • WJ, Orderic and Chronicon say that the battle started at the third hour of the day. Given an hour to armour horses and knights, 15 minutes for William’s pep talk, 15 minutes to assemble into line and 15 minutes to disassemble into divisions, the camps could not be more than an hour’s march apart, probably a lot less.

All of this suggests that both camps were beside the Roman road and separated by no more than a two miles. The fact that the English Standards were visible confirms that the English could not have camped any further north than the Udimore/Rother-Isthmus ridge, which was two miles away from the Brede. But did the English camp on the Udimore/Rother-Isthmus ridge or south of it?

A camp on the ridge would have been the safer, being just two downhill miles to the Rother. A camp south of the ridge would have been more positive and aggressive. Harold’s nature suggests the latter, but the primary sources provide no clues. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 145

An English camp at the battlefield?

It did not make sense to us that the English would leave their fortified camp to fight a defensive battle somewhere else. The traditional explanation is that they were caught trying a surprise attack. Poppycock. Harold knew of the Norman cavalry by the day of battle. He and William had been exchanging messages, so each knew the other’s camp. William had prepared for a surprise attack. There is no way Harold would have tried a shorthanded attack on the Norman camp if the Normans were prepared. Having discovered the Norman cavalry, Harold would either retreat to Bodiam or fortify the English camp while they awaited reinforcements. If they had retreated, the battle would not have happened. We therefore assumed they fortified their camp and stayed there, exactly as Wace suggests.

We originally concluded that Carmen was either mistaken about the English emerging from a wood as the Normans approached – albeit an oddly detailed mistake – or it was trying to say that reinforcements were arriving from a wood when the Normans attacked the camp. Wace does say that English reinforcements were arriving all the time, so perhaps some of them poured forth from a wood to augment those that were already in their camp.

If the English were attacked in their camp, it had to fit descriptions of the battlefield. All the primary sources agree that the ground was steep and difficult. Carmen says it was untilled; probably heathland. WP says that at the start of their attack: “The Duke and his men, in no way daunted by the difficulty of the place, began slowly to climb the steep slope". CKE says that the English: “roused with indignation as the Normans strived to gain the higher ground, drove them down into the valley beneath, where hurling their javelins and rolling down stones on them as they stood below, destroyed them to a man". Carmen says: “In summo montis vexillum vertice fixit", which Morton & Muntz translate as: “On the highest point of the summit he planted his banner".

Historians have always interpreted these statements to mean that the 146 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

Figure 38: English camp candidates battlefield hill is high, steep, conical and topped by a distinct summit. Their reasoning is not complicated. Carmen says that Harold planted his banner on a ‘montis’, Latin for mountain. There are no mountains in southern England - presumably why Morton & Muntz ignore it - but it sounds like it must be a high hill. “Slowly began to climb the steep slope" implies that the hill is high and steep. Carmen seems to confirm this by going on to say that the Duke: “boldly approached the steep slope". For stones to be rolled as weapons the hillsides must be steep. The Normans would not attack up a steep slope if the battlefield hill had alternative shallow slopes. The only hills that do not have shallow slopes are conical or ridges. Ridges seldom have a distinct summit. Q.E.D.

We looked for a high steep conical treeless hill that was close to the Roman road and close to a freshwater stream. There are none. There are, however, a few raised sections of the Rother isthmus ridge near its intersection with the Roman road at Cripps Corner. By definition, they are conical near the top. We examined them. Compasses Hill (B on Figure 38) is most similar to our traditional image of a steep conical battlefield hill, but it is only 200m across and it is covered in trees. Hook’s Beech (C) is a better size for an English Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 147

Figure 39: Possible troop deployments at The Beacon camp site, but it too is covered in trees. Yeakell and Gardner’s 1770 map and MAGIC suggest that both have been woody since ancient times. That left ‘The Beacon’ (A).

We spent weeks investigating The Beacon (apart from its battle possibilities it has some fascinating WWII anti-tank placements). It is a plausible camp and battlefield. It has sparse tree cover, a flattish top, several nearby lakes and it is steep around perhaps 240° of its circumference, especially to the west. On the other hand, it is big and flat-topped to be defended by 6,000. The enclosed shield wall around the flat-top shown in green on Figure 39 is 1750m long, nearly twice the length at the traditional battlefield. Also, it is at the ‘T’ junction of the Udimore Ridge and the Rother Ridge, which gives it three shallow ridge-crest approaches: to the north, east and southwest.

Harold might possibly have protected the northern approach with a fosse across the ridge crest (shown in red). If so, he could have covered the shallow east and southwest approaches eight deep and still leave enough men to be two deep elsewhere. Perhaps he had more men than we calculate. Our bigger issue is that there was almost certainly a ridgeway (yellow dots) on the Rother 148 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps isthmus ridge that crossed the western side of the summit. It would have given the Normans direct access to the shield wall on an easy shallow dry slope, quite unlike the primary source descriptions of steep slopes on difficult untilled ground. It also lacks some of the more enigmatic details mentioned in the primary sources, such as it has nowhere that might be described as a “a narrow place", no way to “enclose the battlefield" and it is not above a plain.

Try as we might, we could not come up with a scenario that fits The Beacon to the primary source descriptions. William would clearly have split his forces to attack from different directions, whereas the primary sources say that they attacked in three divisions from the same direction. They would have attacked on the shallow approaches which would contradict the primary source descriptions of a steep untilled slope. There was no valley in javelin range. Stones would not be dangerous on any slope the Normans would use to attack. The English would not have entered the battlefield in a column. It has nowhere that might be described as a “a narrow place", no way to “enclose the battlefield" and it is not above a plain. We could think of no way, given what was at stake, that a fosse could not be bypassed. The line would be too thin away from the shallow approaches. We are convinced the Normans would have contrived a way to break through on the shallow southern slope.

Reluctantly, we abandoned the combined English camp/battlefield theory. This meant we would have to come up with a plausible explanation as to why the English might leave their fortified camp to fight a defensive battle somewhere that was unfortified; and we would have to explain why Poitiers and Wace imply that the English were attacked in their camp if they were not. But it did mean that the English could have camped south of Cripps Corner on a hill that was not high, steep, conical or treeless.

English camp on Great Sanders ridge

There are three candidates for the English camp between the Brede and the Udimore/Rother isthmus ridge: Woodmans Green (H on Figure 38), Cackle Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 149

Street (F) and Great Sanders ridge (D). Each faced a hill across the Brede from where the English standards would have been visible.

We concluded in the Wargaming section that Great Sanders ridge was the most likely English camp, because its proximity to the Roman road made it the best place to receive reinforcements and its position midway between the three Brede crossing points gave it the best offensive and defensive options.

If we are right that the Norman battle camp was at Cottage Lane, Great Sanders ridge is the only candidate from where the English Standards would have been visible. It is the only candidate from where Harold and Gyrth could have gone scouting the Norman camp without dropping down into the Brede valley. They could have ridden out to Balcombe Green or Brede Barn Farm, both of which were hills overlooking the south bank of the Brede just 500m away.

Besides, if the English camped at Cackle Street or Woodman’s Green, the Normans would have marched up the Roman road to Cripps Corner, then out along the Udimore or Rother ridge respectively to attack from behind and above. They did not. If the English camped north of the Brede, Great Sanders ridge is the most likely place.

Harold or his delegates did not know about the Norman cavalry when they chose the English camp. Given what they did know, Great Sanders ridge would have seemed an ideal place for the English for an operations base and camp. It is a good defensive location. It was adjacent to and controlled the Roman road. It is just a mile from the Brede, ideal to watch all the Hastings Peninsula egress points. It is close enough to blockade those egress points or to ambush the Normans if they tried an infantry sortie. It was well placed for an English attack over any of them. It was 2km from where we think the Norman battle camp was located at Cottage Lane with nothing to impede the view, comfortably close enough for William to see the English standards. It was within striking distance of where Harold’s messenger had found William at his sea camp. We are convinced it is where the English camped. 150 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps

An English camp on the Great Sanders ridge solves two other vexing puzzles. One is that Wace says that Harold had the English camp surrounded by “a good fosse, leaving a well-guarded entrance on three sides". Previously we did not believe Wace on this point. Harold was only at the English camp for a day. Spades were tiny in those days, like lawn edge-cutting tools. Even if they brought five hundred of them, which does not seem likely, how could they dig a useful 2km fosse in a day, especially among tree roots. But the Great Sanders ridge has a steep slope to the north and great gouges out of its rugged southern slope, as if someone has ravaged it with a 20m wide ice-cream scoop. These form a natural fosse. The man-made fosse would only have needed to block the vulnerable eastern and western ridge ends. If they had enough spades, they could have surrounded a camp on Great Sanders ridge with a useful fosse in a day.

The other puzzle is that, according to Wace, Harold and Gyrth went alone to reconnoitre the Norman camp on the day before battle. He says they: “rode on, viewing and examining the ground, till from a hill where they stood they could see those of Normans, who were near. They saw a great many huts made of tree branches, well equipped tents, pavilions and gonfanons; and they heard the horses neighing". The route from the camp to the viewing hill must have been secure underfoot, along a ridge perhaps. The view to the Norman camp must have been unimpeded by trees. They must have been no more than 1km from the Norman camp, in order to hear the horses. So, how could Harold and Gyrth have felt safe to be out in plain sight on their own – well, apart from a few squires perhaps – and that close to the Norman camp? The answer at Great Sanders is that the Brede was in between. We guess they rode along the mid-west spur-crest to Balcombe Green (B on Figure 38).

In summary, we are convinced that the English camped at Great Sanders ridge. It was a defensively sound camp of the right size for 6,000 troops. It overlooked all the Brede crossing points. It had a view of the LIN 130 ridgeway, along which the Normans would have to march to circumvent the Brede. It was strategically well placed to attack a Norman camp at Winchelsea and to defend against a Norman sortie from Winchelsea. Or at least it would Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 151 have been if, as Harold thought at the time that he chose the camp location, the Normans had no cavalry. It is the only plausible camp location that provides a credible explanation for why Harold did not withdraw back to Bodiam when he discovered the Norman cavalry. It is the only credible camp location that would lead to a battle on Saturday.

William’s trap

This brings us to a puzzle that baffled us for thirty years. Harold could not have known about the Norman cavalry when he was at Bodiam, or he would not have crossed the Rother. He could not have known when the English camp was chosen, or he would not have allowed a camp south of Cripps Corner. But he must have known by the time of the battle, even if he only found out that morning, or he would not have fought a defensive battle with no chance of victory. So why did he not immediately leave to summon reinforcements or lead the English army back to safety at Bodiam as soon as he finds out?

According to Wace, Harold and Gyrth get an idea of the strength of the Norman army when they scout the Norman camp at dawn on the day before the battle. Harold suggests to Gyrth that he, Harold, should return to London for reinforcements. They have an argument. Gyrth replies that abandoning his troops would be viewed as cowardly; that he would permanently lose their respect. Harold accepts Gyrth’s argument and decides to stay.

We are sceptical about Wace’s provenance. He says that Harold and Gyrth went scouting alone. Both died in battle. They would not have told anyone some of the details that Wace reports. Perhaps they were accompanied by squires that survived to tell their story. Or perhaps Wace invented some or all of the English side of his narrative.

It makes no odds. Harold must have known about the Norman cavalry by the morning of battle, or he would not have deployed his forces as an enclosed loop (see below). Harold might not have felt able to leave his troops, but why did he not withdraw the entire army? At Hurst Lane, it was not too 152 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps late to retreat when he saw them line up at the bottom of the hill. They only had to get to Cripps Corner, 1500m away. If Harold’s scouts told him about the strength of the Norman cavalry as they crossed the Brede at Sedlescombe, the English still had time to get to Bodiam 4 miles away.

Historians often say that an English retreat would be deemed cowardly. We disagree. Harold just had to spin a plausible reason for retreat that did not make him look cowardly. People were superstitious in medieval times. He could say that God had come to him in a revelation to tell him to withdraw, or that his soothsayer had dreamed it was the best way to win, or that the Normans had brought dastardly Greek-fire against which they needed extra supplies from Bodiam. He could have told them that the Normans were sailing around the Rother to attack from the north, so the English needed to get there first. There was no Internet in those days. He could spin whatever fibs he like with no chance of getting caught out.

Why then did the English not retreat? The only plausible explanation we can come up with is that the English army was effectively trapped and that Norman scouts informed William that no major English reinforcements were imminent. Thus, William was better off spending Friday trying to intimidate Harold into flight (having laid a trap for him), scouting the English camp and devising a good plan of attack.

Figure 40 shows Harold’s predicament. Great Sanders ridge, with the English camp shown in cyan, is surrounded by the Udimore and Isthmus ridges, shown in white dots. We suspect that William had distributed some of his fastest mounts along the ridge, in order to catch Harold or his brothers if they tried to flee. They could not hold the entire English army if Harold decided to retreat. But the main cavalry at William’s battle camp, shown in magenta, could canter to Cripps Corner before the English could run there. The English would get caught on open ground and would have been annihilated. If the English tried to escape in any other direction, the Norman cavalry could spread out along the ridges to encircle them. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Camps 153

Figure 40: William’s trap

As soon as Harold discovers the Norman cavalry, regardless how he found out, battle was inevitable on the 14th. William needed to slay Harold before English reinforcements arrived. Harold could not retreat in person or lead the English army to safety. He could not attack because the English would get ambushed as they crossed onto the Hastings Peninsula. He could not blockade the Hastings Peninsula egress points, because the Normans were already guarding them. 154 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

The Battle

At dawn on the day of battle, the 14th October, the main Norman army was at their battle camp above modern Pestalozzi. William and his barons and his guard were at their sea camp at Winchelsea. CBA explains how William arrived at his battle camp surrounded by units of his cavalry. Brevis Relatio explains how he arrived at: “a hill that was on the side of Hastingas, opposite that hill upon which Harold with his army was", which exactly describes a Norman battle camp above Pestalozzi and an English camp on Great Sanders ridge. The Normans dress for battle at their battle camp and receive William’s pep talk.

Roughly two hours after dawn, the Normans left their battle camp to attack the English camp on Great Sanders ridge. This camp does not fit the primary source descriptions of the battlefield. Harold must have moved the English army elsewhere when he saw the Normans coming. In this way, all the primary sources are right: the Normans did attack the English camp, only the English left to occupy a nearby hill when they saw the Normans coming.

The English could not have gone far in the time available. We walked around the outside of the Great Sanders ridge pondering why the English might have left and where they might have gone. Eventually it crossed our minds that a landslide from Great Sanders ridge might have filled in the northern slope of a former conical hill, thereby leaving it more like a spur with only three sides. We thought about the hollows on the south side of the ridge and wondered whether the land that once filled those hollows had slipped down towards the River Brede.

To check, we walked out onto the footpath (at 50.9424,0.5434) between Hurst Lane and Sedlescombe to look up at the ridge. There was no obvious landslide. We looked around. It was a bit like when Harry Potter realises that he is descended from Ignotus Peverell, opening a chain of discovery about the Deathly Hallows. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 155

Figure 41: Sedlescombe battlefield deployment: shield wall (magenta); fosse (red); Norman attack (cyan)

The first thought that came to mind was Wace’s statement that the English: “… had moreover made a fosse, which went across the field, guarding one side of their army”. This never made sense to us previously. How could a fosse that went across the battlefield only protect one side of the shield wall? There is an obvious answer at Hurst spur which is that the shield wall was not across the battlefield; its flanks folded back on themselves, oval or horseshoe shaped perhaps, with only one side perpendicular to the battlefield. A fosse across the battlefield would guard one side of the English army, exactly as Wace says. 156 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

Then, another revelation. Wace says that Harold issues orders that: “all should be ranged with their faces towards the enemy”. Once again, we thought this must be a mistake. Why would anyone face away from someone trying to kill them? But it makes perfect sense at Hurst spur because most of the English were fighting back-to-back. Harold was telling them to hold their position in the line whatever was going on behind.

Then a new revelation. This must be what John of Worcester meant by: “the English were drawn up in a narrow place”. Again, it previously made little sense. If the English were somewhere narrow, they were presumably on a ridge crest or spur crest. But the landscape south of the Rother comprises spurs branching out of the Udimore, isthmus and Hastings ridges. The main ridges have broad gently undulating crests. The spurs are connected to them by a downhill slope. So why would William attack up a steep slope if he could attack on a shallow or downhill slope? Harold did make a fosse across the battlefield – depicted in Tapestry Panel 53 (Figure 46) - but Wace explains that it was on the upslope. There is an answer at Hurst spur. The downhill link from the Great Sanders ridge was interrupted by giant hollows (profile on Figure 43). The Normans had to attack uphill and the slope was shallower at the southern end of the shield wall than at the northern end.

One more. Wace says that William chooses to: “fight in the middle throng, where the battle shall be hottest". This never made any sense to us. At any other place, William would have employed an ‘oblique order’ attack, where the fighting should be more intense on a flank, but not at Hurst spur. At Hurst spur the Norman flanks would have done little real fighting because the slope, rugged ground, gloop and missiles would have made it virtually impossible for them. Their main job would be to occupy the English flanks to prevent them sending reinforcements to the melee point at the front. At Hurst spur, the fighting would have been hottest in the middle throng.

And yet another. CKE says that the English throw javelins at the Normans in the valley, destroying them to a man. How can this make sense? Lots of Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 157 primary sources talk about their slow climb up a steep slope to get to the English shield wall. They must have started in the valley. The climb sounds like it was a kilometre or more. So how could the English be killing them with javelins? But it all makes sense at Hurst spur. CKE was talking about the valleys at the sides of the battlefield, which were no more than 150m from the English shield wall. The boggy banks probably prevented anyone getting within 50m of the streams. With the slope and the ability to run out of the shield wall, the Norman flanks were in range of English javelin throwers even if they were in the valley.

That was five of the most perplexing puzzles from the primary source battlefield descriptions solved in five minutes. As we went through the other primary source battlefield clues, we came to realize that there was a credible explanation for all of them at Hurst spur. We will run through them shortly.

Figure 42: Tapestry Panel 52

Wace’s implication that the English were fighting back-to-back matches the Tapestry battlefield depictions in Panel 52 (Figure 42) and Panel 54 (Figure 45), and makes sense of some statements in the contemporary accounts that are otherwise inexplicable:

• Wace says that: “The English had enclosed a field where Harold stood with his friends”. This is usually assumed to mean that the English made fortifications to prevent being flanked, but this is implausible because they only had an hour or two to prepare. It is clear to us that Wace is saying the shield wall enclosed a field. • Wace says that the English had: “made a fosse, which went across the 158 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

field, guarding one side of their army". This is usually interpreted to mean that the fosse went across part of the field, protecting one flank, but that is not what Wace says. • Wace says that: “When Harold had made all ready, and given his orders, he came into the midst of the English, and dismounted by the side of the standard”. • Draco Normannicus says of the battlefield that: “The legion of the English surrounds the King". • Brevis Relatio says that a Norman soldier thinks Harold is: “in the midst of the dense array, which was before them on the top of the hill, for he thinks he can see Harold’s Standard there". • Henry of Huntingdon describes the English deployment as: “Cum ergo Haraldus totam gentum suam in una acie strictissime locasset, et quasi castellum inde construxisset, impenetrabiles erant Normannis”. This castellum is usually translated as ‘rampart’ because the translators assume the English shield wall was a line at Battle Abbey. It is clearly wrong. ‘castellum’ means fortress or castle. We translate it as: “When Harold had formed his whole army into a single tight line, constructed like a fortress, the Normans could not penetrate it”. In other words, the overlapping English shields looked like the stakes in an enclosed fortress palisade.

