Hi my name's Kevin Hicks welcome to my YouTube channel The History Squad. Now the film today,
the video, has been requested by my PATREON members, thanks guys. Harold Godwinson the last
Saxon King of England, Harold II who is said to have taken an arrow through the eye at the Battle
of Hastings, or did he? Is it just simply legend, but we'll have a look at that later, but before
we carry on let's just take this helmet off so you can recognize me. And a quick impersonation,
see if you can guess what film this is from. He chose poorly. Right, let's carry on now.
So Harold Godwinson born 1022 the son of Earl Godwin of Wessex and Gytha Thorkelsdotter,
now she was actually related to the kings and queens and earls of Scandinavia. Let's see if I
can name them, Denmark, Jutland, Sweden, Finland, Norway, she is real royalty so Harold Godwinson,
son of Godwin, has an awful lot of royal blood in his veins, but he is a Saxon. Now he has a brother
Tostig and a sister Edith. She becomes Edith of Wessex and believe it or not she's Queen consort
to no other than Edward the Confessor, the king at the time. Harold Godwinson was described as
being very tall, a handsome man who had a bit of a sense of humor. He was also said to have been
noted for his physical strength, his courage and eloquence, as well as his acts of valor. So Harold
ends up becoming one of the most powerful men in all of England, in fact the second most powerful
man outside of the king. In 1045 he becomes the Earl of East Anglia and then when his father dies
in 1053 he becomes the Earl of Wessex and then he picks up an extra one in 1058, he becomes the
Earl of Hereford. He basically controls a complete third of the whole of England and he is the main
opposition to something that's often missed in England. You see Edward the Confessor had spent an
awful lot of time in Normandy and when he returns to England he brings with him clergy, noblemen of
Normandy and they have a growing strength in England, so Harold Godwinson becomes the main
focus of opposition against the Normans already in England, and then he comes to notoriety,
he comes to fame, with a campaign in Wales which is quite something because I didn't actually
know about this one until I did my research. So this campaign in Wales, quite something,
so what happened was this 1062 to 1063 there was a little bit of a campaign. Because the ruler of
Gwynedd had actually conquered the whole of Wales, his name was Gruffydd ap Llywelyn,
a famous name in Welsh history, but in 1063 he was killed by his own troops. Get your head around
that! And then in 1064 Harold Godwinson marries the former wife of Llywelyn and that's Aeldith,
she was the daughter of the Earl of Mercia. Now on top of this they have a couple of sons,
twins possibly, who live to adulthood and live out their lives in exile so I understand,
and now add to this that he has a mistress or in Danish law she was his wife Edith Swanneck and
they have a number of illegitimate children. One of those children was Gytha of Wessex,
she is very important for the future line of Harold Godwinson but I'll talk about her later
you see what happens in 1064 Harold Godwinson is on a voyage to Ponthieu when he's shipwrecked.
He's handed over to the court of William Duke of Normandy who considered himself to
be the rightful heir to the throne of England once Edward the Confessor dies. Now it appears
that Harold Godwinson is held as a virtual prisoner at the court of William and under
duress he's made to swear an oath of allegiance to hand over the crown of England to William once
the old king dies. In 1065 Harold Godwinson sides with rebels or a rebels cause up in Northumbria,
but it's against his own brother Tostig who was Earl of Northumbria. Tostig had levied
unpopular but unjust taxes against the population, they're far too heavy so the rebels had rose up,
Harold Godwinson supports them, Tostig flees into Norway and sides himself with the King of Norway.
Harald Hardrada. Hardrada, the hard reign. And Tostig is replaced with an earl called Morcar.
The family of the Godwinson’s now is divided. In fact Tostig has sided with an enemy.
