King Harold II c1022-1066

Personal

King Harold II was born in c1022 and was the last Anglo-Saxon king of England. He was also known as Harold Godwinson and married Edith, daughter of the Earl of Mercia, in 1064. They had two sons - possibly twins - named Harold and Ulf. Harold was killed at the battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066.

Career

Harold became Earl of Wessex in 1053 when his father Godwin died (a province at that time covered the southernmost third of England). This made him the second most powerful figure in England after the current king, Edward the Confessor who had spent more than a quarter of a century in exile in Normandy. In 1065 Harold supported Northumbrian rebels against his brother Tostig. This strengthened his acceptability as Edward's successor, but fatally divided his own family, driving Tostig into alliance with King Harald Hardrada of Norway. Upon Edward the Confessor's death in (January 5 1066), Harold claimed that Edward had promised him the crown on his deathbed, and made the Witenagemot (the assembly of the kingdom's leading notables) approve him for coronation as king, which took place the following day. However, the country was invaded, by both Harald of Norway and William, Duke of Normandy, who claimed that he had been promised the English crown by both Edward (probably in 1052) and Harold.

Harold now forced his army to intercept William, who had landed 7,000 men in Sussex, southern England on September 28 near Hastings. The two armies clashed on October 14, where after a hard fight Harold was killed and his forces routed. According to tradition, and as depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry, Harold was killed by an arrow in the eye. Whether he did, indeed, die in this manner (a death associated in the middle ages with perjurers), or was killed by the sword, will never be known. Although one Norman account claims that Harold's body was buried in a grave overlooking the Saxon shore, it is more likely that he was buried in his church of Waltham Holy Cross in Essex.

Relationship with Epping

It is not certain where King Harold is buried, but it is thought that his body lay in the Abbey in Waltham Abbey.

External Links

For more information please visit the below links.

King Harold biography

King's grave mystery

Bayeux Tapestry