All of this suggests that Harold was within an enclosed English shield wall. Interestingly, there was a role reversal at Stamford Bridge two weeks earlier when the English army had a large cavalry against a footbound Norse shield wall. According to Heimskringla, Harold Hardrada deployed an enclosed shield wall with outfacing spears because he knew that the horses would not charge the spears. That battle was won by King Harold when the Norse shield wall broke up trying to chase the retreating English. We suspect that King Harold learned how effective a disciplined enclosed shield wall can be against cavalry and adopted an identical setup. Certainly, Wace says that Harold warned his troops they would be defeated if they broke their position. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 159

An enclosed shield wall is one reason Hurst spur is more credible than at any of the other battlefield candidates. They all propose straight shield walls whose flanks are protected by impenetrable woods or impassable streams. As we say when talking about them, there is no such thing as an impenetrable mature wood in temperate latitudes. There are no impassable streams in this region. The shape of their valleys confirms that there never have been. All the other battlefield candidates would have been quickly outflanked. Enclosed shield walls do not work on any of them, either because they are big or too woody or they have too many weak points.

Figure 43: Battlefield hill profile

It is little wonder that no one has considered the hill along lower Hurst Lane as a potential battlefield before. It is bisected by a road which disguises its topography. At no more than 67m above sea level it is puny by hill standards. It is not even a hill. It is a spur that has the defensive merits of a conical hill or ridge - i.e. no shallow slopes up which to attack - because it is partially protected to the north by gouges out of the rugged woody southern slope of the Great Sanders ridge. This can be seen in the hill profile shown in Figure 43. If any Normans tried to occupy the dip north of the English shield wall, they would have been trapped and vulnerable in the dip. If you visit, note that part of the dip was filled in during construction of Hurst Lane.

Hurst spur is like a finger pointing south to the river. The hachure map shown in Figure 44, despite inaccuracies, perhaps gives a better impression 160 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle of the topography. The spur is bounded to the east and west by streams. Today they are only 1m wide. According to the lady that lives in Hurst House, they were sometimes 3m across when she was a child. The gap between them is 400m to 450m. The boggy banks were about 25m wide on each side following the dry autumns of 2014 and 2016. In medieval times the ground would have drained less well, and the water table would have been higher. We guess that the boggy banks might have extended 50m or more from the streams at the time of the battle, leaving just 300m to fight at the pinch point.

Figure 44: Yeakell and Gardner, 1770. Norman camp = red; English camp = green; Shield wall = magenta; Roman road = white; Brede = blue; Udimore ridge = yellow

Above the 55m contour, the spur has steep slopes either side of a flattish top which is some 100m wide. This flat top narrows down to nothing at around the 50m contour. The shield wall could not have extended below the 55m contour. The land is suspiciously level at the 55m contour, leading to gates on both sides of the road. It is nice to think that it was part of Harold’s fosse. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 161

Regardless, it is in the right place to be part of Harold’s fosse. If so, the front of the shield wall would have been straightish and perhaps 10m further up the slope, as shown on Figure 41.

Figure 45: Tapestry Panel 54

The changes in relief are not big enough to show on standard OS maps. Tapestry Panel 54 (Figure 45) perhaps gives a better impression. It is trying to show a front elevation of the hill from William’s point of view. The proportions between the ground, the horses and the figures has gone awry, but it shows a reasonable interpretation of the flattish top and steep sides at Hurst spur, with a flat top and the west slope being steeper than the east.

In the first edition of this book, we depicted the English shield wall as roughly rectangular, 400m long and 100m wide. We subsequently read Adelae Comitissae by Baudril of Bourgueil, written about 1100. He says: “The enemy, discarding their horses, form themselves into a close wedge”. The contours at Hurst Lane suggest the ideal shield wall would be a convex kite, plectrum shaped, like a wedge. Wace says that Harold places the men of Kent at the front of the shield wall, where the Normans are most likely to strike first. This also suggests a plectrum shape. We have updated our battlefield diagrams accordingly. Regardless what shape, the total shield wall length would have been roughly 1000m, perhaps 30% longer that the traditional shield wall at Battle.

A Hurst spur battlefield provides a possible answer another interesting question, which is the toponymy of Killingan Wood, some 200m west of 162 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

Hurst Lane. It is a Saxon era name. ‘Kill’ looks like it comes from Old English ‘cwellen’, to kill. ‘ing’ and ‘an’ are Old English suffixes. We wonder whether some of the English troops took shelter in the wood as they fled from the battlefield, only to be get caught and slaughtered there.

Hurst spur is so different from the tradition battlefield that we must question how we could have been wrong for so long. Our mental picture comes from the primary sources which are interpreted to be saying that the battlefield hill is high, steep and conical. They also talk about the difficulty of the place. Historians have linked the two, assuming that the battlefield was difficult because it was high and steep. This must be wrong.

We think two factors created the confusion. Firstly, some of the primary source references to the battlefield’s height and steepness have been misinterpreted. We will return to this momentarily. Secondly, we think that historians were looking for evidence that the battle happened on the slopes south of Battle Abbey. Where Poitiers says “The Duke and his men, in no way daunted by the difficulty of the place, began slowly to climb the steep slope", they were looking for a link between the battlefield’s slope and its difficulty because Battle Hill’s only apparent difficulty is the 25m wide slope below the terrace where the re-enactments take place; even this is dubious, having been steepened when the new Abbey was built.

There is not necessarily a link between Poitiers’ phrases: “in no way daunted by the difficulty of the place” and “began slowly to climb the steep slope”. We interpret his statement to mean that the place was difficult in ways apart from its steepness. Hurst spur has plenty of other difficulties. It funnels the runoff from the Great Sanders ridge. The ground close to the streams would have been boggy; it still is. The ground away from the streams would have been wet and slippery. The slopes would have been tussocky, covered in gorse, heather and other dwarf shrubs. It would have been steep where it mattered: 15% or so at the contact points. And, perhaps above all, Hurst spur is narrow. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 163

Two sources show that our mental picture of the battlefield hill is out of scale. Pseudo-Ingulf says of Harold’s demise: “At last, towards twilight, he fell, on a small hill where he had collected his forces”. We have heard this interpreted to mean that Harold ran from the battlefield and made a final stand on this small hill. We have heard it said that this is the hill depicted on Panel 54. Both are wrong. The detailed accounts – Wace and Carmen – are clear that Harold died on the main battlefield. It was, as Pseudo-Ingulf says, a small hill. CKE says that the English were: “roused with indignation as the Normans strived to gain the higher ground, drove them down into the valley beneath, where hurling their javelins and rolling down stones on them as they stood below, destroyed them to a man". How far could anyone throw a medieval javelin? 30m? 40m? The world record for a wooden javelin without using an ankyle is 70m. Even if they matched the world record and the slope was 25%, the place they were throwing from was no more than 18m above the valley beneath. If this is right, the battlefield was a lot smaller and narrower than tradition suggests. Needless to say, these dimensions closely match Hurst spur.

We think that Harold deliberately chose to fight on Hurst spur because its narrowness hampered the Norman cavalry on the sides of the battlefield. The ground close to the streams would have been too boggy to support a heavy horse with armoured rider. The gap between the bog and the English shield wall would have been narrow (75m to the west, 100m to the east), slippery, steep and covered in tangly dwarf shrubs. Horses would be under constant risk of slipping or tripping. The further they strayed from the bog, in the hope of better ground, the greater their danger from javelin and hammer throwers. The rugged ground would prevent them getting up any speed and the steepness of the hill at the contact point would have blunted a traditional Norman couched lance attack.

The slope was shallower at the front of the shield wall, but this was where Harold must have deployed the fosse that Wace talks about. It is depicted in Tapestry Panel 53 (Figure 46) as a water filled ditch fronted by a knee-high barricade. Wace says that the barricade was made from shields and sticks. It 164 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle looks benignly low, but we guess the objective was just to get the horses to jump or refuse. Most of those that jumped either slipped or fell on landing. We suspect that the fosse was not dug with spades, as usually assumed, but churned by running horses to-and-fro along the English side of the barricade until the ground became slippery and gloopy. Perhaps it then filled with groundwater. Wace says that every Norman that got past the fosse was killed. We guess that they were moving so slowly that they were picked off at the shield wall.

Figure 46: Extract from Tapestry Panel 53 showing English barricade

Wace also tells us that no Norman barons died in the main battle. This is probably why. They were all mounted and, after the opening skirmishes, William’s cavalry did not participate in the battle until the denouement. To make matters worse for William, Harold had no archers to return ammunition, so the Norman archers and crossbowmen would have become impotent after a few minutes too. In effect, for most of the day William had 3,000 infantry fighting an uphill battle on hugely adverse terrain against 6,000 better equipped and better positioned rivals. Harold presumably predicted this when he chose to defend Hurst spur.

Valliant as they might have been, the Norman infantry had no chance while the shield wall held firm. Not only were they outnumbered on the wrong side of a steep and slippery slope, but they would have been barefoot or Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 165 wearing slick soled leather sandals that would have given no purchase. Their armour could not withstand the huscarl’s axes. The ground would have been covered with dwarf shrubs which would have hindered their progress and become increasingly gloopy. And they would have been under constant threat of being shield charged into the stream, bog or fosse, where they would topple over each other, drowning or crushing those on the bottom while the English chopped up those on the top.

Harold knew the English were safe as long as the shield wall held. William would have realised it too after the opening melee attacks. Several of the primary sources talk about it. William’s instinct would have been to encircle the English army, picking them off as fast as the Normans could make arrows and crossbow bolts. But even that was not feasible Hurst spur.

Figure 47: Battlefield relief. Roman road (black); English camp (white), English shield wall (magenta); Norman start position and tightest encirclement (yellow)

William could not have put encircling forces between the English and the streams because they would have been shield charged into the bogs where 166 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle they would have been crushed, drowned or hacked to death. He could not put encircling forces between the English and the Great Sanders ridge because they would have been annihilated in the dip.

The tightest encircling loop William could have formed - shown as the yellow loop on Figure 47 - would have been some 700m in diameter which would have put the English out of arrow range. He did not have enough men to make it secure. And those to the east and north would have been in a wood where horses would have been a liability and the infantry would have been vulnerable to skirmishing attack from Harold’s newly arriving reinforcements.

We must come back to why the English might have left their fortified camp to occupy an unfortified lower position. There is a logical explanation at Hurst spur. First, they were at the camp no more than two days, so the man-made fortifications could not have been great. Second, William had prepared to attack the camp, so his plans would be set awry. Third, the camp had defensive weaknesses with three shallow access points, two of which held the Roman road. It was also woody. Trees obscure the line of sight and hinder the ability to command. We think Harold reasoned that he stood a better chance of controlling the battle and keeping the shield wall intact at one of the spurs that jutted out south-east of the Great Sanders ridge.

The far west spur had the Roman road up its crest. The far east spur was shallow, wide and woody. The mid-west spur was too wide to defend. None of the others had hollows protecting the top slope. We think Harold judged his best chance of surviving one day was on the mid-east spur upon which Hurst Lane now runs. It had excellent line of sight with very few trees and it was narrow and boggy which would have provided protection against the Norman cavalry. The spur’s only weak point – the shallow southern end - could be adequately protected by a hastily made fosse. Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 167

Match with the contemporary accounts

Hurst spur provides a plausible explanation for all the primary source battlefield descriptions, many of which were previously thought to be impossible or conflicting. Let’s run through them.

1. Orderic says that the battle was at Senlac. Senlac was Old English for ‘sandy loch’ or ‘sandy lake’. The Brede estuary was sandy by definition. The Saxons sometimes used the term ‘loch’ to mean a river that is cut off at low tide. There was a low-tide ford below modern Brede village. Thus, also by definition, the Brede reach between Brede village and Sedlescombe that separated the two armies was a sandy loch and a low- tide sandy lake. 2. Chronicon says that the engagement was: “nine miles from Heastinga, where they had fortified a castle”. We assume Roman miles from the Norman sea camp at Winchelsea. It is not as specific as it sounds because it does not say whether this is crow flying or walking distance. Hurst spur is 9.7 walking miles or 8.4 crow flying miles. Close enough. 3. CBA says that the battle was near Herste. Hyrst is the Old English term for a wooded hill, of which there are dozens in the area. Almost everywhere was near a hyrst of some sort. Hurst spur has a more specific relationship. According to our interpretation of Domesday, it was in the manor of Herste at the time of the battle. 4. CKE says that the English were: “roused with indignation as the Normans strived to gain the higher ground, drove them down into the valley beneath, where hurling their javelins and rolling down stones on them as they stood below, destroying them to a man". We interpret this to mean that the shield wall was within javelin throwing range of the valleys at the sides of the battlefield; no more than 70m away and no more than 18m higher, just like Hurst spur. We interpret the rolled stones to mean that there was a rocky outcrop or quarry above the English position. The huge gouges between Great Sanders and Hurst Lane look like some sort of excavation that might well have created waste boulders. 168 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

5. Tapestry Panel 54 depicts the battlefield hill. Allowing for it being stylised, cartoonised and out of proportion, it does look like Hurst spur viewed from the south: small, low, flat topped with the English standing back to back, steep, especially on the left. 6. Wace, Carmen, Jumièges and Orderic, in one way or another, say that the battle started at the third hour of the day. Given the time needed to don armour, assemble and receive a pep talk and commands, the battlefield cannot have been much more than a one-hour march from the Norman battle camp. Hurst spur is a one-hour march from Cottage Lane where we think the Normans had their battle camp. 7. John of Worcester says that: “the English were drawn up in a narrow place”. It is not clear whether he was referring to the battlefield, the English formation or both. The relatively dry part of the battlefield averaged 300m wide. The front of the English shield wall would have been 100m wide. Both are narrow for armies of this size. 8. Carmen says: “Suddenly the forest poured forth troops of men, and from the hiding places of the wood a host dashed forward. There was a hill near the forest and a neighbouring valley … they seized possession of this place for the battle”. The southern slope of the Great Sanders ridge would have been tree lined, much as it is today. As the English entered Hurst spur from their camp, it would have looked to the Normans that they were pouring forth from the forest through which they had come. 9. Carmen says that the battlefield: “was untilled because of its roughness”. Hurst spur is mostly meadowland today. It would have been Wealden Greensand lowland heath then, like the Panel 54 depiction and almost certainly untilled because of its roughness. 10. Wace says that: “The Normans appeared, advancing over the ridge of a rising ground; and the first division of their troops moved onwards along the hill and across a valley”. The Normans crossed the Brede at Sedlescombe, then left the Roman road and marched along what is now a footpath between Sedlescombe and Killingan Wood. The English would have seen them appear over rising ground as they skirted around the stream head at 50.939,0.536. The Normans would then have headed east Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 169

across the valley and stream to form up somewhere near Brede Lane. It is exactly as Wace describes. 11. Orderic says that the English: “... formed a solid column of infantry, and thus stood firm in the position they had taken". This matches Hurst Lane where the English would have left their camp in a column whose order was equivalent to where they would fight, men of Kent coming out first to fight at the southern tip. Their deployment would have been tight, looking like an infantry column to the Normans. 12. Henry of Huntingdon (our translation) says that the English army was deployed as: “a single tight line, constructed like a fortress”. Their overlapping shields looked like a palisade, and they were deployed in an enclosed plectrum-shaped loop that looked like a fortress. 13. Wace says that the English built up a barricade before them: “... with their shields and ash and other wood, that had been well joined and wattled together". At any other place, the usefulness of a low barricade and fosse that was dug in less than two hours would have been negligible. It could not be both wide enough and deep enough to prevent the Normans getting over it or circumventing it. Not so at Hurst spur. The shield wall would be most vulnerable on the relatively shallow slopes to the south where the fosse would have needed to be only 150m long to be effective. Wace says that it went across the field, which implies it was 300m long. If they had enough spades, they could have dug a 1m deep 300m long fosse in two hours. We think even this was not necessary. The barricade and fosse are shown on Tapestry Panel 53 (Figure 46). It looks to us that the barricade was brought with them, exactly as Wace says, and that the fosse was made by running horses to-and-fro in order to gloop the ground. 14. Wace says that: “The English had enclosed the field where Harold was with his friends”, then that Harold knew the Normans would attack hand to hand: “so he had early enclosed the field in which he placed his men”. We interpret this to mean that the shield wall was an enclosed loop, like the plectrum-shaped shield wall we propose at Hurst Lane. 15. Wace says that: “The English stood in close ranks, ready and eager for the 170 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

fight; and they had moreover made a fosse, which went across the field, guarding one side of their army”. The traditional interpretation is that the fosse only went across part of the field, but this is not what Wace says. A fosse across the entire battlefield would protect the entire shield wall at the other battlefield candidates. At Hurst Lane, the English flanks bent back on themselves, forming an enclosed loop. A fosse across the battlefield would only protect one side of the shield wall, the front. 16. Wace says that Harold issued orders that: “all should be ranged with their faces towards the enemy”. This would be inexplicable at the traditional battlefield, or indeed at Caldbec Hill or Telham Hill, because they would all have had straight shield walls. The English were hardly likely to face away from someone trying to kill them. However, it makes perfect sense at the Hurst spur battlefield where most of those in the shield wall were back-to-back. Harold did not want his troops getting distracted by what was going on behind them. 17. Draco Normannicus says: “The legion of the English surrounds the King", The shield wall was enclosed around the King. 18. Brevis Relatio says that William, looking at the English army from his camp, asks a nearby soldier where he thinks Harold is. The solider replies that he: “thinks he is in the midst of the dense array, which was before them on the top of the hill, for he thinks he can see Harold’s Standard there." The King was in the midst of a tightly packed enclosed shield wall. 19. Wace and Carmen say that William divided his troops into three, Franks and Bretons on the flanks, Normans in the middle. Poitiers says that William wants his three divisions to be visible all the time, so that he could command them by voice and hand signals. He orders them to attack different places. Wace says that William chooses to “fight in the middle throng, where the battle shall be hottest". At any other place there is no reason the battle would be hotter in the middle than the sides. At any other place, just as with modern rugby, the best strategy would have been an ‘oblique order’ attack on the weakest English flank. But that would not work at Hurst spur. The battlefield was so narrow that William could not get significant numbers on either side of the shield Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 171

wall. Most of the fighting would have taken place in the middle, as William says, at the front of the shield wall. 20. Wace says that: “In the plain was a fosse which the Normans had now behind them, having passed it in the fight without regarding it. But the English charged and drove the Normans before them, till they made them fall back upon this fosse. Many were seen falling therein”. This is one of the most specific statements in all the primary sources. We thought it had to be a mistake. How could the Normans pass a fosse so steep and dangerous without noticing it? How could the English force them back so far? Yet even this has an explanation at Hurst spur. The fosse was a steep riverbank on one of the streams that run either side of the battlefield. They can pass it without noticing because it is parallel to them: i.e. they pass it, but do not cross it. The English can shield charge them into it because there is so little space at the sides of the battlefield. If the English shield charge, the Normans back up, forcing those furthest from the contact zone into the bog where they trip and fall into the fosse. 21. Wace’s statement above suggests there was a plain below the shield wall. He confirms this later in his description of the feigned retreat: “following the Normans, as they go rejoicing in the success of their scheme, the English scattered themselves over the plain”. Hurst spur has a plain below the shield wall, exactly as Wace describes. 22. Poitiers says that even late in the day after having suffered heavy casualties the English position was still “very difficult to surround". William did not have enough men. As we explain above, the shortest encircling loop William could have created would have been 2.5km long which would have left it too thin to be effective. 23. Carmen says that: “The Duke sighted the King far off on the steeps of the hill”. William was either looking from the Norman camp, as described by Brevis Relatio above, or down the slope below the battlefield. In the case of the former, the battlefield was below the Norman camp, so it was visible in its entirety. In the case of the latter, it means William could see Harold over the shield wall, which is only possible if the slope behind the English line is greater than the slope in front of it. This is quite unlike 172 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

the traditional battlefield and all the established alternatives, but it is exactly the case Hurst spur. 24. Wace says that the youths, common herds, priests and clerks move onto rising ground to watch the battle. Hurst spur is not high. It is overlooked by hills to the east, west and north. We suspect that the Norman camp followers were watching from the hill to the west, around 50.941,0.539. 25. Domesday lists manors that were wasted during the conquest. We would expect the battlefield manor to be wasted. Hurst/Herste was wasted, although it is not necessarily significant because its previous value was tiny. 26. Pseudo-Ingulf says of Harold’s demise: “At last, towards twilight, he fell, on a small hill where he had collected his forces”. Hurst spur is a small hill. 27. CBA mentions a ditch named the Malfosse, into which many Norman knight fell and died as they chased the fleeing English after the battle. It must have been within sprinting distance of the battlefield. Poitiers describes it as a ‘labyrinth of ditches’, which implies iron ore mining to us. We think it was at Footlands, less than 1km away on the far side of the Killingan Wood and the Roman road. 28. Baudril of Bourgueil says: “The enemy, discarding their horses, form themselves into a close wedge”. A wedge-shaped shield wall is most likely to be deployed at a narrowing spur, like Hurst spur.

