1.3.4 Harrying Of The North

Question 1

Causes of the Harrying of the North (5)

Answer 1

Tensions in the north of England had existed since William’s invasion but they reached boiling point in 1068/69
- Edwin, Morcar and Edgar the Aethling fled north in 1068. Edgar once again made a claim on William’s throne.
- King Malcolm of Scotland, who had recently married Edgar’s sister, gave his support to the claim. Edgar was becoming a powerful rival to William.
- In January 1069, a Norman earl, Robert of Commines, was murdered by a group of English rebels and the Bishop of Durham’s house was set on fire.
- Edgar attacked the city of York
- In the summer, 240 Danish Viking ships invaded the north of England and joined Edgar’s army. This army took control of York Castle and defeated the Norman army stationed in the city.

Question 2

The Harrying of the North (3)

Answer 2

• The Harrying of the North happened in wintertime, from October 1069 to March 1070.
• He paid the Vikings to abandon the English army and return to Denmark. The leaders of the English army scattered.
• Determined to teach the people of the north a lesson, William tried to make the north of England uninhabitable. William laid waste to huge areas of land around York. He ordered the slaughter of all livestock, the burning of all crops and the salting of the land so that nothing else would grow. All the land from York and Hull north (between the River tees and Humber)

Question 3

Short-term impacts of the Harrying of the North (4)

Answer 3

• Farmers’ lost income
• Up to 100,000 people, which was about 5% of the English population at the time, died in the Harrying of the North
• Thousands of people lost their homes, crops and livestock. This forced them to move to other parts of the country and caused a refugee crisis in England
• A lady at the time, called Florence of Worcester, reported that people were starving to death so badly that they resorted to eating other humans (cannibalism)

Question 4

Long-term impacts of the Harrying of the North (4)

Answer 4

• William, unsurprisingly, was criticised for killing hundreds of thousands of people
• In the Domesday Book, written in 1086, 80% of Yorkshire was recorded as ‘waste’, meaning that it was unpopulated and not used for farming. This may have been the direct result of William’s actions.
• William’s aim had been to remove the threat of the rebellion in the north once and for all and it is certainly true that he faced little trouble from Yorkshire during his reign. The Harrying however did not mark the end of rebellions against William elsewhere in the country. The only resistance and further rebellion was the one led by Hereward the Wake, which ended in 1071.
• As the harrying ended the guerrilla war, and the local resistance, it seems like it worked and consolidated the Normans’ control of England

Question 5

Where did the Harrying of the North take place?

Answer 5

From the Humber to the Tees River

Question 6

The Harrying of the _____ was one of William I’s most extreme methods of retaining control of England. It happened partly because William wanted to avenge Robert ______ (his appointed earl of north Northumbria) who had been killed by locals

Answer 6

North, Cumin