Before he was
crowned as King in January 1066, Harold Godwineson had what we would now call a
‘common law’ wife, Edyth Swannhaels - Edith ‘Swanneck’ or Edith the
Fair. As King he was obliged to make a Christian blessed marriage of alliance.
There would, perhaps, have been two choices for him. A daughter of Duke William
of Normandy could have been a possibility – I am convinced that a marriage
agreement was made when Harold was in Normandy during a visit dated 1064 (or it
may have been 1063 or 1065 – we do not know for certain). A betrothal would
have been made to secure Harold’s loyalty and to pledge to aid William’s bid
for the English throne. The engagement would have been broken off by a
disgruntled father the day he heard news of Harold’s coronation. I wonder if
the girl in question was relieved or disappointed?
The other choice was the sister to the two
Northern Earls, Edwin and Morkere of Mercia and Northumbria. She was Alditha,
widow of the Welsh Prince Gruffydd, defeated, and some say slain, by Harold in
1063
There are two schools of thought regarding
whether Alditha was pleased to be bargained off in a second marriage of
convenience, depending on whether you are a Harold supporter or not. On one
side, Harold is reported as being a brutal man, arrogant and conceited. It’s
interesting that this view is more readily banded by the Welsh. The fact is,
Gruffydd was murdered by his own people who then surrendered. In consequence,
Wales was left to its own stewardship (similar to when Llewelyn ap Fawr ruled
as Prince under King John). Nor are there Norman tales of Harold being ruthless
– on top of the rest of the Norman propaganda, I would have expected a
blackening of his character. (Think subsequent kings who, for various reasons,
were discredited.)
The widow Alditha and her young daughter,
Nest, were courteously escorted back to her own family in Mercia after Gruffydd’s
death. This does not strike me as the action of a vindictive man, Had Harold
wanted to ensure loyalty, his own control and an insurance of submission, he
could have sent mother and daughter into the confine of a nunnery, ordered her
marriage to someone of his choosing or simply locked them up. Instead, he gave
Alditha her freedom and the prospect of a life of her own. (Albeit one dictated
by her brothers.)
Nest
later married the Marcher Lord Osbern fitz Richard of Richard’s castle on the
Hereford/Shropshire border, which gives rise to my personal belief that after
1066 Alditha fled to Wales. But I am ahead of myself.
Our first problem with ‘Alditha’ is her
name, there are several variants: Ealdgyth, Algytha, Edyth, Edith… take your pick.
I favour Alditha to avoid confusion with Edith Harold’s sister, wife to King
Edward (the Confessor) and Edith Swanneck his first wife (whom I tend to name
as Edyth). Alditha was the granddaughter of Leofric, Earl of Mercia, daughter
of Ælfgar his son and successor. Ælfgar was unpredictable and hostile to the
Godwine family and King Edward. Prior to his rebellion of 1062 he had already
been banished once from the kingdom.
Unhappy with Harold’s brother Tostig being
made Earl of Northumbria, Ælfgar allied with Gruffydd of Wales, and began
raiding the Welsh Marches and Herefordshire. This Welsh alliance – sealed by
Alditha’s marriage circa 1057 – backfired however, as it gave Harold as King
Edward’s chief advisor, the excuse he needed to enter Wales and put an end to
the many years of aggressive border warfare. Defeated, Ælfgar was exiled and
died later in 1062. Mercia passed to his son Edwin, and Northumbria went to
Morkere when Tostig subsequently fell out with Edward and was exiled in 1065.
Harold took Alditha as wife soon after
King Edward’s death to ensure the support of the North, and to provide
assurance that he would not endorse the return of the unpopular Tostig to
favour. It is not known whether Alditha was crowned as Queen - again it is
logical that she was, in order to secure her own and her brothers’ position. How
sincere was Harold though? Did he truly mean to honour these two northern
brothers as respected earls in their own right, or was it all sham?
The north was to find out when Norway’s King,
Harald Hardrada, allied with Tostig who still harboured a grudge against his
brother Harold, invaded England in the late summer of 1066.