We need to revisit the primary source statements that led us astray. In our defence, these statements have been similarly interpreted by virtually everyone that has read them for nearly a thousand years.

1. Returning to Carmen’s line “In summo montis vexillum vertice fixit", which is usually translated “At the highest point of the summit he planted his banner". ‘montis’ usually means mountain but there are no mountains on or near the Hastings Peninsula. Kathleen Tyson says that 'mons’ can mean any dominant hill on a plain. Carmen refers to cliff at Dover cliffs as ‘mons’ and they are not much higher than Hurst spur. Or perhaps Carmen exaggerated for dramatic effect. The rest of the phrase is a Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 173

tautology: the highest point of a hill is the summit. There is a plausible explanation at Hurst spur. Latin ‘in summo’ means 'summit’, but 'summit’ means the 'highest point’. We tend to think of a summit in mountain climbing terms, but it could be applied to a ridge or spur, in which case it might mean the crest. Hurst spur slopes down towards the river. We think Carmen is saying that “He planted his banner at the highest point of the crest of the hill". This would be on the crest furthest from the river, exactly where to be expected. 2. Returning to CKE’s statement that the English were: “rolling down stones on them as they stood below, destroyed them to a man”, which is usually interpreted to mean the battlefield hill was high and steep. We think Malmesbury was trying to say that the English rolled their stones when the Normans were tightly bunched within perhaps 30m of the shield wall. The stones were fatal because the Normans were too packed to move sideways to get out the way. The slopes of Hurst spur are easily steep enough for big stones to have been fatal at that range. 3. Returning to Poitiers saying that the Normans: “... began slowly to climb the steep slope", which implies the battlefield hill was long and steep. The slope to the top of the battlefield is only 1:20, with a 50m plateau below the shield wall, steepening to 1:12 at the shield wall. Perhaps this what Carmen meant when it says that the Duke: “boldly approached the steep slope", although 1:12 is not that steep. Perhaps they were both exaggerating for heroic effect. We think they were trying to say that the hill was steep enough that it could only be climbed slowly because the Normans were barefoot or wearing slick-soled leather sandals on ground that was wet, slippery and tangly. For comparison, Crecy was also described by French commentators as a steep hill that hindered cavalry charges. It too was only 1:20. There had been a downpour before the battle of Crecy, but it was August in sunny France. October 1066 in damp England was probably wetter and more slippery. 4. Returning to Poitiers’ statement that: “... the English were camped on higher ground, on a hill close to the forest through which they had come". Well, the English were camped on a hill close to the forest through which they 174 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

had come, so it is right. But the English camp was lightly wooded whereas Poitiers gives the impression that this hill was treeless. We suspect this might be an ambiguous use of the Latin word 'castra’. castra is usually translates as fortress or bivouac but actually means any fortified land occupied by a military force. The battlefield hill would effectively become a castra as soon as the English occupied it. We suspect Poitiers was trying to say that the English army deployed on a treeless hill close to the wood through which they had come. 5. Returning to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’s comment that: “William came against them by surprise, before his army was drawn up in battle array ". This surely cannot mean the English were victims of a surprise attack: they knew where the Normans were camped and were watching for an attack. We are unconvinced by the translation. The Old English says: “Wyllelm him com ongean on unwær, ær þis folc gefylced wære". The key word is ‘unwær’ which gets translated as ‘by surprise’ or ‘unawares’, but that is not its usual meaning. It usually means unwary, heedless or incautious. We think it refers to William rather than to Harold. We guess that the ASC is trying to say: “William attacked unwarily, before Harold’s army was prepared". In other words, he attacked without caution before Harold had finished fortifying the battlefield, which is exactly what we suggest did happen.

Conclusion and postscript

We are convinced that the battle was fought at Hurst Lane spur. We think it best fits the primary source accounts, the local geography, contemporary military tactics and common sense.

Just to re-iterate what we said long ago: the real battle narrative is as simple as it could possibly be (Figure 48). The English camped on Great Sanders ridge, close to the Hastings Peninsula, yet at what Harold thought to be a safe distance from the Norman army. To his horror, he discovered the next morning that William had brough a significant cavalry (although he still did Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle 175 not realise how big) that put them in range of attack and prevented an organised withdrawal. The English army was effectively trapped. William spent that day scouting the English camp and devising a plan of attack. He sortied to attack the English camp at dawn the following day. Harold moved the English army to a nearby hill, which he thought stood a better chance of survival. Unlike other battle theories, this does not rely on idiotic battle tactics, suicidal surprise attacks or camping at ridiculously poor defensive positions. It just needs Harold to have a small but crucial intelligence oversight.

Figure 48: Camps and Sedlescombe battlefield deployment 176 Sedlescombe Battlefield – The Battle

We have been lucky enough that the main landowners on both sides of Hurst Lane have allowed us to metal detect the prospective battlefield and dig up some finds. The eastern side of Hurst Lane has been intensively irrigated and farmed. There is a lot of stuff in the ground, but the signals from medieval artefacts are difficult to separate from 20th century farming activities. The western side is teeming with finds but a public footpath crosses the battlefield, so it has a lot of modern junk in the ground. We did find some lumps of distressed iron and lead which we sent to the Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds. They confirmed some of them are medieval but cannot identify any of them as being military. We are only amateurs. Hopefully, one day we will find professional metal detectorists and/or archaeologists who can do a better search.

177

Part 2 - The Traditional Battlefield

Figure 49: Traditional Norman attack at Battle Hill

We think that the Battle of Hastings was fought near Sedlescombe. If we are right, it was not fought at the traditional Battle Abbey location. Yet the tradition is supported by hundreds of books, thousands of articles and just about every medieval and military expert that has ever lived. How could they all be wrong?

We are not contradicting any archaeological evidence, for the simple reason that there isn’t any. We are not really contradicting the experts either. None of them think that Battle Abbey is a likely battlefield. Rather, they accept five primary source accounts which say or imply that Battle Abbey was built on the battlefield. Having ‘made their bed’, they have to lie in it, by devising ways to justify an unlikely battlefield. We are contradicting the base evidence: the five primary sources which say that Battle Abbey was built on the battlefield. We do not take it lightly. Five independent references is normally definitive by medieval standards.

First, we review Battle Hill as a battlefield. How it matches military or 178 The Traditional Battlefield geographical clues in the contemporary accounts, how it matches William and Harold’s personal motivations, 11th century military tactics and, not least, common sense. If the battle was not fought at the traditional location, Battle Hill is just a random hill that happens to be in roughly the right area. It may match some clues, but only through chance. It is unlikely to match the more peculiar or specific clues.

We will then address two associated issues. If the battle was not fought at Battle Hill, the five ‘Abbey on the battlefield’ references must be mistaken or misinterpreted. We will investigate how this might be. It also means that Battle Abbey was not built on the battlefield. We will look at how this might be and why else Battle Abbey might have been built where it is.

To set the unlikely scene, the cyan line on Figure 49 shows the traditional Norman attack from the one direction they would have wanted to avoid.

Battle Hill as a battlefield

Figure 50: Battlefield deployment derived by Stephen Morillo from other commentaries

Back on our school trip to Battle Abbey in 1966 we were shown Colonel Charles H. Lemmon’s battlefield diagram, upon which Stephen Morillo’s diagram in Figure 50 is based. Even as eight-year-olds, we could see it has two major flaws. The Traditional Battlefield 179

Harold’s shield wall only works if the English are on rising ground, but historians place them in a line across the hill where two-thirds of the English army are perpendicular to the slope. The English flanks would have been level with their adversaries, virtually defenceless against Norman couched lance attacks. It beggars belief that Harold would have used this deployment and, if he did, William’s tactics make no military sense.

William had a huge cavalry, Harold had none. William would surely have outflanked the English line to attack Harold from behind and above, where he was only protected by his personal guard. Failing that he would have implemented what soldiers refer to as an ‘oblique order’ attack, matching his best troops against the weakest flank. A line breach or flanking manoeuvre would have delivered a quick victory against the traditional shield wall, but instead we are led to believe that William risked everything in melee combat on the battlefield’s most adverse terrain against Harold’s elite huscarls.

Figure 51: Traditional battlefield deployment with contours, after Morillo 180 The Traditional Battlefield

Figure 52: Traditional battlefield deployment with relief, after Morillo

Hopefully our reworkings of Lemmon’s diagram in Figure 51 and Figure 52 give a clearer indication of what military historians are thinking (note that we have regressed some of the post-battle terracing and road levelling).

The idea of the traditional English deployment is to stretch the shield wall between two stream heads, then bend it around the southern slope of Battle Hill. The bend puts more of the English shield wall on rising ground and it accommodates the place where Harold is supposed to have died. The streams are thought to protect the English flanks, preventing the Normans riding around the open ends of the line. This is how military historians explain William’s failure to outflank the defence. We can only imagine that they never visited the site.

Figure 53 shows us standing astride the protective streams. Neither of them is more than shoulder width, at least within 1km of Battle. Their valleys are 5m deep in places but so shallow the Norman cavalry might not even notice The Traditional Battlefield 181 they were there. Doubtless some would claim the streams were more difficult to cross in the 11th century. We think not. They were stream heads with catchment areas of less than an acre. They would only have been significantly wider during torrential rain, which was not the case on the day of battle, and then only downstream. They are in V shape valleys that have been made by post-glacial bank erosion. Those valleys have had an extra thousand years of erosion since the battle. They are probably 10% deeper than they were then. Considering what was at stake, it is implausible that the Normans could fail to outflank the defence if they tried.

Figure 53: Flank streams, northeast to the left and west to the right

Even if we accept for a moment that there was some inexplicable reason the Normans did not try to cross the flank streams, they could have looped around to attack from the north. They just needed to go back down the Hastings Ridge pick up the Rochester Roman road at Beauport Park, then north along the road to Cripps Corner, west along the ridgeway to Netherfield, then down LIN-130 track which follows the same route as the A271 into north Battle. It was only 13 miles, which might have taken 90 minutes for coursers without breaking into a canter.

The contemporary accounts do not mention any attempt at a flanking manoeuvre or loop attack. Perhaps William thought his knights and barons might flee if they were out of his sight. But Poitiers says that the English position was still difficult to surround after six hours of fighting. It sounds like outflanking or looping the shield wall was not possible for some reason. It 182 The Traditional Battlefield would have been trivial at Battle.

No easy victory with a flanking or looping manoeuvre then. What about an oblique order attack? The contemporary accounts say that William concentrated his elite Norman troops on the centre of the English line, matched against Harold’s elite huscarls on the steepest part of the hill. This is exactly the wrong tactic. Any experienced commander would have concentrated on one end of the English line, where the ground was level, to draw the elite defenders, then switch to the other end in an oblique order attack. The only plausible explanation for William to concentrate on the middle of the English line at Battle, is that he was very naive. Still, it is difficult to believe he was that naive and that poorly advised.

Even so, if William’s elite troops were occupying Harold’s elite huscarls in the centre, it should have been easy for his Frankish and Breton troops to break through one of the English flanks. They were on level ground, fighting English peasants armed with billhooks, hatchets, hoes and other agricultural tools. Wace says that the English had made a fosse across the battlefield that protected one side of the shield wall. This does not fit the traditional battlefield because a fosse across the battlefield would protect the entire shield wall. Perhaps he meant that it went across part of the battlefield. The English only had an hour to prepare fortifications. It is difficult to believe that it would hold back the Normans for long. Even if it did, the other flank should have been easy pickings, yet they failed to make a break for six hours, and then only by a ruse.

Wikipedia, which represents the consensus on most subjects these days, shows the English deployment with what soldiers refer to as ‘refused’ ends (Figure 54). It left us perplexed. It is no more difficult to outflank. It just means that the Normans would have to ride 400m further north, which is nothing in this context. On the other hand, it would have stretched the shield wall from 750m to 1200m, which would make it a third thinner and therefore much easier to breach. It would have done nothing to prevent the Normans looping around to the north via Sedlescombe and Whatlington. In our The Traditional Battlefield 183 opinion, this formation is inferior to Lemmon’s … and Lemmon’s is feeble.

Figure 54: Wikipedia Battle Hill deployments

An alternative Battle Hill engagement scenario

There is a more fundamental issue. How could the English have ended up defending such a miserable position as Battle Hill? According to the traditional narrative, they were caught trying a surprise attack. This is absurd. William knew it was Harold’s trademark tactic and had prepared for it. William and Harold had been swapping messages and scouting each other’s camps the previous day, so Harold knew he was prepared and knew that the Norman cavalry gave them a huge advantage on open ground. He would never have attacked the Norman camp short-handed. Everyone that has an alternative battlefield theory uses this argument to justify why they think that the battle was not fought on Battle Hill.

Many years ago, we came up with an alternative engagement scenario (Figure 55) that better explains how the battle might have been fought on the slope south of Battle Abbey (x). At the time we thought that the English were camped at their traditional location on Caldbec Hill (C). We had already decided that the Normans were camped at Winchelsea (W) but they could 184 The Traditional Battlefield

Figure 55: Possible pincer attack have used the same tactic wherever they had camped on the Hastings Peninsula.

We postulated that William looped some of his cavalry north via Sedlescombe and Whatlington to attack the English camp from the north. We thought that the English saw them coming and tried to escape south, only to run into the Norman infantry coming up the Hastings ridge from the southeast. This neatly explains why Harold did not escape north – because the Norman cavalry was blocking that route - and it gives a plausible explanation for why the English left Caldbec Hill to fight on the defensively inferior Battle Hill.

If Harold had been trapped on Battle Hill with the Norman cavalry to the northwest and the Norman infantry to the southeast, we wondered what he The Traditional Battlefield 185

Figure 56: Enclosed shield wall on Battle Hill would have done. The slope to the north was steep, but the slope to the south was shallow and the slopes to the northwest and east were virtually level. We think that Harold would have enclosed the summit in a looped shield wall, like Figure 56.

An enclosed shield wall might have survived intact for six hours with fortifications on the ridge crest, but the English had hardly any time to prepare. The only possibility we could come up with was some sort of natural fortification, like a redirected stream or landslip. Neither is likely on a ridge crest, but the latter is less unlikely. We postulated that a landslip between the stream heads (red line) partially protected the northwest approach. Perhaps the English had time to dig a 200m fosse to partially protect the eastern approach (magenta line). In this scenario, it is feasible that William might have chosen to attack on the traditional battlefield to the south.

We scoured the contemporary accounts for an interpretation that might 186 The Traditional Battlefield

Figure 57: Tapestry Panel 50 support this theory. We could find no indication that William used a pincer attack or that he tried to attack on a shallow ridgeway approach. Indeed, the contemporary accounts say the exact opposite: that the Normans attacked together in three divisions and they attacked up a steep uncultivated slope. Also, Tapestry Panel 50 (Figure 57) shows the English scout shielding his eyes. It might be just a figurative representation of a lookout. Otherwise, it means he is looking south or east from the English camp in the morning whereas the Normans would have been coming first from the north. There is substantial evidence – listed above – that the English employed an enclosed shield wall, but it could apply anywhere.

Then we saw the Time Team Battle of Hastings TV show with its compelling evidence that the English almost certainly did not camp on Caldbec Hill. We had to abandon this alternative engagement scenario. That left us back at square one, with no plausible explanation for why the battle might have been fought on Battle Hill and, assuming it was, how it could fit any plausible military tactics of the day.

Traditional battlefield and the primary sources

Despite all our misgivings, it is worth persevering to check how the traditional The Traditional Battlefield 187 battle scenario fits the contemporary account descriptions. We listed the primary source battlefield clues in Part 1. Here they are again:

1. Orderic says that the battle was at Senlac. Senlac was Saxon for ‘sandy loch’ or ‘sandy lake’. 2. Chronicon says that the engagement was: “nine miles from Heastinga, where they had fortified a castle”. We assume Roman miles from the Norman sea camp at Winchelsea. It is not as specific as it sounds because it does not say whether this is crow flying or walking distance. 3. CBA says that the battle was near Herste. Herste is the Saxon word for a wooded hill. 4. CKE says that the English were: “roused with indignation as the Normans strived to gain the higher ground, drove them down into the valley beneath, where hurling their javelins and rolling down stones on them as they stood below, destroying them to a man". The part about rolling stones is usually interpreted to mean that the battlefield hill was high and steep. We think it is trying to say that the battlefield was compact and steep near to the shield wall. We interpret the part about javelins to mean that the valley beneath the battlefield hill was no more than 70m away and no more than 18m lower. 5. Tapestry Panel 54 depicts the battlefield hill as small, steep sided, flat topped and rugged. 6. Wace, Carmen, Jumièges and Orderic, in one way or another, say that the battle started at the third hour of the day. Given the time needed to don armour, assemble and receive a pep talk and commands, the battlefield cannot be much more than a one-hour march from the Norman camp. 7. John of Worcester says that: “the English were drawn up in a narrow place”. It is not clear whether he was referring to the battlefield, the English formation or both. 8. Carmen says: “Suddenly the forest poured forth troops of men, and from the hiding places of the wood a host dashed forward. There was a hill near the forest and a neighbouring valley … they seized possession of this place for the 188 The Traditional Battlefield

battle”. 9. Carmen says that the battlefield: “was untilled because of its roughness”. 10. Wace says that: “The Normans appeared, advancing over the ridge of a rising ground; and the first division of their troops moved onwards and across a valley”. 11. Orderic says that the English: “... formed a solid column of infantry, and thus stood firm in the position they had taken". 12. Henry of Huntingdon [our translation] says that: “Harold had formed his whole army in a single line, like a castle, that the Normans could not penetrate”. We interpret this to mean that the English formation was a long thin tightly packed loop around the crest of a hill. 13. Wace says that the English built up a barricade before them: “... with their shields and ash and other wood, that had been well joined and wattled together". 14. Wace says that: “The English had enclosed the field where Harold was with his friends”, then that Harold knew the Normans would attack hand to hand: “so he had early enclosed the field in which he placed his men”. We interpret this to mean that the shield wall was an enclosed loop. By tradition, it means that the battlefield was enclosed by impenetrable woods or unpassable streams. 15. Wace says that: “The English stood in close ranks, ready and eager for the fight; and they had moreover made a fosse, which went across the field, guarding one side of their army”. We interpret this to mean that the English flanks bent back on themselves. By tradition, the fosse only went across part of the field, so it only protected one of the English flanks, although this is not what Wace says. 16. Wace says that Harold issued orders that: “all should be ranged with their faces towards the enemy”, which we interpret this to mean that the English were standing back-to-back in an enclosed shield wall. 17. Draco Normannicus says: “The legion of the English surrounds the King", which we interpret to mean that the English shield wall was enclosed around King Harold. 18. Brevis Relatio says that William, looking at the English army from his The Traditional Battlefield 189

camp, asks a nearby soldier where he thinks Harold is. The solider replies that he: “thinks he is in the midst of the dense array, which was before them on the top of the hill, for he thinks he can see Harold’s Standard there". We interpret this to mean that the English shield wall was enclosed around King Harold and his standard. 19. Wace and Carmen say that William divided his troops into three, Franks and Bretons on the flanks, Normans in the middle. Poitiers says that William wants his three divisions to be visible all the time, so that he could command them by voice and hand signals. He orders them to attack different places. Wace says that William chooses to “fight in the middle throng, where the battle shall be hottest". 20. Wace says that: “In the plain was a fosse which the Normans had now behind them, having passed it in the fight without regarding it. But the English charged and drove the Normans before them, till they made them fall back upon this fosse. Many were seen falling therein”. We interpret this to mean that the fosse was parallel the Norman attack, to the side of the battlefield, below the shield wall and within driving distance of the shield wall (perhaps 100m). 21. The statement above also means there was a plain below the shield wall. This is confirmed later by Wace, at least below the section where the feigned retreat happened, because he says: “following the Normans, as they go rejoicing in the success of their scheme, the English scattering themselves over the plain”. 22. Poitiers says that even late in the day after having suffered heavy casualties the English position was still “very difficult to surround". 23. Carmen says that: “The Duke sighted the King far off on the steeps of the hill”. It might mean William is looking from his camp or that he could see Harold over the shield wall, which is only possible if the slope behind the English line was greater than the slope in front of it. 24. Wace says that the youths, common herds, priests and clerks move onto rising ground to watch the battle, which means the battlefield was overlooked. 25. Pseudo-Ingulf says of Harold’s demise: “At last, towards twilight, he fell, 190 The Traditional Battlefield

on a small hill where he had collected his forces”. We interpret this to means that the battlefield was a small hill. 26. Domesday flags those manors that were wasted during the conquest. We would expect the battlefield manor to be wasted. 27. CBA mentions a ditch named the Malfosse, into which many Norman knight fell and died as they chased the fleeing English after the battle. It must have been within sprinting distance of the battlefield. Poitiers describes it as a ‘labyrinth of ditches’, which implies iron ore mining. 28. Baudril of Bourgueil says: “The enemy, discarding their horses, form themselves into a close wedge”. The shield wall was an enclosed wedge shape.

