Mysteries of the Norman Conquest

Blending history and travelogue, the author visits disputed battle sites, shedding new light on how the struggle for the English crown truly unfolded. The story of the Battle of Hastings is well known. But recent findings have cast doubt on the traditional narrative and even on the location of the battle site. The titanic struggle for the English crown in 1066 may not have taken place at what is today Battle Abbey, and there are a number of plausible alternative sites. In Mysteries of the Norman Conquest, historian Robert Allred investigates. Taking nothing for granted, Allred hiked through the sites of the three battles of 1066 - Fulford, Stamford Bridge and Hastings. Armed with the medieval sources and much of the current literature, he set out to appraise the evidence and to draw his own unbiased conclusions. Following in the footsteps of the Viking warriors of Harald Hardrada, the knights of William of Normandy and the Anglo-Saxon soldiers of King Harold, the reader is taken on a journey from Yorkshire to the South Coast and down through the ages to reexamine what has been written about that momentous year-the intrigues, preparations and maneuvers-which culminated on 14 October 1066, on a bloody hill somewhere in Sussex.