Morkere and Edwin were defeated at Gate
Fulford. Did they believe that the new English King had abandoned them? Did
they doubt Harold’s pledge of sincerity when he took their sister as his wife –
to ally with and support the north? Did they wonder whether, when push came to crunch,
that he would, after all, take the side of his own brother? If that is so, they
were to be proven wrong.
Neither the north, nor the invaders
expected Harold and his full-time regular army, the Housecarls, to move with
such haste. They marched swiftly, with no hesitation or doubt, to aid the north,
calling out the ordinary part-time soldiers, the Fyrd as they went northward –
the men of Cambridgeshire, Lincolnshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire…
(note: NOT the men from the south! The southern fyrd remained in the
south!)
Harold honoured his pledge. The north was
his kingdom and he would defend it from foreign invasion. Hardrada and Tostig died
at Stamford Bridge, not far from York. Harold had proven his worth, but Duke
William of Normandy had taken advantage of the unexpected decent weather and
had landed on England’s south coast. He believed, as had Hardrada, that he had
a right to the English throne, and was determined to take what was his.
William’s (erroneous) belief was that way back
in 1051/2 Edward had promised him the throne. Edward’s mother, Queen Emma of
Normandy was William’s great aunt, and Edward himself was more Norman than
English in his ways due to being raised as an exile in Normandy for many years.
It is likely that he and William, being close kindred by blood, were also
friends and allies. It is also likely that Edward knew that he would not
produce children, (else why would he promise the succession? In 1051/2 he had
been married only a short while, was still a youngish man and, normally, would
be expecting to have sons to follow him. The Church later claimed that he had
vowed celibacy, but this is highly unlikely for a childless king. More
believably, he was either impotent or homosexual. (I believe the latter to be
the more likely.)
We all know what happened a few weeks
later seven miles from the coast at Hastings at a site now called, simply, ‘Battle’.
Speculation by some has claimed that the
men of the north did not return, in haste, with Harold to the south because
they were uncertain of supporting him. That’s nonsense. Edwin and Morkere’s
armies had just fought TWO major battles in as many weeks. They were exhausted,
probably wounded. They did come south as soon as they could – but of course, by
then it was too late. And the biggest reason of why these two earls would have
marched to support Harold, was their sister, Alditha.
She was heavily pregnant by the late
summer. A legitimate son would very likely become the next King of England
after Harold (OK so Harold had sons by Edyth Swanneck which could have put the
cat amongst the pigeons, but that’s another article to be considered here on my
blog…) A nephew as King would place Edwin and Morkere in a very strong position,
a position that would have been absolutely nothing under William. So of course,
they backed Harold! (In other words, do not believe the post-1066 Norman
propaganda.)
Alditha was kept well away from the South
of England, it is believed that she was sent to Chester, and that after the
outcome of Hastings that she fled into Wales for her and her unborn child’s
safety. She gave birth to a son, also to be named Harold, in late 1066 or earl
1067. Her two brothers attempted rebellion against William in 1068 and again in
1069, probably citing the young child as the legitimate heir. The Norman
response was a winter march across the Pennines in 1069-70 to occupy Chester
and to crush the two Earls in battle near Stafford.
William of Malmesbury suggests that the
young Harold later journeyed to Norway where he was well received by Olaf
Haraldson, and a Harold is found among the followers of Magnus Olafson in 1098
when a battle was fought against the Norman earls of Shrewsbury and Chester.
Thereafter, this Harold disappears from the records, apart from the claim that
as an old man a Harold was to claim that he was the king. Yeah right…
I personally don’t believe this was Harold
Haroldson. I am convinced that he died as a young child. No proof, just gut
feeling or an author’s fancy. IF he was even rumoured to be alive as a child,
or young man Duke William would have ensured that he did not survive. His hold on
England until he died, was tenuous back then, even rumour of a legitimate
English heir would have been difficult for him to endure – or indeed survive.
What happened to Alditha? Nobody knows.
A delight for fiction writers, we can make
her story up and no one can contradict our ideas.
© Helen Hollick
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| www.helenhollick.net |
Next week: Bishop Odo... Nasty or Nice?
such a good content
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