Then there are the five ambiguous clues.

29. Carmen says: “In summo montis vexillum vertice fixit ", which is usually translated “At the highest point of the summit of the hill he planted his banner". By tradition, it means that the battlefield hill was high, steep and with a conical summit. But it is a tautology. We interpret ‘summo’ to mean hill crest: “He planted his banner at the highest point of the crest of the hill". We interpret this to mean that the battlefield was on a spur whose crest sloped down toward the advancing Normans. 30. CKE says that the English were: “rolling down stones on them as they stood below, destroyed them to a man”. This is usually interpreted to mean the battlefield hill was high and steep. We think Malmesbury was trying to say that the English rolled their stones when the Normans were tightly bunched within perhaps 30m of the shield wall. The stones were fatal because the Normans were too packed to move sideways to get out the way. If so, the battlefield was not necessarily high and only steep at the shield wall. 31. Poitiers says that the Normans: “... began slowly to climb the steep slope". Carmen says the Duke: “boldly approached the steep slope". This is usually interpreted to mean that the battlefield hill was long and steep. We think they are trying to say that the hill was steep enough that the Normans The Traditional Battlefield 191

could only climb it slowly. It might be because the slope below the battlefield was wet and slippery while the Normans were barefoot or wearing slick soled shoes rather than that it was particularly steep. 32. Poitiers says that: “... the English were camped on higher ground, on a hill close to the forest through which they had come". This is usually interpreted to mean that the Normans attacked the English in their hilly camp. Alternatively, it might be trying to say that the English occupied a hill close to their camp, where they were attacked. 33. ASC says that: “William came against them by surprise, before his army was drawn up in battle array ". This is usually interpreted to mean the English were victims of a surprise attack. We suspect it is trying to say that William attacked unwarily.

Some of these clues relate to the camps. We have already said that we cannot find a plausible English camp location or a plausible engagement scenario that might lead to a battle at Battle Hill. We will just have to ignore this for now. How does Battle Hill match up otherwise?

Wace and Carmen say that the battlefield was overlooked from rising ground. The south slope below Battle Abbey was overlooked from Telham Hill. A tick. Wace says that the English first see the Normans appear over rising ground, then cross a valley. The English could have first seen the Normans appear over Telham Hill then cross the stream now dammed at New Pond. Another tick. There is a plain below the centre and western flank of the shield wall. A tick. Battle Hill could be described as a 'small hill’, not in terms of area but in terms of elevation. A tick.

Carmen, Poitiers and Malmesbury are usually interpreted to be saying that the battlefield hill is high, steep and conical with a distinct summit. We dispute the interpretations but, taken in their traditional context, Battle Hill gets half a tick. It does have a distinct summit, it is fairly high by Hastings Peninsula standards and it is a tad conical near the top. On the other hand, the traditional battlefield is on the shallow southern slope of Battle Hill and it is virtually level on the ridge crest to the east and northwest. CBA and WP 192 The Traditional Battlefield refer to the Malfosse which is thought to have been Oakwood Gill, some 1500m north of the traditional battlefield. It is just about close enough and in a plausible direction that some might flee. Another half tick.

On the negative side, Battle Hill was not untilled or covered in Lowland Greensand scrub. It could not have had a fosse that went across the battlefield. It has nowhere that could be described as a narrow place. It is as far from a wood (roughly 1km) as anywhere on the Hastings Peninsula. It has no nearby lake that sounds like Senlac. It was not near anywhere named Herste at the time of the battle. It would not have been difficult to surround. It is not steep enough for rolled stones to be dangerous on any slope the Normans might have used to attack. The nearest valley is ten times the world record javelin throw away, and that is not from where the Normans would have attacked. There is no reason the fighting should be more intense in the middle than the flanks; indeed, the reverse is more likely. There is no reason the English would deploy as an infantry column. The Normans would not have passed a fosse parallel to the battlefield into which they were later driven. The English would not be standing back-to-back. It is eleven Roman miles as the crow flies to where we think the Normans built their fortress at Winchelsea, and only seven from where they traditionally camped.

In summary, the traditional battlefield does fit a couple of the most general battlefield descriptions and partially fits a few others. It fails to fit more than half the primary source descriptions, including all the most peculiar or specific. Indeed, it seems that the more specific the description, the worse the correlation with Battle Hill. In our opinion, Battle Hill is exactly what we would expect of a random hill in the roughly the right area for the battlefield.

Malfosse

WP, CBA, Orderic and others report that many Normans fell to their death at a place named Malfosse. C T Chevalier, supported by Elizabeth van Houts and other eminent historians, suggests that the Malfosse survived as a similar The Traditional Battlefield 193 sounding place named Maufosse. A 13th century Charter records the transfer of Maufosse to Battle Abbey. It was 1500m north of Battle Abbey on the edge of Duniford Wood. Maufosse was drained by Oakwood Gill. Chevalier therefore suggests that Oakwood Gill was the Malfosse.

A Malfosse at Oakwood Gill is used as evidence that the battle happened at Battle Abbey. With the Normans attacking from the south, the English would presumably flee north. After 200m they would hit the Isthmus Ridge. They could flee west or northeast along the ridgeway, or north down into the Line valley and Duniford Wood. They probably split into all three. The last of these skirts around the western side of Caldbec Hill, then runs parallel to the Line. If they stayed ahead of the chasing Norman cavalry for 1km, they would reach Oakwood Gill, somewhere near where it crosses the A2100. If it was a steep-sided gorge, the Norman cavalry might have ridden over the edge and fallen to their death.

Chevalier refers to Oakwood Gill as ‘a deep ravine’, with steep banks, brambles, undergrowth and a stream. Well, it is fairly steep sided by Hastings Peninsula standards, though that hardly means it was precipitous. The south bank is perhaps 45 degrees at its steepest. The stream is barely shoulder width. Some might claim that it was steeper in the 11th century. We doubt it. Precipitous gorges are cut into porous rock or geological faults. Oakwood Gill cuts into earth. Earthen banks erode into the stream leaving relatively shallow sides. They always have done and always will do.

We doubt that Oakwood Gill was ever steep enough for a horse to fall unless it was at full gallop, which seems unlikely after the battle. There is a common misperception that medieval warhorses were like modern shire horses. They were more like sturdy ponies, no more than 15 hands, for the simple reason that an unseated armoured rider needed to be able to vault back on without ladder, stirrups or leg-up. They were bred for strength and stamina more than speed. Any speed they might have would have been dulled after carrying an armoured rider for 8 hours. We doubt they were even cantering in pursuit of the English battle survivors. 194 The Traditional Battlefield

Even if the Normans were chasing at a gallop, we doubt they would come to much harm at Oakwood Gill. It was probably lined by trees, in which case the horses would have had slowed to a walk. If it was not lined by trees, brambles would have grown at the valley bottom, which would have cushioned any fallers.

Poitiers describes the fosse into which the Normans fell, although he does not name it, as a ‘labyrinth of ditches’, which has never applied to Oakwood Gill. We are not even convinced by Chevalier’s association between Malfosse and Maufosse. Maufosse, after all, is French for 'grumpy'. All the land in this area was given to quasi-French speaking Normans after the Conquest. It makes more sense to us that the area was named Maufosse after a bad harvest or hunting accident rather than corrupted from Malfosse.

The Malfosse accounts differ considerably between the primary sources. As Morillo concludes, it is far from certain that it was not just an invention that got corrupted through many tellings. There was another incident during the battle in which the Normans got pushed back into a fosse. Perhaps this is how the story originated.

If the Malfosse ever existed, we think it is most likely to be some sort of cut and fill iron-ore workings. Footlands is the only likely place north of Battle Abbey that it might have been, but it is on the far side of Petley Wood. If the English made it into Petley Wood, they would have spread out and hidden rather than run out the other side.

All in all, if the Malfosse incident happened, quite the reverse of the tradition, we think it is evidence that the battle did not happen at Battle Abbey rather than that it did.

Evidence that Battle Abbey was on the battlefield

The important point from what we say above is that the only evidence that the battle was fought on Battle Hill is the six contemporary accounts which The Traditional Battlefield 195 say that Battle Abbey was built on the battlefield. Six is an awful lot by medieval standards, but are they accurate, independent and trustworthy?

The history behind the Abbey’s foundation is different from everything else to do with the battle. It could not have been reported by the vast majority of battle participants because the Abbey was not started until seven years after they left. It could not have been recorded in the first wave of primary sources because it was not started when they were written. It probably was not recorded on the Tapestry, but the end is missing so we will never know. The six contemporary account references came much later. All but one were written more than fifty years after the battle.

• Anglo-Saxon Chronicle E. Its obituary for William (originally written c1087) says: “On the very spot where God granted him the conquest of England he caused a great abbey to be built". • Brevis Relatio written by a monk at Battle Abbey c1120 says: “Now the battle was fought on fourteenth October on the ground where William, then Duke of Normandy, but afterwards King of the English, ordered an abbey to be built, in memory of the battle and for the pardon of all the sins of those who were slain there.” • Chronicles of the Kings of England written by William of Malmesbury (c1125) says of the monastery that: “... the principal church is to be seen on the very spot where, as they report, Harold was found among the thickest heaps of the slain." • The Ecclesiastical and Normandy written by Orderic Vitalis (c1125) says that: “William founded at Senlac, where the decisive battle took place, the Abbey of the Holy Trinity". • Roman de Rou written by Wace (c1160) says that Harold, “erected his standard and fixed his gonfanon right where the abbey of the battle now stands. There he said he would defend himself". Much later it says: “Where the battle had been, he built an abbey and put an Abbot therein". • The Chronicle of Battle Abbey written by the monks of Battle Abbey (c1170) says: “... Harold, the usurper of the realm, speedily collected an army, 196 The Traditional Battlefield

and fearlessly, but rashly, hurried to the place which is now called Battle, ...". During the battle: “Upon the hill where the Abbey now stands, the English supported their King in compact body". Before the battle William made an oath: “I make a vow on this very battlefield I shall found a monastery for the salvation of all, especially those that fall". The monks of Marmoutier, who were appointed as prime contractors for the construction, wanted to build the Abbey elsewhere. William would have none of it, commanding them to: “lay the foundations of the temple on the very place where he had achieved victory over his enemy". The monks comply: “they wisely erected the high altar on the precise spot where the ensign of King Harold, which they call the Standard, was observed to fall."

Brevis Relatio and the Chronicle of Battle Abbey are related, insofar as they were both written at Battle Abbey and it seems likely that the latter is based on the former. Even so, five independent references would normally be conclusive evidence by medieval standards, but we are not convinced they are independent, or that they are saying what they seem to be, or that they are sound.

CBA provides the only specific explanation for how and why the Abbey came to be on the battlefield. It says that William was fulfilling a vow he made before leaving Normandy and another just before the battle that if God granted him victory, he would build a magnificent monastery on the battlefield and dedicate both the monastery and the battlefield land to God. Professor Eleanor Searle, a medieval expert who made the definitive CBA translation, thinks these alleged vows are bogus.

To be clear, Prof Searle was not denying that the Abbey is on the battlefield. On the contrary, she was convinced that the Abbey is on the battlefield. She was simply saying that it is not there to fulfil a vow William made before the battle. We will return to her reasons and her alternative theory below. Her reason for being so sure that the Abbey is on the battlefield is because she thought it is independently verified within living memory of the battle in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, then again in three other primary sources before the The Traditional Battlefield 197

CBA was written. We are sceptical.

What the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle actually says is: “On the very spot where God granted him the conquest of England he caused a great abbey to be built". This is an odd and ambiguous choice of words. The conquest of England was not granted until London decided not to resist, weeks after the battle and nowhere near Battle. Perhaps it is meant spiritually. It was, after all, written by a medieval monk who would have believed to his core that God decided the battle’s outcome in advance, that God guided each side accordingly, and that God granted victory to the protagonist that was most pious or that promised most to promote God’s will. In this light, if the words mean anywhere specific, they mean where William prayed before the battle. It still does not make much sense. He took Mass in his camp, which was not at Battle, and if the ASC was trying to be specific, why not say: “Where William took Mass on the day of battle". For that matter, why not simply say: “He caused a great abbey to be built on the battlefield"? We think, for reasons we will return to, that the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was being deliberately vague.

Much the same could be said of Orderic’s description that the Abbey was built “where the battle took place". The thing is that a ‘spot’ or ‘place’ sounds pin-point accurate, but we subconsciously accept slippage for remoteness and context. Thus, the spot/place where Marc Bolan died was a particular tree on Queens Ride but the spot/place where William Rufus died was the New Forest. In general, the more remote and less inhabited the place the more vague the size of a spot or place. For most of us, the spot/place where Apollo 11 landed was the Sea of Tranquillity which is 500 miles wide.

Hastings Peninsula was remote and sparsely inhabited in 1066. Anywhere on the south side of the Andredsweald might as well have been in Spain as far as most of England’s population were concerned. Building the Abbey “On the very spot where God granted him the conquest of England" and “where the decisive battle took place" might be some distance from the battlefield. The contemporary accounts were not cartography lessons. They were written to record the glorious (or calamitous) nature of the battle. Their audiences 198 The Traditional Battlefield would not know or care if the spot/place where they say it happened was five miles from the real battlefield. More perhaps. Even today most people outside Sussex are happy to think that the spot/place where the battle happened was Hastings, six miles from the nearest plausible location.

CKE does say that the Abbey is on the battlefield, but in less than a glowing endorsement. Malmesbury says: “Alterum monasterium Hastingis aedificavit sancto Martino, quod cognominatur De Bello, quia in eo loco principalis ecclesia cernitur ubi inter consertos cadaverum acervos Haroldus inventus fuisse memoratur.” This ‘memoratur’ is an unusual verb ending that implies the memory/mention of others but not himself. Giles translates to ‘’as they report”, implying this is what the monks of Battle Abbey claim but Huntingdon does not believe them. Vidler reckons it shows that Huntingdon thinks the story is humbug: “a mere invention of the monks”.

Roman de Rou unambiguously states twice that the abbey is on the battlefield. It was written a century after the battle. Wace says that it is based on information passed down from his father, who recorded it from first-hand accounts. But those first-hand accounts could not have reported that the Abbey was built on the battlefield because it was not started until long after they left. Where else could Wace have got the information? Two possibilities stand out. He either embellished pre-existing accounts - i.e. the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Orderic and/or CKE - or, like Malmesbury, he took the word of the monks at Battle Abbey.

In our opinion, they amount to the same thing because we think that the monks at Battle Abbey were the ultimate source of all the assertions that the Abbey is on the battlefield. Our reasoning is that hardly anyone else could possibly have reported battle’s location by the time the primary source references were written. The battle’s exact location was, after all, an unnamed hill in a virtually uninhabited area that was covered in unnamed hills. There were no maps. Hardly any non-clergy were literate.

The first report of the battlefield’s location was not written before William’s The Traditional Battlefield 199 death, 21 years after the battle. The only people who were likely to have been literate, present at the battle and alive when William died were William’s brother Odo and Bishop Geoffrey de Montbray. Both marginally outlived William but the former was in disgrace after rebelling against William, the latter after rebelling against William Rufus. It seems implausible that the ASC chronicler could have consulted them. The builder monks of Marmoutier were also literate and might have known the battle’s exact location, but those that were compos mentis when the ASC 1087 entry was collated would still be in Battle working on the Abbey.

Note the similarity between the ASC and Brevis Relatio statements. Brevis Relatio was also written by the monks at Battle Abbey. We think that the ASC chronicler wrote to ask them about the battle. Brevis Relatio itself was the second ‘Abbey on the battlefield’ reference, written the 1110s. No one literate that was involved in the battle or the positioning of the Abbey would still have been alive when the third ‘Abbey on the battlefield’ reference was written in the mid-1120s. The monks at Battle Abbey would have been the only (supposedly) reliable source of unpublished information. Malmesbury reports that his information came from them. We think Orderic and Wace asked them too or worked it out from earlier documents that were informed by them. If we are right, all the primary source references that the Abbey is on the battlefield are ill-founded.

The primary source authors were all monks who never visited the site and who seldom left their monastery. They would have naturally trusted their fellow monks. They could use existing reliable message delivery channels that the clergy used to communicate with each other every day. Nothing could have been easier or more natural than for them to ask for information from the monks at Battle Abbey. Alas, the monks of Battle Abbey had a vested interest to fib about this subject.

Ecclesiastic fiction

Professor Searle believes that the monks of Battle Abbey invented the story 200 The Traditional Battlefield of William’s vows. We go further to say that they also deliberately gave the impression that the Abbey stands on the battlefield when they knew it was untrue. But why?

According to Prof Searle, they wanted to protect the Abbey’s wealth and privileges, which were extensive and uniquely generous. They are listed in the CBA. It claims that William promised that no expense would be spared in the Abbey’s construction, that it would be richly endowed, and that it would be immune from State or Church interference. In addition, CBA says that because the battlefield land was so barren, William promised the Abbey permanent exemption from any form of tax and the ability to charge tolls, among many revenue generating wheezes.

These privileges made the Abbey vulnerable. Its wealth made it a constant target of subjugation by the Church. Its privileges, especially its tax exemption, irked later Norman kings and set a dangerous precedent. We imagine William’s descendants being badgered by other monasteries hoping for similar privileges. Moreover, the original incentive for granting the Abbey independence - to attract settlers, according to Prof Searle - had waned by the 12th century. Henry I had no material incentive to maintain the Abbey’s privileges.