On the 5th of January 1066, Edward the Confessor dies. He left no written will,
but William Duke of Normandy reckons he was the rightful and legitimate heir to
the throne of England and that Edward had indeed promised him the throne some years
before when he'd visited Normandy. They also state that Harold Godwinson had promised to
support William's claim to the throne when he had been held in Normandy some years before as well,
but this was under duress and none of this was written down so it's not legitimate. Now Harold
Godwinson claims that Edward on his deathbed promised Harold the succession to the throne
but it was the witan, the gathering of the notables and the earls of England who agreed
that Harold Godwinson should be the legitimate King of England. They chose Harold not William,
so Harold was crowned King of England the very next day. There was a third claimant to the throne
of England and this claim was supported by, by Tostig, none other than the renegade brother
of Harold Godwinson and this is Harold Hardrada, the King of Norway who claimed that he was related
to King Knut and through that lineage he had a rightful claim to the throne. What happens next
changes the entire course of the history of England.
So 1066, what a year. What a great subject there's a fantastic book and it's called 1066 The Year of
Three Battles. It's great because what happens is this. To the north Harald Hardrada, hard reign,
invades the north of England together with Tostig the brother of Harold Godwinson. The earls of the
north together with Earl Morcar, remember him, were supposed to stay behind the walls of York
reinforcing it. This would have kept the Viking army in check, allowing King Harold to concentrate
on the threat from William Duke of Normandy in the South, however Morcar and these earls decided to
come out and face the Vikings. It was at Fulford Gate. They were outmaneuvered and their army was
basically destroyed. It was a major defeat for the Saxons of the north but what's worse it leaves a
Viking army on the loose in the north of England, this leaves the north wide open, so Harold races
to the north. He defeats the Viking Army at the Battle of Stamford Bridge in September there.
Tostig so they say was killed by Harold but Harold Hardrada is shot through the
throat with an arrow. And there's a little side here apparently as he's dying he tried
to compose his death poem but the monk who was writing it down basically said no it's
rubbish so he made it up. I love all of these side stories. Meanwhile news arrives to Harold
Godwinson that William Duke of Normandy has arrived in the south and he is burning,
looting and killing so Harold Godwinson races to the South. Now I've got a question for you,
put yourself into the shoes of Harold Godwinson, what would you have done? You must have known
that Hardrada was going to invade the North and you already knew that preparations in
Normandy were ongoing, ships being prepared for an invasion of the South. What would you have done?
Can I tell you what I would have done? But this is just Kevin. I'd have sailed across to Ouistreham
and I would have burnt William Duke of Normandy's fleet, but that's just me and I'm a little bit
like that. But the truth of it is, 14th of October 1066, the Battle of Hastings happens right,
this day-long battle. Incredible courage on both sides but Harold Godwinson of course is slain.
Legend has it he was shot through the eye with an arrow or was he? Because there are other
accounts where he was hacked down and hacked to pieces. In fact at the end of the battle they
could not identify his body so it was a lover who actually was able to identify part of the body by
some personal blemish or other. There are lots of stories attached to this and there's a, a little
Norman one where they said that he was buried on the shoreline looking out at sea and there was
a headstone carved “Here lies the body of Harold Godwinson, King of the Saxons, now he watches the
sea like he should have done”. Now I mentioned earlier about one of the illegitimate children
of Harold and Edith Swanneck, that's Gytha. She goes on to marry Vladimir, Grand Duke of Kyiv Rus,
that's modern day Kiev. Now because of this, this marriage Harold Godwinson is proclaimed martyr
by the Russian Orthodox church and every 14th of October it's Harold Godwinson’s feast day,
but it goes on further and I actually love this because I love to know, you know, where are we
from, where your family's from. Because of that marriage into that royal family there, the Rus,
most of the kings of France, up until the revolution, could trace their lineage back
to Harold Godwinson as can our King Charles through his mother Queen Elizabeth apparently
they could claim lineage to Harold Godwinson. So the story didn't end at
Hastings, it continued on to the present day and I find that absolutely fascinating.
Well I hope you enjoyed that video there, if you did like, share and subscribe and don't
forget to turn on the all notification buttons because you never know what's coming on down the
line with the History Squad. But before I go, quick shout out to some of my PATREON members
who without their support I don't think I'd be able to do all of these videos that we do. First
of all Aditya Anand yeah, Stephanie Walker and Hannah Wallace. Wallace now there's a name. I
might just feature a film about a certain Wallace in the future but for now, take it easy. Bye-bye.