Professor Searle has several reasons to think William’s vows were fabricated. They are not corroborated in any other document. They overlap with Pope Alexander II’s penitential ordinances of 1070. And the context is wrong in the CBA. The words of William’s vow place him on the battlefield but the position in the chronicle places him in his camp putting on his armour. CBA is really two manuscripts bound together. The first seems to be a genuine early account of the invasion. It does look suspiciously as if the vow has been invented and clumsily inserted into this narrative.

But why invent the story of the vows? Why not just tell the probable truth that William promised the Abbey’s privileges verbally but never got around to issuing a royal Charter to protect them permanently? We guess the The Traditional Battlefield 201 problem was one of precedents. If William’s successors accepted Battle Abbey’s verbal claim for independence and tax exemption, how could they refuse similar verbal claims - real or invented - from other abbeys?

Battle Abbey’s monks needed to associate their privileges with something unique about the Abbey that could not be used as a precedent. What could be better than the battlefield?

The protection is a little convoluted. William’s alleged promise was that if God granted him victory, he would build a magnificent abbey on the battlefield and give both battlefield and monastery to God. In effect, because the Normans won, this is saying that God was so pleased with William’s promise that he granted the Normans victory. With victory came Norman power and wealth. Thus, future Norman kings would be reluctant to interfere with the Abbey for fear God rescinded their power and wealth, while the Church would be reluctant to interfere because they could not be seen to be thieving from God. Clever, but it only works if those in power believed that the Abbey was at the location of a Godly miracle, making it equivalent to Chartres or Lourdes for instance, which would only apply if it was on the battlefield.

Searle thought that the monks’ deceit started with a forged charter of the 1150s. We think it started as soon as William died. William’s son and successor William Rufus proved to be an immoral and despicable man who immediately fell out with the Pope and started appropriating Church revenues. As it happens, he was a great supporter of the Abbey, but no one was to know that when he came to power. His accession would have seemed an opportune time for the monks of Battle Abbey to protect their earnings and independence by inventing the story of William’s vows. The Anglo- Saxon Chronicle’s obituary for William would have been a good opportunity to ‘independently’ substantiate the Abbey’s location on the battlefield. The 1120s, when two of the other references were written, would have been a good time to re-iterate the story because King Henry I tried to reform the English Church. Likewise, for the period between the 1150s and 1170s 202 The Traditional Battlefield when the Pope and the Bishop of Chichester tried to subjugate the Abbey.

We are also suspicious of the wording in Orderic and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. They feel contrived to mislead. CBA’s introduction explains that its main authors were lawyer monks. The wording in these two references seem to us typical of a lawyer who knows that the Abbey is near to the battlefield but wants to give the impression that it is on the battlefield without lying. Where we say above that the wording in Orderic and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle feel deliberately vague, we think they reported verbatim the deliberately vague words provided by the monks of Battle Abbey.

Understandably then, the monks of Battle Abbey never told an outright lie. In some cases, they answered ambiguously. In others, they excused themselves by saying their answer was ‘by tradition’.

English Heritage’s argument

Historians are in an invidious position, embodied in Roy Porter’s 2014 paper entitled “On the very spot: In defence of Battle”. It was a response to the alternative battlefields suggested by John Grehan and Nick Austin, but his view would represent all professional historians and would encompass all alternative battlefield theories, including ours. It can be summarised by saying that two independent contemporary accounts specifically say that Battle Abbey was built on the battlefield, three others imply it was so. There is not a shred of unambiguous evidence that the battle was fought anywhere else. Professional historians are intelligent and smart. They know the traditional narrative is weak, but in the absence of more tangible evidence that the battle was fought elsewhere, they can no more accept it is wrong than a biologist can accept that evolution is wrong. It would destroy their careers.

English Heritage have devised a less contentious argument: “Building the abbey on the side of a hill presented the monks with practical difficulties they could have avoided had they chosen to build elsewhere. It is difficult to see why they would have chosen to build the abbey in such an awkward spot without a The Traditional Battlefield 203 compelling reason". Their implication, without saying so, is that one compelling reason that Battle Abbey might have been built on the side of Battle Hill is that William instructed the monks of Marmoutier to build the Abbey where Harold died and that was where he died. We are sceptical.

For a start, William’s original Abbey was closer to the ridge crest where the ground was flatter than the surviving ruins. The original Abbey was also smaller, so the slope would have presented less difficulties. True, the ground under the original Abbey was not level but, in our opinion, it would not have presented significant practical difficulties for the Normans, who were, after all, master stone masons.

Coombes Church 35 miles along the coast is older than the original Battle Abbey and built on a steeper slope by Saxons. Its chancel survived into the 18th century. If Saxons could build Coombes Church with money raised by village crowd sourcing, the Normans would have had few problems building the original Abbey with money provided by the King. They might even have enjoyed the challenge.

Also, note that ‘difficulties’ are different from ‘impossibilities’. At the end of the day construction ‘difficulties’ are just a matter of cost and time, both of which had been indemnified by William. The construction was not that difficult anyway. When the original Abbey fell in the 13th century, its replacement could have been built anywhere, but they chose to build it further down the hill where the slope was greater.

Why Battle Abbey is where it is

Time to step back, to think about William’s motivation for building his abbey. English Heritage say that: “there is a widespread consensus among historians that founded Battle Abbey as a penance for the blood shed at the battle and to commemorate his great victory". Certainly, William had built penance abbeys previously. Certainly, the Pope did impose church/abbey building penances on the Normans as redemption for the blood they had 204 The Traditional Battlefield spilled. There are other possibilities. William’s alleged vow in the CBA was for his abbey to give salvation to those that fell in battle and to repay God for giving him victory. Brevis Relatio says that it was built as a memorial of the battle and to pardon the sins of those who were slain there.

William’s motivation for building his abbey could have been any or all of these, but none of them bound his abbey to the battlefield. No one ever fought at Karnak, or at Titus Arch or at Trafalgar Square. Æthelstan’s Muchelney Abbey was penance for the Battle of Brunanburh which happened hundreds of miles away. de Luci’s Lesnes Abbey was penance for killing Thomas Becket which happened fifty miles away.

The Pope’s penance instructions to the invaders were to: “do penance for one day in each week for the remainder of his life, or to let him redeem his sin by perpetual alms, either by building or by endowing a church". The Pope would obviously have wanted these new churches and abbeys to be widespread with lots of earnings potential, not all plonked on a battlefield with no inhabitants to leech. Indeed, we find it hard to believe that the Pope would approve of a monastery on a battlefield: Many would interpret it to be a glorification of violence.

Professor Searle presumably discounted all these traditional reasons too because she thought that William put his abbey on the battlefield to curry favour with his barons; an act of insolence to humiliate the English and to quell rebellions. We think this unlikely. The Abbey was not completed until 1094, by which time the worst of the danger was over. Battle Hill was so remote that Anglo-Saxon renegades are unlikely have given two hoots what it was used for. And, anyway, the local population, just 370 families on the entire Hastings Peninsula, were mostly Jutes. If William wanted to humiliate and/or quell anyone important, he would have built his abbey at Tamworth or Winchester (and, indeed, perhaps for this very reason, he did build a castle at Tamworth and a cathedral at Winchester).

The only rational explanation we can envisage for William wanting to build The Traditional Battlefield 205 his abbey on the battlefield is if he believed that close proximity to the place of violence might help sanctify his personal sins and/or those of his fellow invaders and/or give the Norman dead a better chance of salvation. As far as we know these notions have no religious merit, but if this was what he believed, the Abbey should be on the Norman side of the battlefield or at the Norman graveyard. Located where it is, it would be more likely to sanctify and/or salve the English than the Normans.

In our opinion, the entire argument is inside out. We think that William would have wanted his abbey anywhere except the battlefield and absolutely anywhere other than where Harold died. Putting it elsewhere would rob English insurgents of a focus. It would prevent the English using the abbey to venerate Harold as a martyr. It would prevent the monks being haunted by the souls of unburied English warriors - a huge fear at the time. It would prevent scavenging on the abbey grounds. It would let William hide the evidence of his sins. It would be clear that he was not glorifying violence. It would let him use the land for his own purposes. It would let him choose a location for his abbey where it might help the defence of his new realm.

Turning the argument around, it is perfectly plausible that the Abbey was built on Battle Hill despite the battle having happened elsewhere. In addition to all the reasons just mentioned, perhaps the battlefield land belonged to another religious order. If so, William would not have wanted to rile the Pope by sequestering land from the Church when the whole idea was to earn the Pope’s absolution. Or perhaps no one could find the battlefield when William eventually got around to commissioning his abbey. It could have become overgrown or lost during the seven-year gap. Or perhaps the monks of Marmoutier decided to build it elsewhere. CBA says that they thought the battlefield was inappropriate for an important abbey. It goes on to say that William instructed them to build his abbey on the battlefield anyway, but perhaps this last bit was invented whereas the need to build elsewhere was not.

Assuming the battle happened elsewhere, why might William have chosen 206 The Traditional Battlefield to build his abbey at Battle Hill? And why build on the side of the hill? Even though we reject English Heritage’s argument that it would have been horribly difficult to build the abbey on the side of a hill, it would certainly have been easier to build it somewhere flatter, lower and closer to fresh running water. There must have been a reason.

It is possible that William instructed the monks of Marmoutier to build his abbey on a hill because he wanted it to be prominent. Battle Hill is not as prominent as Caldbec Hill or Blackhorse Hill, but perhaps William preferred it because it was closer to the battlefield, or more reminiscent of the battlefield, or perhaps he just liked it. Or perhaps the monks of Marmoutier preferred it because it was treeless on the summit and therefore had better foundations

Figure 58: Battle Abbey lines of sight and less need of site clearance.

We think the overwhelming reason for the Abbey’s exact position was line of sight (Figure 58). It was the only place on the Hastings Peninsula that had an uninterrupted view of Winchelse and pefenes ea; the two most likely incursion points for a future invasion. It might seem odd insofar as Battle Hill is 50m lower than Blackhorse Hill and 40m lower than Caldbec Hill, but they were both blocked out by trees to the east, whereas the slope south of Battle (which is, of course, the location of the traditional battlefield) was clear The Traditional Battlefield 207

in both directions. Indeed, Battle is the only place that overlooks a south facing treeless downslope on the entire Hastings ridge or isthmus ridge. Everywhere else has a blocked view of Winchelse or pefenes ea or both.

In addition, an abbey close to the junction of the Hastings ridge and the isthmus ridge could be used as a garrison in times of war, with fast access to anywhere invaders might try to land or camp. And it was in Harold’s former land which became William’s upon accession. As far as we can see, placing the Abbey at Battle would have been convenient, politically easy and strategically sensible.

If this is right, why was the original Battle Abbey 50m south of the ridge crest? It is not far, but it did lower the Abbey by a few metres, and it did complicate the construction. The shift might have been enforced by poor ground conditions on the ridge or to improve the lines of sight. We guess it was because the ridge crest already had a ridgeway. Doubtless William could have diverted the ridgeway to make space for his Abbey, but it would then have had freight traffic passing through the grounds every day. As it was, it would have had the ridgeway conveniently passing its front door, like many modern buildings.

None of this is to absolutely refute the possibility that the Abbey is on the 208 The Traditional Battlefield battlefield, and thus that the battle happened at the traditional location. Only physical evidence elsewhere can do that. Rather it is to say that the evidence that the battle happened at the traditional location is flimsy and probably contrived. The battle could have happened on pretty much any hill within, say, five miles of Battle. And, given the lack of archaeology and poor match with the contemporary account descriptions, it is extremely unlikely to have happened at the traditional location. 209

Part 3 - Alternative Battlefield Theories

Figure 59: Momentous Britain investigates Caldbec Hill (top left), Crowhurst (top right), Beech Farm in a gale (bottom left) & Battle Abbey (bottom right)

The traditional battlefield surrounding Battle Abbey is a poor geographical, topographical and military fit for what we are told about the Battle of Hastings in the contemporary accounts. It is not supported by any archaeological or physical evidence. It makes no sense. These inadequacies have led some people to suggest that the battle was fought elsewhere.

We are among the sceptics. We explain our theory that the battle was fought near Sedlescombe above. Credible arguments have been made for other battlefields. The most established of these are Caldbec Hill, whose main proponent is John Grehan, and Telham Hill whose main proponent is Nick Austin. Just as plausible, in our opinion, is the chevron shaped ridge at Wadhurst Lane, now being promoted by Simon Coleman. Less credible, but 210 Alternative Battlefields better known and now endorsed by English Heritage, Channel 4’s Time Team favour the east slope of Battle Hill. We will add one unheralded alternative in the unnamed hill southeast of Telham Court.

Figure 60: Traditional and proposed battlefields: B=Battle Abbey; C=Caldbec Hill; T=Telham Hill; O=Telham Court; W=Wadhurst Lane; H=Hurst Lane

None of these alternative battlefield candidates has unearthed any battle related archaeology. We therefore intend to apply the same process that we used for the traditional battlefield. We will match each of them to military, geographical, and topographical descriptions from the contemporary accounts, as well as to common sense and to our idea of the leaders’ personal motivations. We will also consider any additional site-specific information that their backers have discovered.

As we say repeatedly, the clues in the contemporary accounts are equivocal or enigmatic. None of the place names survive. Some of the clues seem to be Alternative Battlefields 211 contradictory, most notably whether or not the English were attacked in their camp. Many of the clues use unqualified adjectives like big, narrow, close, near, steep, long, etc, that have a wide range of meanings. Some clues are ambiguous in their original language or in translation. Some of the locational clues are relative to the Norman or English camps, for which there are no confirmed locations. It is no wonder that different historians read the same clues and reach wildly different conclusions.

The easy part is that Caldbec Hill, Telham Hill, Telham Court hill and Wadhurst Lane are all ridges or spurs, one of the clues. They were all close to a wood, another clue, although the same might be said of pretty much everywhere in East Sussex. None of them are nine Roman miles from Heastinga as John of Worcester states: They are all at least two Roman miles too far from Winchelsea or at least two Roman miles too near to anywhere else the Normans might have camped on the coast.

Woods are an interesting factor in the battle. William’s horses, lances, archers and armour would all be ineffective in dense woodland. Woods were so ubiquitous in medieval Sussex that Harold would never have been more than a few hundred metres from one. Why then would Harold even consider fighting behind a shield wall? In a battle between a static shield wall against cavalry, infantry and archers, the shield wall cannot win. It can only survive. If Harold’s objective was to survive, his best chance would be to melt away into a nearby dense woodland.

We reject claims that a retreat into woodland would be deemed cowardly. It is true that Saxons and Vikings took pride in shield wall fights. If the English were fighting Vikings or other Saxons, they may well have thought it dishonourable to shy away from a shield wall fight. But, despite their common ancestry, the Normans were neither Saxon nor Viking. They fought behind equine tanks and at distance with arrows and quarrels. The English would have thought them dishonourable cowardly cheats. If we were in English shoes, any tactic that led to ultimate victory would have been honourable. Harold was a medieval aristocrat. Hunting in woods would have 212 Alternative Battlefields been in his blood. We think he would have jumped at the chance to nullify the Normans’ superior armour, weapons and mobility by skirmishing in a wood. If a cover of dense woodland was nearby, we think he would not have hesitated to order a retreat into it.

We can only imagine that the woods near to the battlefield were too small or too thin to provide decent cover. Harold had a manor nearby at Crowhurst. Perhaps he had had the woods thinned and the undergrowth cut back for hunting. The only wood that could not have been thinned was the Andredsweald, which was too far away to be relevant to the battle scenarios discussed below, bar perhaps Wadhurst Lane.

Another factor regarding woods is that Caldbec Hill, Telham Hill and Wadhurst Lane all rely on impenetrable woods to force the Normans to attack from a disadvantageous direction or to prevent them outflanking one or both ends of the English shield wall. We are reliably informed that there is no such thing as an impenetrable mature wood in temperate latitudes. Certainly, we have never seen one. The Hastings Peninsula would only have had mature deciduous woods in the 11th century. The trees would have had large canopies that prevent other trees growing nearby and prevent light getting to the understory. Typically, the more mature the wood, the wider the tree spacing and the lighter the understory. We do not believe that impenetrable woods played any part in the Battle of Hastings, but we will give each of these alternative battlefield theories a chance, regardless.

There is another fundamental issue with the battlefield candidates apart from Wadham Lane and Hurst Lane, which is that they are on the Hastings Peninsula. William’s plan was to lure Harold to the Hastings Peninsula and kill him. Why the Hastings Peninsula? We think because the four crossing points allowed William to capture saboteurs trying to scorch-earth while offering an unrivalled opportunity to ambush Harold. Even if William did not realise this when he arrived, he would have known two weeks later when Harold turned up. He might have placed himself and his barons somewhere remote and vulnerable, but we are convinced that most of his troops were Alternative Battlefields 213 secreted up near the crossing points. In our opinion, the only way that the battle would have been fought on the Hastings Peninsula, is at a crossing point, but this would contradict all the contemporary accounts, so it could not have happened. We will temporarily shelve this issue as well, to give all the battlefield candidates a reasonable airing.

Wherever the battle was fought, it needed to fit with William and Harold’s motivations and tactics. We talk about these in the main Sedlescombe battlefield blog. To summarise, William needed to kill Harold and his brothers quickly. He needed to lure Harold and as many brothers as possible, prevent them from fleeing and then kill them all. The longer it took, the bigger the English army, the more attrition to the Norman army and the greater the probability that someone would annex Normandy. We think that this was in Harold’s mind too. Normandy, Brittany, Anjou and Maine had been left undefended. We think that Harold wanted a quick victory, or at least a quick siege, because he hoped to plunder or annex Normandy before anyone else got a jump on him.

Figure 61: 1770 Yeakell and Gardner hachure map of Sussex

We have updated this section since the first edition of this book to incorporate evidence from the 1770 Yeakell and Gardner hachure map (Figure 61). It was collated 700 years after the battle. A lot had changed in 214 Alternative Battlefields the meantime. Some combination of glacial rebound and silting lowered the effective sea level by 5m, the Camber and Crumbles shingle spits had been washed away. Pevensey Levels, Combe Haven and much of the Romney Marshes had been inned and silted up. This made the coast almost unrecognisable. Inland is a different story. They lacked the tools and manpower for widespread deforestation. It seems unlikely that they would plant new woodland in a region covered in woodland and short of farmland. We believe that this map provides a good proxy for inland land usage in 1066.

Caldbec Hill

Caldbec Hill is traditionally where the English camped on the night before the battle. It is a park now. English Heritage have a plaque at the entrance to remind us of its supposed history. Grehan and Mace think that the Normans attacked the English at this camp.

We were impressed by the amount of research Grehan and Mace seem to have done. We had already spent twenty years investigating the battle when we read their book, yet we had not seen half the references they cite. Unfortunately, we think they made a few early analytical errors which set them off on the wrong foot and which then compounded through their arguments.

Firstly, and most crucially, they have got confused about the Brede’s tidal limit. As we mention in the Introduction, in the early Holocene, the Brede was 200m wide at Sedlescombe (S on Figure 62), but by the 11th century, due to some combination of glacial rebound and silting, it was the normal head of tide. Grehan and Mace do not allow for this, so they assume that the Brede could only be crossed by ferry in the 11th century. In practice, the road was still busy, so it must have been easily traversable by bridge and causeway, or by a shallow solid ford. Alternative Battlefields 215

Figure 62: East Sussex in 1066 with Roman road (black) ridgeways (white), possible tracks (white dots) and places that are relevant to the battlefield candidates

Upstream, the fluvial Brede was just a small river with a 100 km² catchment area. For comparison, the Thames is 63m wide at its tidal limit. If the fluvial Brede was in a river channel, it would have been no more than 5m wide and easily fordable. As we mention in the Introduction, this was a busy crossing in Roman times. We think that they channelled the river and crossed the valley with a causeway and bridge. We further think that the abbeys of St Denys and Fécamp restored the causeway and bridge. If not, there would have been a shallow shingle ford across the fluvial Brede at Sedlescombe. In either case, it would have been an easy crossing place, quite unlike the impassable barrier proposed by Grehan and Mace.

Secondly, they say that Caldbec Hill (CH) was chosen for the English camp because it was at the junction of the roads to London and Lewes. Again, we guess they got confused insofar as the nearest road to London was at Lewes. 216 Alternative Battlefields

That road was 23 miles away through the primeval Andredsweald forest. Other roads were closer. A Roman road (black line) to Rochester and a possible ridgeway from Netherfield (N) to Lewes were some three miles from Caldbec Hill. They were probably accessible via fords and/or circuitous ridgeways. But this does not make Caldbec Hill some sort of communications hub. Those fords and ridgeways would have been unsuitable for army supply carts and treacherous for movement after dark. With a third of his army still to arrive, poor road access makes Caldbec Hill an unlikely English camp.

Thirdly, they think that the Andredsweald stretched down to Caldbec Hill, providing cover for one half of their proposed battlefield. This cannot be right. Petley, Beech and Duniford Woods were north of Caldbec Hill, with farmland beyond them. The Andredsweald was too dense for meadowland or ploughland. There is a line of manors between Ashburnham and that had both, then nothing north of them. This line marks the southern boundary of the Andredsweald. Simon Mansfield used a different method to reach much the same result. If we are right, the Andredsweald did not come within 5km of Caldbec Hill. Indeed, Yeakell & Gardner (Figure 65) shows no trees within 1km of Caldbec Hill, which suggests it was treeless in the 11th century too.

Fourthly, they think the Norman camp was at its traditional location near Hastings. There is close to zero chance this is right, for reasons we explain in boring detail in the Place Names section above.

These errors have led to flaws in their analysis. For instance, armed with the notion that the only way off the Hastings Peninsula was to cross the Isthmus Ridge, they deduce that Harold’s plan was to occupy the ridge in order to block the Normans’ escape. Likewise, thinking that there was no way for the Normans to get their cavalry across the Brede or the Line, they deduce that there was no reason for Harold to enclose the northern end of his shield wall. Alas, the early errors, especially the confusion about the Brede’s tidal limit, percolate through all their arguments. Alternative Battlefields 217

More fundamentally, we do not trust the evidence that the English camped on Caldbec Hill. It is mostly based on one translation of Poitiers’ statement that the English: “were camped on a hill near to the forest through which they had come". Grehan and Mace reason that this must be Caldbec Hill because it was just outside the southern boundary of the Andredsweald, which was the only real forest in the region. We think they have miscalculated the southern boundary and of the Andredsweald and that they take the translation too literally. The original Latin is ‘montem silvæ’ which can mean any sort of hilly wood. They were all over East Sussex. The English would have been near to a hilly wood through which they had come wherever they decided to camp.

Time Team metal detected the summit of Caldbec Hill for the TV special. They failed to unearth any finds. It was not just that they did not make any battle related finds, but they did not make any finds at all, as if the land had never been occupied.

Grehan and Mace support their theory with evidence that ‘haran apuldran’, which ASC states to be Harold’s destination in Sussex, referred to a ‘hoary apple tree’ that was a hundred boundary marker on Caldbec Hill. We do not trust the translation. We have more faith in Giles and Ingram’s translation of haran apuldran to ‘the estuary of Appledore’ (i.e. the Rother), not least because modern Bodiam on the Rother is the most likely place that Harold would muster with his troops from Kent and his sea-borne huscarls.

Even if haran apuldran was intended to mean 'hoary apple tree’, we think it was not a hundred marker. Romans brought cultivated apple tree varieties, but the Saxons lost the technique of making tree grafts, so they soon mixed with wild varieties to become unpalatable. The only apple trees in Britain by Saxon times were wild crab apples. They were too short lived to be useful hundred markers. Grehan admits there were only 14 of them in the entire country. And why would a typical ASC reader understand what it meant? It could have been any of the 14 apple tree hundred markers, or something else. A proper noun, for instance. Old English proper nouns did not have 218 Alternative Battlefields capitals, so it is impossible to be sure, but if it was a proper noun - a royal hunting park, perhaps - it is unlikely to have been on treeless Caldbec Hill.

For the English to have got to Caldbec Hill, they would have had to cross the Brede or the isthmus. We talk about this in the main battlefield blog. In the unlikely event that William allowed the English over the Sedlescombe crossing unmolested, they would head east to Cottage Lane, Starlings Hill or Lower Snailham, not west to Caldbec Hill. The only alternatives were to cross the ford at Whatlington or to take the ridgeways via Netherfield (N). But both these options would have been ambush prone and risky for carts carrying army supplies. The only plausible reason Harold might have used them is if the Sedlescombe crossing was blockaded or guarded. In either case, he would have camped north of the Brede while the other side was scouted. Once again, we think Grehan and Mace were misled by their confusion about the Brede’s tidal limit.

If Caldbec Hill was not the English camp, it is difficult to imagine how the English army might have ended up defending it in a battle. Why would they go there at all? Grehan and Mace suggest they were trying to block a Norman escape from the Hastings Peninsula by occupying the Isthmus Ridge, but this assumes the Normans wanted to leave the Hastings Peninsula, which they clearly did not, and it is based on their confusion about the Brede’s tidal limit. If the English had been attempting a surprise attack but got caught on the Hastings Ridge, it is feasible they might retreat to Caldbec Hill, but a surprise attack against the Norman cavalry at a location the Normans had been fortifying for two weeks is preposterous.

Pah, we must put all these quibbles behind us. Caldbec Hill is a hill in roughly the right area for the battlefield. It has long been associated with the Battle of Hastings, albeit as the English camp. The battle could have happened there, regardless how it came about. We must give it a chance. If it fits enough of the primary source descriptions, we can return to think about how and why the English might have ended up defending it. Alternative Battlefields 219

Figure 63: Caldbec Hill Relief - CH = Caldbec Hill; x = Battle Abbey

Figure 64: Caldbec Hill battlefield deployment; after Grehan and Mace

Grehan and Mace have a battlefield deployment diagram in their book. Unfortunately, their deployments are superimposed on the contours, so it is 220 Alternative Battlefields difficult to see what is going on. Figure 64 shows our reproduction with the contours on top. They left a gap between the ridgeway (yellow line) and the wood (bottle green) to the north. We guess it was a mistake, so we filled it in. Our extension stretches the shield wall out to 1500m, which leaves it precariously thin, but this must be better than allowing the Norman cavalry to ride unhindered through a yawning gap in the defence.

Figure 64 shows a common issue with Battle of Hastings battlefield theories. It assumes, as with the traditional narrative, that William would attack whatever shield wall was presented to him, no matter what the other possibilities and no matter how disadvantageous. In this case, Grehan and Mace suggest that William would attack from the southeast, but that would be idiotic. Caldbec Hill is at the junction of the Hastings Ridge and the Isthmus Ridge. Like all ridges on the Hastings Peninsula, it would have had shallow dry slopes on its ridge crests. Those crests probably had ancient ridgeway tracks. If the English were deployed as in Figure 64, there is no way William would have attacked up the steep boggy slope to the southeast. He would clearly have attacked along the shallow dry ridge crests to the northeast, south and west.

Moreover, Grehan and Mace’s theory contradicts one of the few statements about the battle that is agreed by most of the primary sources: That William placed himself and his elite Norman troops in the middle division, where the fighting would be most intense. Grehan and Mace’s theory has the middle column on the steepest slope, where the fighting would have been least intense. The intense fighting would have been on the Norman left flank, attacking on the shallow slope to the south.

Figure 64 shows another common issue with Battle of Hastings battlefield theories, in that it assumes woods were impenetrable. As we say above, as far as we know, there was no such thing as an impenetrable mature wood in temperate latitudes. The Andredsweald may well have been the densest wood in Britain, in the sense that it had no glades. But that also means that the trees were widely spaced and the understory sparse. The Normans had Alternative Battlefields 221 all day to find a 200m route that circumvented either end of the shield wall. It would not have been that difficult. Once through they could have occupied the summit to shoot at Harold from behind and above.

In one way or another, we think that William would have got troops behind Grehan and Mace’s shield wall within an hour or two. If they did not outflank the defence via the wood, they would have employed an oblique order attack to break through somewhere else because the defensive line was so thin. This cannot be what happened.

Figure 65: Yeakell and Gardner Caldbec Hill in 1770

Grehan’s argument is pretty academic, because Yeakell and Gardner show Caldbec Hill to be treeless (Figure 65). It seems unlikely that it would have been de-wooded in the intervening 700 years, because lack of running water would make poor farmland. If Caldbec Hill was treeless and the English line was stretched to fill the gap, it would have been untenably thin. Grehan and Mace’s battle scenario is therefore implausible.

We guess that Grehan knows. When Time Team presented him with their alternative theory, he made no attempt to defend his own. He meekly accepted theirs, even though it was clearly invented at the last moment to compensate viewers for having not seen an iota of proper evidence. If Grehan had more confidence in Time Team’s joke theory than his own, we can be fairly sure that his own was unsound. 222 Alternative Battlefields

Figure 66: Enclosed shield wall on Caldbec Hill

Just because Grehan and Mace’s battle scenario can be discounted, does not mean that the battle did not happen on Caldbec Hill. There might have been a different scenario, in which Harold deployed an enclosed loop shield wall higher up the hill (Figure 66). It has a flattish top. The shortest useful shield wall would have been 1250m long; 30% longer than the traditional shield wall, but only 500m long at the main contact points to the northeast, south and southwest. Harold could have packed his defences eight deep at the main contact points and still had enough men to be three deep elsewhere.

Several primary sources say that the Normans attacked in three divisions controlled by William’s voice and hand signals. This could only have happened at Caldbec Hill if William chose not to attack on the northeast ridgeway. The only likely reason he would give up this excellent option is if Harold fortified it. Wace does say that the English protected one side of the battlefield with a barricade and fosse. Perhaps this was it. It just needed to be Alternative Battlefields 223 substantial enough to persuade William to concentrate his attack on the ridge crests to the south and west. It seems unlikely that the English could dig a deep enough fosse in the available time, but perhaps they were helped by a landslip. We will assume it was there for now (red line in Figure 66).

This scenario could lead to a stalemate battle. The main contact point to the south and west would be only 300m long. Harold had enough men to defend that part of the shield wall 10 deep and still have enough men to be three deep elsewhere. Despite the shallow slope, the narrowness would have made the fight difficult for the Normans. At any one time they could only engage perhaps 300 infantry in the fight. They had no chance of breaching a determined defensive line. Doubtless the Normans would have probed the other defences, not least to prevent English reinforcements getting to the main combat point, but the terrain would have made it difficult. It is easy to imagine the fight lasting all day and only ending thanks to a ruse. But how does it fit the other primary source descriptions?

Caldbec Hill backs onto Oakwood Gill, which is the traditional location of the Malfosse. John of Worcester says that the English were drawn up in a narrow place. Caldbec Hill would have been narrow from the Norman point of view. Wace, Huntingdon, Brevis Relatio and Draco Normannicus suggest that the English were standing back-to-back. The contact zone is now under a road and housing estate, which might explain why no archaeological finds have been made. And, as Grehan and Mace say, Caldbec Hill’s summit is known as Mountjoy, which is the English version of a name sometimes given by Normans to the sites of their military victories.

Carmen, Poitiers and Malmesbury are usually interpreted to be saying that the battlefield hill is high, steep and conical with a distinct summit. We question these interpretations but, taken in their traditional context, Caldbec Hill is a qualified match. It does have a distinct summit, it is high by Hastings Peninsula standards, it is conical near the top, and it has steep slopes to the southeast and northwest. On the other hand, it has shallow or level approaches on the sides of the hill that the Normans were likely to attack. 224 Alternative Battlefields

In all other ways Caldbec Hill is a poor fit. It is not overlooked. It is not beside a plain. It was not covered in Lowland Greensand scrub. It had no nearby sandy lake that could be Orderic’s Senlac. It was not near anywhere named Herste. A fosse would not have enclosed the battlefield. It is not visible from the Norman fortress at Winchelsea or anywhere else the Normans might have camped. It is not steep enough for rolled stones to be dangerous on any slope the Normans might have used to attack. It would have been easy to surround. The nearest woods, Petley and Beech, were 1km away with no crossing tracks, which makes it unlikely that the Normans would see the English emerge from a wood. The Normans would not be seen crossing a valley or appearing over rising ground. The valley below is not within javelin throwing range. There is no reason the fighting should be more intense in the middle than the flanks; indeed, the reverse is more likely. There is no reason the English would deploy as an infantry column.

We come back to several fundamental issues. We cannot think of any plausible reason Harold would have gone to Caldbec Hill, let alone camp there or defend it to the death. Even if the English did end up defending Caldbec Hill, we do not believe that they could have made fortifications that were strong enough to dissuade William from a pincer attack. We are all-but certain that William would have found a way around or over any fosse the English could have constructed in the time available. Once the line was broken or circumvented, William would (and, wherever the battle happened, did) enjoy a quick and decisive victory.

Much as we say about the traditional battlefield, Caldbec Hill fits some of the general primary source descriptions, but none of the more specific and enigmatic. It just seems to be a random hill in a landscape covered in random hills. It cannot be discounted as the battlefield, but it seems to us the least likely of the genuine candidates. Alternative Battlefields 225

Crowhurst / Telham Hill

Figure 67: Nick Austin’s battle scenario

Nick Austin’s Crowhurst battlefield theory has more adherents than all the other alternative battlefields combined. To summarise. The Normans landed at Monkham Wood in Combe Haven (1 on Figure 67). They camped nearby at Redgeland Wood (R). The next day they moved 750m northwest, to the top of the hill at Upper Wilting (2). On the eve of battle, the English army was camped on Telham Hill (T), a spur off the Hastings Ridge. The Normans sortied at dawn towards Crowhurst (C), planning to attack the English camp. When Harold saw the Norman army cresting Green Street hill (G), he set up his shield wall 10m below the crest, on the steepest part of the south slope of Telham Hill. The Normans passed through Crowhurst and attacked up Telham Hill where they killed Harold and defeated the English army. 226 Alternative Battlefields

We first heard Nick Austin’s theory when we saw him present “Secrets of the Norman Invasion" back in the 1990s. We were impressed. He had a reasonable argument why Combe Haven would fit all the primary source landing place names. If the Normans landed in Combe Haven, they would have camped on a nearby hill. Harold did come to defend his ancestral homeland. If the Normans were at Upper Wilting, he might have made the English camp on Telham Hill ridgeway, overlooking his personal manor at Crowhurst. If the English were camped on Telham Hill, William would have attacked the English camp. This interpretation of events seems coherent and credible.

Coombe Haven landing and Hæstinga port

Austin’s theory about the landing place names is particularly ingenious. He thinks that Hastingas and cognates referred to Hæstinga port, which he places at Monkham Wood (1 on Figure 67). He thinks that Pevensey and cognates referred to the region defended by the fortress at Pevensey, which would include the entire Hastings Peninsula. Thus, all the landing accounts could be right because they all say that the Normans landed and/or camped somewhere that sounds like one or the other or both.

The landing and Norman camp are crucial to Austin’s battle narrative because there are only a couple of places that the Normans could have camped that might lead to a battle on the southern slope of Telham Hill. If the Norman camp was anywhere in a semicircle north of the Telham Hill, they would have attacked from the north. If they camped anywhere south or west of Telham Hill, they would have crossed Powdermill Stream at Stone Cottage or the pumping station, climbed Telham Hill to Lower Telham, then attacked from the north. It only leaves the southeast and east. East is not navigable from Combe Haven. If the Normans attacked up the south slope of Telham Hill, they must have camped to the southeast of Crowhurst. The Tapestry depicts the Norman camp on raised ground. The only navigable raised ground southeast of Crowhurst is Green Street and Upper Wilting. Wace Alternative Battlefields 227 says that Harold first sees the Normans crest a hill and cross a valley. The only candidate that matches these descriptions is Upper Wilting.

The only obvious reason the Normans might have camped at Upper Wilting is that they landed nearby at Monkham Wood. Austin therefore predicted in Secrets of the Norman Invasion that there must have been a port at Monkham Wood. He was vindicated during survey work for the Bexhill Link Road in 2015 when the remains of Romano-British era jetties were found at Monkham Wood.

Figure 68: Yeakell and Gardner map of Combe Haven’s north shore in 1770

It is a shame then that there are some discrepancies about a Monkham Wood landing. Austin says that the Normans would need at least 2 miles of shore upon which to land (we calculate over 3), but there was less than 1 mile of strand between what is now Filsham Reedbeds and Little Bog. In 1770, the Yeakell and Gardner map (Figure 68) shows that Monkham Wood and Redgeland Wood were more extensive than now, lining most of the proposed landing site to a depth of 500m. If the wood was like this in 1066 - and it is difficult to believe that anyone would plant a wood between 1066 and 1770 - it is quite unlike the level plain next to the landing area described by Wace or the flat treeless camp depicted in the Tapestry. 228 Alternative Battlefields

There are some discrepancies about Austin’s Hastingas and Pevensey theory too. Several primary sources say that William did not stay in ‘Pevensey’ but quickly moved to ‘Hastingas’. This would not make sense using Austin’s definitions, because they did not leave the region controlled by the fortress at Pevensey until a week after the battle. Orderic says that the Normans occupied ‘Pevensey’ and ‘Hastingas’, which would make no sense if, as Austin suggests, the latter was inside the former. Several primary sources say that the Normans built their first camp at ‘Pevensey’, then their second at ‘Hastingas’. But both camps would be in Austin’s Pevensey. CBA says that William leads his men from where they landed to a “port not far away", but Austin thinks that they landed at the port.

The most specific clue about the Norman camp is in CBA, which says that the Normans dress for battle at a hill named 'Hechelande’. Austin thinks it was Redgeland Wood (R). He explains that Hechelande and Redgeland would be pronounced similarly in the local dialect of the day. We think it is a red herring. As we note in the Traditional Battlefield blog, and as Austin says himself, CBA is not trustworthy on this topic. But even if it is right, CBA goes on to say that Hechelande was inside the Abbey’s Leuga whereas Redgeland Wood was 3km outside the Leuga. It is not just a measurement issue either. CBA specifically says that Crowhurst was outside the Leuga and Redgeland Wood was 2km further away. What’s more, Redgeland Wood is in the opposite direction from the battlefield. Needlessly returning to their first camp to get dressed for battle would waste an hour and make them walk an unnecessary extra 1.5km when every ounce of energy might be crucial.

We checked Monkham, Redgeland and Upper Wilting against some of the other primary source landing and camp clues. Carmen says an English spy was standing at the bottom of a sea cliff watching them land. There are no sea cliffs beside Combe Haven. Warenne Chronicle says that the Normans entered England between two fortresses. Fortresses are usually built on high ground, which was absent beside Combe Haven. Austin counters that a building associated with the port might have looked like a fortress. One was a mint, so it is possible, but that would be at the landing site rather than Alternative Battlefields 229 beside the entrance to it. Carmen says that a monk emissary leaves the Norman camp on a road (Latin 'iter’). 'Iter’ usually means a paved road, of which there was only one on the Hastings Peninsula, on the far side of the Hastings Ridge. Austin counters that iter can mean trackway, several of which have been identified in the Wilting area.

Then there is the link between Monkham Wood and Hæstinga port. Hæstinga port is important to all landing theories because several contemporary accounts specifically say it is where the Normans landed, most of the others say it is where they camped. It is especially crucial to Austin’s theory because the only straightforward way that the battle could have been fought on the southern slope of Telham Hill is if the Normans landed at Monkham Wood. Therefore, Austin’s battlefield theory depends upon Hæstinga port having been at Monkham Wood.

In the absence of direct clues to Hæstinga port’s location, as we discuss in ‘The Landing’ section above, we have to rely on the argument that east Sussex was too small and too sparsely populated to have had two major ports. If so, Hæstinga port was the one and only major port in the region. It was an export hub, with some 10 times as much outbound cargo as inbound in the 13th century, which almost certainly means it exported natural resources. This provides two methods to resolve Hæstinga port’s location: 1) By references to the region’s major port in Saxon times, or as close to Saxon times as it is possible to get; 2) By proximity to the region’s natural resource production centres.

The Bexhill Link Road excavations unearthed no less than 14 Roman era bloomeries at Wilting. They also unearthed a Roman era road from Wilting to Crowhurst Park where there were more Roman era bloomeries. Almost certainly then, iron products were exported from a major port at Monkham Wood in Romano-British times. The archaeology is still in the ground to prove it. Austin tries to argue that it was still a major port in Saxon times. 230 Alternative Battlefields

Monkham Wood and the nearby island of Bulverhythe have Old English names, which means that they were inhabited in Saxon times. Their coastal location implies that they were ports. Austin thinks that the region’s Roman era bloomeries were still active in Saxon times and that most of their output was still exported from the port at Monkham Wood. He thinks that the region’s biggest salt production was nearby and also exported from this same port. He notes that early Norman Sheriffs had a manor near Monkham Wood, thereby corroborating that it was the region’s most important Norman era port. If he is right about all this, Monkham Wood would have been the busiest port in the region in Saxon times, and therefore the most likely place to have been Hæstinga port.

Austin’s Hæstinga port theories are not supported or contradicted by the archaeology. The excavations for the Bexhill Link Road showed no evidence of Saxon era activity at the port in Monkham Wood, no evidence of Saxon era iron working, no evidence of Norman occupation of the port or either of Austin’s proposed Norman camps. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but it does not help Austin’s case because his natural resource theories are weak.

Cleere notes that there is no evidence of Saxon era iron smelting in the Hastings region, and little evidence of it elsewhere in Britain. Yet there was huge demand for iron products. If any Wealden bloomeries were active in Saxon times, the most likely is Beauport Park, the biggest Roman era iron bloomery in Britain and the third biggest in the Roman empire. Austin reckons that its output was exported from the port at Monkham Wood. We think it extremely unlikely. Beauport Park is on the far side of the Hastings Ridge from Monkham Wood, 80m below the crest and 1km closer to the Brede than to Monkham Wood. A metalled road linked Beauport Park to the Brede near Sedlescombe bridge. It seems implausible to us that Saxons would haul bulk iron products up, over and down the Hastings Ridge on rutted cart tracks, when it was easier and quicker to drop them down to the Brede by road where they would be taken by barge for export via Winchelse. Alternative Battlefields 231

Austin’s evidence that Combe Haven had the only Saxon era salt production in the vicinity looks to us like a 14th century valuation for 20 acres of saltmarsh. Certainly, Domesday lists no saltpans in Combe Haven’s manors of Wilting, Crowhurst and Filsham, whereas it lists 100 in Rameslie manor and 30 in Hooe. Rameslie manor, which we believe spanned the Brede, had the greatest salt production in southern England. Again, it seems implausible to us that Saxons would haul bulk salt up, over and down the Hastings Ridge when it could be exported by barge from the place of its production.

Bulverhythe is listed as a port in the 1227 Ship Service records. This scheme allowed the King to requisition ships and crews in proportion to the value of liberties he bestowed to each of them. It is a proxy for freight shipping volume. It shows that Bulverhythe was a port in the 13th century, though relatively small, contributing part of one ship when Winchelse provided 10. Monkham is not even mentioned in the Ship Service or Pipe Rolls, which suggests that its port did not handle freight.

Nick contacted us after the first edition of our book was published about some new Hæstinga port evidence he had found. It involves the location of Hæstinga ceastre. As we note in the Place Names section above, Hæstinga ceastre was probably encompassed by, or was adjacent to, Hæstinga port. ‘Ceastre’ is the Old English term for a Roman fortification. Austin has found the impression of a probable Roman fortification on a LIDAR scan of Upper Wilting. One of King Alfred’s burhs was at Hæstinga ceastre. Its dimensions are recorded in a document known as the Burghal Hidage. Those dimensions match the LIDAR impression at Upper Wilting. Austin is confident it is Hæstinga ceastre, which means that Hæstinga port was nearby which can only mean it was at Monkham Wood.

Austin is not the first to come up with a novel theory about Hæstinga ceastre’s location. A similar argument proposed that it was at Rye and separately that it was at Winchelse. It is one of the arguments we use that Hæstinga ceastre was at modern Winchelsea – see ‘The Landing’ section above. None of these others are supported by LIDAR evidence but Upper Wilting does not fit the 232 Alternative Battlefields normal model of Alfredian burhs. Burhs were typically built on promontories. Upper Wilting was not a promontory. A burh’s main purpose was to watch for Viking sea raiders. The sea view from a burh at Upper Wilting would have been blocked to the east and southeast and interrupted to the southwest. We conclude that Upper Wilting’s Roman enclosure is unrelated to Hæstinga ceastre even though it is roughly the right size.

None of this would matter if there was no evidence that Hæstinga port was anywhere else. But we list pages of evidence in ‘The Landing’ section above that it was at Winchelse. Not least, there are two unambiguous clues that Austin does not mention. De Viis Maris says that Winchelse was the region’s major port at the start of the second crusade (i.e. in 1147); Ship Service records and the 1192 Pipe Rolls show that Winchelse was by far the biggest port in Sussex in the 12th and 13th centuries.

It is true that the earliest of these records referred to 90 years after the battle. But Winchelse handled more than ten times Bulverhythe’s shipping volume by 1227, with Monkham Wood not even being mentioned. It seems implausible to us that Winchelse could have grown ten-fold or that Monkham Wood could have shrunk ten-fold in the intervening 160 years. Quite the reverse. A port in Combe Haven is likely to have grown over that time because it would have serviced the new Norman castle at Hastings.

By our reckoning, the Brede basin produced 90% of the region’s natural resources in Saxon times. It comprised Rameslie’s salt, and iron products from the only active Saxon era bloomeries in the region. We believe that it was all shipped by barge to Winchelse from where it was exported by ship. This ties in with the Ship Service records which show that Winchelse, Iham (which later became modern Winchelsea) and Rye - all at the mouth of the Brede - had more than ten times the freight volume of any other port in the region. We are convinced that it was the major port in the region and was therefore the most likely place to have been Hæstinga port. Alternative Battlefields 233

This is not to deny that there was a Saxon era port in Combe Haven or that it was home to the Norman Sheriffs, as Austin states. But we think the port was limited to fishing in Saxon times and that it was the most practical place for the Sheriffs to live. They could not have had a manor near Winchelse, or anywhere else beside the Brede, because the land belonged to the Abbey of Fécamp. The sea cliffs east of Hastings would have made the Bourne and Priory valleys dangerous places to sail. If Norman Sheriffs needed to live close to Hastings Castle and they used ships to move around Sussex, both of which seem likely, a manor in Combe Haven would have been the best alternative.

Nick Austin’s battle scenario

Figure 69: Crowhurst battlefield OS map

In order to move on, no matter how unlikely, we have to imagine that the Normans camped at Upper Wilting on the eve of battle. No alternative could lead to a battle on the southern slope of Telham Hill that fits more than a couple of the primary source clues. As we said above about Caldbec Hill, if Austin’s battle narrative is credible and his battlefield fits enough of the primary source descriptions, we can return to think about how and why the Normans might have camped at Upper Wilting. 234 Alternative Battlefields

Figure 67 sets Austin’s scene at dawn on the day of battle. The Normans were at Upper Wilting Farm (2), the English on Telham Hill (T). Soon after dawn on the 14th October, the Normans marched towards Crowhurst.

According to SOTNI, when Harold sees the Normans crest the western shoulder of Green Street hill, he sets up his shield wall at what is now Pye’s Farm (magenta line on Figure 69), on the southern slope of Telham Hill. The shield wall would have been roughly 650m long, perhaps 20% shorter (and therefore 20% deeper) than the traditional shield wall at Battle Abbey. Austin says that it was bounded at the sides by impenetrable woods, Fore Wood to the west and Hunter’s Gill to the east. The Normans were therefore forced to attack up the slope from Crowhurst (cyan arrows on Figure 69).

Figure 70: Yeakell and Gardner map of Telham Hill in 1770

Yeakell and Gardner (Figure 70) show the geography in the 1770s. It is probably a good indication of how the area looked in 1066. Austin’s proposed battlefield would have been virtually treeless with the English shield wall on the shading that depicts the steepest part of the slope. Fore Wood was tight against the west side of Austin’s battlefield. Note that it depicts no trees on the eastern side of the battlefield, apart from along the Alternative Battlefields 235 base of the gill. It is essential for Austin’s theory that there was an impenetrable wood to the east of the battlefield, so we will assume that it was at least as woody as it is today.

If the battle was fought on the southern slope of Telham Hill, in the circumstances that Austin describes, it would have been horribly difficult for the Normans. The hill would have been steep, slippery and untilled, exactly as described by most of the contemporary accounts. If Fore Wood and Hunter’s Gill protected the English flanks as Austin suggests, his scenario might have led to a battle that lasted all day and only ended thanks to a ruse.

Austin has worked out his battle narrative to fit all the traditional primary source battlefield descriptions. He says that the English Standards would be visible from the Norman camp, which fits with Carmen. The English would see the Normans appearing over rising ground (Green Street), then cross a valley, which fits with Wace. There is a plain below the shield wall which fits with Wace. The English are attacked in their camp, which fits with Poitiers and ASC. The English see the Normans coming and occupy a nearby hill, which fits with Carmen. The battlefield seems to be enclosed by woods and difficult to surround, which fits with Wace. The battlefield would be overlooked from Telham on the ridge, which fits with Wace. The slope of the battlefield is steep, which fits with Poitiers and Carmen. It is steep enough for rolled stones to be deadly, which fits with Malmesbury. Hunter's Gill is steep enough in parts to have been the Malfosse, which fits with WP and CBA.

It is easier to note where Austin’s scenario does not fit the traditional primary source battlefield descriptions. Telham Hill is not conical, but we do not trust that translation. It is not small, but Ingulf is not a widely trusted source. The battlefield is not narrow, although it is 20% narrower than the traditional battlefield at Battle Abbey. 236 Alternative Battlefields

Nick Austin’s evidence

Austin offers some physical evidence to support his battlefield theory. We were thrilled when we first heard him talk about it. It is the only physical evidence that anyone has offered to support any battlefield candidate (including our own). One is the ruins of what he refers to as Crowhurst Abbey, which he thinks was a first attempt to build William’s Abbey on the battlefield. The other is a low stone wall that he thinks might be Eleanor Searle’s battlefield marker. The wall is under a 2000-year-old yew tree in Crowhurst cemetery, the ruins are behind the house next door – see our photos in Figure 71.

Figure 71: Secrets of the Norman Invasion, wall and ruins in Crowhurst

We lost confidence in the wall and ruins when we went to see them. The ruins look no earlier than 13th century. Austin points out some 11th century features on them. He kindly contacted us about some new research that we had missed, showing that it is made of Caen stone, and therefore likely to have been constructed by Normans before the 13th century. Even if he is Alternative Battlefields 237 right, the building is not really on the battlefield - it is 1500m away - and its stones might have been robbed from another site. The utterly charming man that owns the property with the ruins told us that the medieval wall is thought to be underneath the wall there now (Figure 71), but we had decided by then that Professor Searle’s translation of Latin 'spinam’ to 'low stone wall’ is faulty. None of this matters. Nowhere else has anything better.

We are also sceptical that William would have been able to see the English Standards from his camp. Austin says that his SOTNI photograph looking north from Upper Wilting shows a building on Telham Hill ridge. We could not see it, even with powerful binoculars in good light. The scene looks very different now because the SOTNI photo predates construction of the Bexhill Link Road. Most of the foreground trees are no longer there. Even so, it is odd that the electricity pylons crossing Austin’s battlefield are not visible. It is even more odd that the gently curving outline of Green Street hill is not in the middle ground. We will ask him about this when we get a chance.

Figure 72: View towards Nick Austin's Telham Hill battlefield from summit of Upper Wilting Figure 72 shows the view towards Austin’s battlefield from Upper Wilting in July 2020. The tiny grey haze in the red circle is the top of an electricity pylon that is immediately above the centre of Austin’s battlefield. Only the top 5m is visible, which means that the English Standards would need to be 30m 238 Alternative Battlefields high to be visible from Upper Wilting. The trees that obscure it are less than half-way to the battlefield. Even if there were no trees to obscure the view in 1066 - which seems unlikely considering that this was a heavily wooded region - William would have needed the eyes of a hawk to see any Standards.

We do not like the look of Austin’s Malfosse at Hunter’s Gill either. This is the scar into which WP and CBA report that many Norman knights fell, crushing and killing those beneath, while they chased the fleeing Englishmen. The steepest part of the gill, with a drop of perhaps 5m, is southeast of Austin’s battlefield. The English would have had to run through the Norman lines to get to the gill, which seems implausible. Even if they did, the ground is covered in soft mulched leaves, twigs and ferns which would cushion any fall. The stream is 100m into the wood from Austin’s battlefield and the wood is too dense for a horse to trot. If Norman knights were chasing the fleeing English, they were not going fast enough to fall into the gill.

Austin explains that there was a path through Hunter’s Gill heading to the bloomeries at Crowhurst Park. He shows a photograph in SOTNI of a dilapidated bridge over the gill. But this path is no more than two horses wide and it is at the northern end of the gill where the drop is only a few metres. Perhaps two lead riders might have fallen over the edge and got crushed by their horses but those behind would have had plenty of time to stop.

Another problem is that Telham Hill does not fit the new battlefield clues that we have found, especially the more peculiar of them. The English would not be seen emerging from a wood. The English would not have been fighting back-to-back. There is no reason that the fighting might have been more intense in the middle than on the flanks; the opposite is more likely. The valley is out of javelin range. The English would not have deployed as a military column. The Normans would not have passed a fosse into which they were later driven. Harold and Gyrth would not risk scouting close enough to the Norman camp to be able to hear their horses. Alternative Battlefields 239

Nick Austin’s route of attack and a possible alternative

Returning to our core principle, we need to check how a credible battle narrative at Telham Hill fits the contemporary accounts battle descriptions. Even if William could not see the English Standards and the Malfosse was elsewhere, Austin’s narrative still fits as many of the traditional contemporary account battlefield clues as Caldbec Hill or Battle Abbey. But we are not convinced that his narrative is credible.

Fighting up Telham Hill would have been so disadvantageous for the Normans that William would surely have looked for ways to outflank the defence. In SOTNI, Austin reckons that the English flanks were protected by impenetrable woods that bounded the sides of the battlefield. None of the contemporary accounts mention William trying a flanking manoeuvre, which implies that something was protecting the English flanks. Wace says that “Harold enclosed the battlefield”, which is traditionally thought to mean that something protected the English flanks. But, as we say above, there is no such thing as an impenetrable mature wood in temperate latitudes. Austin provides a photograph of Hunter’s Gill in SOTNI where the undergrowth looks impenetrable but note that the sky is visible. It is not in dense woodland.

We went to check for ourselves. We can confirm that neither of the woods is impenetrable. Hunter’s Gill is fairly open north of the caravan park with tall widely spaced trees, and a thin understory of small ferns. The SOTNI photographs were taken at the northern end of the gill where the trees have been thinned to improve the land around Telham Place. It has left enough light for dense shrubland to develop. It would only have been like this in 1066 if the woodland had been cleared, but then there would have been no woodland protecting the eastern side of the English line. Fore Wood is slower going. It took us an hour to make the 1km crossing from south to north. We were delayed by incompetent navigation – we avoided the paths and animal tracks - getting stuck at the railway and getting blocked by rhododendron groves (none of which would have bothered the Normans). Even if the 240 Alternative Battlefields understory was thicker in the 11th century, both woods are traversed by a north-south stream that would have given an express route for anyone that did not mind getting their feet wet.

Nick Austin was gracious enough to chat with us about this. He pointed out that even if the Normans found a way through the woods, it would be impractical for the transit of thousands of horses and men. He is probably right but we were not thinking that the entire army had to outflank the defence. There were no English archers. The idea would be to get perhaps 50 archers and crossbowmen onto the crest of Telham Hill, where they could shoot at Harold and his barons with impunity from above and behind. Even if they failed to kill him, the shield wall would be forced to break in order to defend him, thereby allowing the Norman cavalry through the gaps.

None of this really matters. The contemporary accounts suggest that it was impossible to outflank or surround the English defence. It was not impossible on the south slope of Telham Hill. Therefore, the battle was probably not fought on the south slope of Telham Hill.

There is another fundamental problem. If the English were at Telham Hill, relative safety was just 3½ miles away over the Sedlescombe crossing. The route via Beauport Park was on good roads. Complete safety was a further 5 miles north along the Rochester Roman road at Bodiam. WP, Wace and others explain that Harold had dispatched scouts to check the Norman strength and deployment on the days before the battle. Once he realised the size of the Norman cavalry, he had plenty of time to retreat over the Brede at Sedlescombe or back to Bodiam. Even if Harold did not realise the strength of the Norman cavalry until he sees them cresting Green Street hill, they were still two hours away (some primary sources say the battle started at the third hour of the day, and Green Street is roughly an hour from Upper Wilting). Harold had plenty of time to get his men and himself across the Brede. With control of the crossing, he had plenty of time to get to Bodiam. Many would say that Harold could not retreat because it would be deemed cowardly. We Alternative Battlefields 241 disagree, but it misses the point. William could not afford to take the risk that Harold might retreat.

Moreover, even if we imagine for a moment that Fore Wood and Hunter's Gill were impenetrable and that the battle started as Austin suggests, there was nothing that William could do to prevent Harold and/or Gyrth and/or Leofwine from fleeing to Bodiam if they thought the English might be losing. Again, it is not that we think it is likely that they would have fled, but William could not afford to take the risk that they might. If any of them survived the battle, the invasion would almost certainly have failed.

We broached this with Nick Austin too. He confirmed what he says in SOTNI, that he thinks the Hastings Ridge ridgeway had become overgrown with an impenetrable oak wood that both prevented the Godwinsons from fleeing and the English army from retreating. It seems unlikely to us. Once again, there is no such thing as an impenetrable mature wood in temperate latitudes, and we think the ridgeway was still in regular use anyway. Telham and Baldslow were both Saxon era settlements on the ridge that had no access apart from a ridgeway.

If the English could not get to Telham Hill via the Hastings Ridge ridgeway, as Austin suggests, they could not have arrived from London via the Rochester Roman road. Austin believes they came down the Old London Road, which roughly follows the route of the A21. He reckons it crossed the Brede at Whatlington ford, climbed onto the Hastings ridge at the Esso garage southeast of Battle, from where it headed south to Telham Hill. We are sceptical.

The A21 route through the High did not exist before 18th century turnpikes were built. Some say it followed an ancient trackway. It is hard to believe that an unknown trackway across the Andredsweald was still open 600 years after the Romans left or that Harold would risk his supply carts on deeply rutted tracks, unless there were no alternatives. Likewise, it is difficult to believe that Harold would risk an ambush by crossing Whatlington ford, unless there were no alternatives. The Rochester road and 242 Alternative Battlefields

Sedlescombe crossing was that better alternative. We even doubt that the Old London Road went from the Esso garage straight to Telham Hill. It had been common knowledge since Roman times that cart tracks could not exceed a 9% gradient. Two slopes on this route exceed 20%.

But if the English army did not arrive at Telham Hill on the Old London Road, they can only have got there on the Rochester Roman road via Beauport Park and the Hastings Ridge ridgeway. If that is how they arrived, there was nothing to stop them retreating or fleeing back down the same route.

Figure 73: Alternative Norman attack on Telham Hill

Austin’s proposed route of attack was only 3.5km but it crossed three streams that would have been below high tide. One of them ran through 200m of tidal mud flats. It is difficult to believe that the Normans could get to the battlefield by the third hour, as some contemporary accounts suggest. Alternative Battlefields 243

Austin told us that he thinks the bogs had dried out by 1066. One of them is named 'Little Bog’, a Middle English name, so it seems unlikely. The other two are labelled 'Pond Bay’ on the OS map, which means they were dammed at some point for iron production. It is possible then that the Normans marched over these dams, although we do not know of any other Pond Bays that date to this period.

Given the difficulties of Austin’s proposed attack - the boggy route to Crowhurst, the disadvantageous fighting terrain, the possibility that the English army might retreat to safety, or that the Godwinsons might flee - William presumably considered different routes of attack. The obvious alternative would have been to march onto the Hastings Ridge then out along Telham Hill spur to attack the English army from above (using one of the routes shown on Figure 73). This would resolve all the issues associated with Austin’s sea level route of attack, and virtually guarantee victory.

Nick told us that he thinks the routes from Upper Wilting onto the Hastings ridge were blocked by impenetrable woods. But the westerly route would use the Roman track between Monkham Wood and Crowhurst Park. He cannot have it both ways: If the track was open to export Crowhurst Park iron from Monkham Wood, it was open for the Normans to get onto the Hastings ridge. If the track had become overgrown with an impenetrable wood, iron products were not being exported from Monkham Wood, so it was not Hæstinga port.

Of course, the Normans did not attack from the ridge. It would contradict all the contemporary accounts. Alternative routes of attack are not mentioned in the contemporary accounts. The fact they did not attack from the ridge, or even consider it, is yet another reason to think that the battle was not fought on Telham Hill.

Quite apart from all this, if we are right that William could not see the English Standards from his proposed camp, that Hunter’s Gill could not have been the Malfosse, and that the south slope of Telham Hill was not protected by impenetrable woods, then Telham Hill fits no more battlefield clues than 244 Alternative Battlefields

Battle Abbey or Caldbec Hill. It fits none of the peculiar battlefield clues. In our opinion, it fits no more battlefield clues than any random hill on the Hastings Peninsula. As with the traditional battlefield and all the established alternatives, we have no proof that the battle was not fought on Telham Hill, but we think it unlikely.

Time Team

Thanks to the power of television, the best-known alternative battlefield theory is Time Team’s, from their 2003 Battle of Hastings TV show. Tony Robinson (sitting on the bench in Upper Lake, Figure 74) concludes that the battle probably did happen on Battle Hill, only with the Normans attacking along the ridge crest from the east rather than up soggy fields from the south.

Figure 74: Tony Robinson’s bench

We are reliably informed by one of the producers that Time Team did not take their theory seriously, but thought they needed to say something positive because the entire dig made no finds, no advances and no useful discoveries.

We were therefore surprised to read a paper (“On the very spot: In defence Alternative Battlefields 245 of Battle") saying much the same by Roy Porter, English Heritage’s Head of Property. As we mention above, his argument is based on the five apparently independent contemporary accounts that imply Battle Abbey was built on the battlefield. It reads rather like evidence that Atlantis was not at Santorini or Cyprus, so it must have been in Orpington High Street. But it contains a novel shift that he followed up in an interview with The Guardian: “The one place we know the armies weren't is the low ground below the abbey, where most visitors understandably think the battle must have been fought."

The Guardian reporter, presumably prompted by Porter, says that the view from the gatehouse roof shows the: “high ground towards Hastings from which William’s army marched". It sounds like English Heritage have accepted Time Team’s theory. They are not alone. The Sussex Country Archaeologist had previously told us (in private) that this is his personal view too. His name is on the list of eminent historians that helped Porter prepare the paper, along with Directors of The Battlefields Trust and The Royal Armouries, and TV star Dr Marc Morris.

Figure 75: Time Team battlefield deployment 246 Alternative Battlefields

It is difficult to see the point of English Heritage’s u-turn. Figure 75 is our interpretation of the traditional English battlefield deployment with the Normans attacking from the east. Tony Robinson’s bench is under the head of the middle arrow. The Norman attack would come along Marley Lane from the east. In other words, Time Team’s battle scenario is the same as the traditional battle scenario, only with the entire Norman army compressed into the traditional right flank. The English shield wall would still have to stretch between the two stream heads, in order to prevent the Normans riding around the open ends of the English line.

If the Normans attacked along the ridge crest, Harold would concentrate his forces on his eastern flank. Exactly as Time Team suggest, the ridge crest attack makes far more military sense than the traditional attack. The Normans would have better ground than on the traditional battlefield and they would not be fighting up any noticeable hill.

The idea would be to draw the English huscarls to the east end of the line before launching an oblique order attack on west end. The battle would have been over in 30 minutes. But the contemporary accounts say that the battle lasted most of the day. It is totally implausible that the Normans would spend all day attacking the best defended part of the English line, when they could canter up to the weak end and break through in minutes.

Battle was already a poor match for the contemporary account battlefield and engagement descriptions. A Norman attack along the ridge crest contradicts those few clues where it did match. It would no longer be overlooked by Telham Hill, the English would no longer first see the Normans cresting a hill and crossing a valley, there would no longer be a plain below either of the Norman flanks, the battlefield would no longer be untilled ground on a steep slope. We list 30 clues about the battlefield above. Time Team’s theory does not match a single one. We are embarrassed on their behalf.

English Heritage’s change of heart means that the battle’s killing zone would be under the town and Abbey. As the Guardian says: “To add to the confusion, Alternative Battlefields 247 the annual recreation of the battle by costumed re-enactors, which will be fought with increased fervour in October, is held in the wrong place, since the town and the abbey ruins occupy the true site." We have a sneaking suspicion that English Heritage have bought into Time Team’s joke theory because it absolves them of any responsibility to find archaeological evidence of the battle on their proposed battlefield. The theory is no more likely than the traditional battlefield, and the chances of that are negligible.

Telham Court Hill

Back in the early 1990s we believed the received wisdom that the English camped on Caldbec Hill, that the Normans were camped near where Hastings castle would later be built and that the English were caught trying a surprise attack on the Norman camp. We knew that this had not ended up with a battle at the traditional battlefield, so we cast around for somewhere more likely. Our attention was drawn to the unnamed hill southwest of Telham Court which, by tradition, was supposedly between the English and Normans at the start of their attack.

Figure 76: Telham Court Hill battlefield deployment 248 Alternative Battlefields

We think that Telham Court hill is the best defensive position on the Hastings Peninsula for a 6,000 man army. It is a spur rather than a proper hill, but it is conical near the top. It is protected on three sides by boggy streams. It is steep around most of its circumference. A determined shield wall – as shown on Figure 76 - would have been incredibly difficult to breach in six hours, or indeed six days. Harold would have known this, because his Crowhurst manor was barely 2km away.

Telham Court hill is a reasonable fit for the primary sources too. It is steep around 330° of its circumference, steep enough for rolled stones to be dangerous. It is overlooked from Hastings Ridge. There are several valleys below, although the Normans would not have crossed any of them. The valley to the north is within javelin range. Any of the surrounding valleys could have been the Malfosse. They would have to have occupied it in a military column, because the entrance was so narrow. The entrance is so narrow that the fighting would have been more intense in the middle. Harold could easily have dug a fosse across the battlefield that would protect one side of the shield wall. The plectrum-shaped shield wall would have enclosed Harold and the battlefield.

There are a few primary source contradictions. The eastern approach, which is the only one that Normans could have used for their attack, is too shallow. Indeed, it is 30m below the ridge crest. Most of the Norman attack would be downhill, with a 5m kicker at the end. There was no wood on the Hastings Ridge, so the English would not have been seen emerging from a wood through which they had come. It has no plain below the shield wall. And it is too narrow. The eastern approach is just over 100m across with both sides falling away steeply. It would not be possible to get three divisions on the approach at the same time. There would have been no way for the cavalry, infantry and archers to exchange positions without a full retreat.

In our opinion, if the English had been caught trying a surprise attack, or Harold simply decided that he wanted to fight a defensive battle and picked the battlefield, this would have been where he would choose to go. Indeed, Alternative Battlefields 249 this is yet more evidence that the battle did not happen on Battle Hill. It was less than 1km away. There is no way that Harold would have chosen to defend Battle Hill if he could instead have defended Telham Court hill.

Yet we no longer think the battle happened here. Not least, because it is too good a defensive position. William would have been idiotic to allow the English to get to Telham Court hill, when they had to cross the Brede or the Isthmus Ridge first. William would have ambushed them long before they got to Telham Court. His chances of breaking through a shield wall on Telham Court hill using any traditional means would have been negligible, and he cannot have used a feigned retreat because the hillsides are too steep and there is no plain below. If we were William and got faced by an English shield wall on Telham Court hill, we would have brought some boats from the camp to use as battering rams. This would not be the battle described in any of the primary sources. 250 Alternative Battlefields

Wadhurst Lane / Beech Farm

Figure 77: Hastings Peninsula isthmus topography

Through to the late 1990s, we still accepted the traditional view that the English army camped on Caldbec Hill. Wace says that the Norman fleet steered towards a port. He implies that they passed through the port to land upstream of it. We speculated that they steered towards pefenes ea, then passed it to land in the Ash Bourne estuary. If they landed there, they would have camped on Standard Hill, a mile south of the western end of the Isthmus Ridge. Caldbec Hill is at the eastern end of the Isthmus Ridge.

If the Normans camped at Standard Hill and the English camped at Caldbec Hill, we speculated that the battle might have played out as tradition suggests, only rotated 90 degrees clockwise onto the Isthmus Ridge instead of the Hastings Ridge. In other words, the English were heading west along the Isthmus Ridge to attack the Norman camp on Standard Hill, when they ran into the Normans heading the other way. As in the traditional scenario, and Alternative Battlefields 251 as Carmen specifically says, we thought the English might then have occupied a nearby hill where they set up their shield wall.

Figure 78: Yeakell and Gardner, High Wood and Wadhurst Lane in 1770

The two obvious candidates are High Wood hill on the B2096 and Wadhurst Lane, both of which are roughly a mile north of the Isthmus Ridge. High Wood hill is higher and steeper but, as its name suggests, it is ancient dense woodland. It was more widespread in 1770 (Figure 78) and therefore probably also in 1066. The battle described in the primary sources could not have happened in woodland, let alone such dense woodland as High Wood. We concentrated on Wadhurst Lane.

The topology around Wadhurst Lane is a chevron shaped ridge (Figure 79) with a north-south leg along the lane, and an east-west leg that stretches out across Beech Farm. The ridge has moderately steep sides by local standards. Today, it is almost treeless to the east of Wadhurst Lane. Harold’s army was too small to defend the entire ridge. He could only defend one leg of the chevron. Which would he choose? 252 Alternative Battlefields

Figure 79: Wadhurst Lane and Beech Farm ridges in 1m relief

Beech Farm ridge has a narrow level approach from the north and a wide shallow slope to the south. Wadhurst Lane ridge has a narrow level approach from the south, and two shallow approaches from east and west at the northern end, but it is higher and relatively steep-sided elsewhere.

In the first edition of this book, we thought that the most likely battlefield in this area - perhaps the most likely in the entire region - was the northern half of Wadhurst Lane where the ridge top is less than 100m across. The only level approach is from the south, where the ridgetop is barely 50m across. We envisaged a sausage shaped enclosed shield wall, shown in yellow on Figure 82. Alternative Battlefields 253

Figure 80: Simon Coleman’s proposed battlefield at Beech Farm

Since then, Simon Coleman has published his theory that the battlefield was at Beech Farm. His suggested English troop deployment is shown in white on Figure 80, with the Norman attack (cyan) up the south slope. He thinks that a stream protected the west end of the shield wall and an impenetrable wood - outlined in green on Figure 80 - protected the east end, as well as the vulnerable level approach from the north.

Simon Coleman’s proposed deployment would be no worse a match for the traditional primary source battle descriptions than Battle Abbey. The battlefield would be on a treeless part of the hill. It is overlooked, by the Netherfield ridge. The Normans would have had to cross a valley. The manor was wasted. William could have commanded three divisions attacking from the south by voice and hand gestures. There is a steep gully to the northeast that could have been the Malfosse. A fosse could have partly protected the north side of the battlefield. It would have enclosed the battlefield because streams surrounded the other three sides. We think that the Tapestry and 254 Alternative Battlefields

ASC are trying to say that the battle happened near to the Hastings Peninsula but not on it. Beech Farm fits this description.

On the other hand, Beech Farm is not narrow, and it is a poor match for our new battlefield clues, especially the more peculiar of them. The English would not be standing back-to-back. There was no plain below the battlefield. The valley is out of javelin range. Rolled stones would not have been dangerous on any slope that the Normans would have used to attack. The English would not have entered the battlefield in a column. The fighting is more likely to have been intense on the flanks than in the middle. William would surely have sent a significant cavalry contingent via Netherfield to attack the northern end of the shield wall, no matter how daunting its protective fosse. Considering what was at stake, we think that the Normans would have found a way to breach it.

Once more, an impenetrable wood is supposed to protect at least one end of the shield wall. Either a wood or stream is supposed to protect the other end. As we say about Caldbec Hill and Telham Hill above, there is no such thing as an impenetrable deciduous wood in temperate latitudes. Beech Farm is named after Beech Wood. MB lives in Burnham Beeches, a mature beech wood. The understory is so thin and the trees so far apart that orienteering events take place in it. There is no reason to believe that beech woods were any less porous in the 11th century, or in the 11th century BC for that matter. If the scenario was as Coleman suggests, we are convinced that the Normans would have found a way to outflank the defence through the wood or, just as likely, would ride around to the north on the ridgeway (black line) via Netherfield, so that they could occupy the summit and attack the English from above and behind. Alternative Battlefields 255

Figure 81: Yeakell and Gardner 1770 map of Beech Farm

Yeakell and Gardner (Figure 81) shows two additional issues. Firstly, there was continuous woodland through Beech Wood, Ashes Wood, High Wood, Creep Wood and Darvel (now Darwell) Wood through to the Andredsweald. If the English army found itself facing the Norman cavalry anywhere near Wadhurst lane, we could not imagine any scenario in which they would not dissolve away into these woods. A shield wall, after all, was a survival tactic with no chance of victory. Harold was almost guaranteed to survive if he dissolved away into the woods, where Norman horses, armour, lances and archers would be useless. Indeed, if the Normans chased Harold into the woods, the English stood a good chance of victory.

We asked Simon about this. He understandably replied that it would be deemed cowardly for Harold to avoid a fight. We disagree, for reasons we discuss at this start, not least that Harold, like all medieval aristocrats, would have thought of forests as his natural and favourite habitat. 256 Alternative Battlefields

Figure 82: Simon Coleman and MB battlefield candidates with outline of 1770 Beech and Ashes Woods

Secondly, Yeakell and Gardner shows that Beech Wood and Ashes Wood covered nearly all of the Beech Farm ridge and most of the Wadhurst Lane ridge. If anything, they would have been bigger at the time of the invasion. The 1770 wood is outlined in green on Figure 82. It shows that both Simon Coleman’s proposed shield wall (in white) and half of ours (yellow) are inside the wood. They cannot have been the battlefield. 257

Bibliography

Primary sources:

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (of which three versions covered the invasion, known as C, D and E); reasonably contemporary with events Carmen Widonis (aka Carmen de Hastingae Proelio); c1067 William of Jumieges; Gesta Normannorum Ducum; c1070 William of Poitiers; Gesta Guillelmi; c1072 Bayeux Tapestry; finished c1077 Domesday Book; finished 1086 John of Worcester; Chronicon ex Chronicis; c1125 Orderic Vitalis; Historia Ecclesiastica; c1125 William of Malmesbury; Gesta regum anglorum; c1135 Master Wace; Roman de Rou; c1160 Monks of Battle Abbey; Chronicle of Battle Abbey; c1170 Benoît de Sainte-Maure; Chronique des Ducs de Normandie; c1170

Other medieval manuscripts

Baudril of Bourgueil; Adelae Comitissae; c1100 Monks of Battle Abbey; Brevis Relatio de Guillelmo Nobilissimo Comite Normannorum; early 12th century Henry of Huntingdon; Historia Anglorum; c1129 Pseudo-Ingulf; Crowland Chronicle; allegedly before 1109, but perhaps forged later Monks of Battle Abbey; Quedam Exceptiones de Historia Normannorum et Anglorum; c1107 Stephen of Rouen; Draco Normannicus; c1167 Warenne Chronicle (aka) Chronicon monasterii de Hida iuxta Winton; c1200

Modern sources:

Nick Austin; The Secrets of the Norman Invasion; Ogmium Press; 2002 Dr Nicola R Bannister; Sussex Historic Landscape Categorisation; 2010

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Bernard Leeman; The 1290 Masacre of Jews at Jury’s Gap Romney Marsh; 2015 Ivan Margary; Roman Roads in Britain; J. Baker; 1973 Ivan Margary; Roman Ways in the Weald; Phoenix House; 1949 David and Barbara Martin; New Winchelsea Sussex - A Medieval Port Town; English Heritage; 2004 D. J. A Matthew; The Norman Monasteries and their English Possessions; Oxford University Press, 1963 A. Mawer; Problems of Place-Name Study; Cambridge University Press; 1929 J. Neumann; Hydrographic and Ship Hydro-dynamics Aspects of the Norman Invasion, 1066; 1989 Sir Nicholas Harris Nicolas; The History of the Royal Navy I; Bentley; 1847 Andrew Pearson; The Roman Shore Forts; Tempus Publishing; 2002 Roy Porter; “On the very spot: In defence of Battle”; English Heritage Historical Review; 2014 Catharine Pullein; Rotherfield: The Story of Some Wealden Manors; Courier Press; 1928 N.A.M. Roger; The Naval Service of the Cinque Ports; The English Historical Review, Vol 111; 1996 Louis Salzman; The Inning of Pevensey Levels; Sussex Archaeological Collection 53; 1910 Eleanor Searle; Chronicle of Battle Abbey translation; Clarendon Press; 1980 Sir Frank Stenton; Anglo-Saxon England; Oxford at the Clarendon Press; 1971 D. Alan Stevenson; The World’s Lighthouses to 1820; Dover Maritime; 1969 John N C Taylor; Pett in Sussex: The Story of a Village, It’s Church and People; Edgerton Publishing Services; 2004 Edwin Tetlow; The Enigma of Hastings; P. Owen; 1978 David Gaska-Tusker; The hydrological functioning of the Pevensey Levels Wetland; PhD paper, 2005 Kathleen Tyson; Carmen de Triumpho Normannico; Granularity; 2017 Terence Wise; 1066: Year of Destiny; Philips; 1979 Peter Poyntz Wright: Hastings (Great Battles); Phoenix Publishing; 2006

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Endnote

Even though the ASC reference has always been transcribed as “Hæstingaport”, one word, the scan below clearly shows it as "hæstinga port", two words. We will capitalise the ‘H’ in Hæstinga for the sake of readability.