1066 and all that...

by Ben Soton

BBC1’s Sunday night drama, King & Conqueror, opens up one of Early Medieval Europe’s most important events – the Norman conquest.
This is not the time of absolute monarchs with grandiose palaces; it is the dog-eat-dog world of early feudalism. Loyalties had little to do with nationality, which arose centuries later but a world where your local or regional overlord or earl often mattered more than the titular monarch. A world power came out of the blade of a sword and was held by rival warlords and schemers. It had a greater resemblance to Game of Thrones than The Tudors.
King & Conqueror traces the trials and tribulations of Harold Godwinson, the Earl of Wessex (played by James Norton) and William of Normandy (played by Nikolaj Coster-Waldau); whose rivalry for the English Crown came to a head at Hastings in 1066. The drama paints a story of two similar men; both at the higher end of the feudal hierarchy and of a similar age. Both were outstanding warriors – much like the Norwegian king Harald Hardrada, the other claimant for the English throne, who was killed by Harold along with most of his men only a few weeks before the fateful battle of Hastings. 
It was a clash of titans and a case of last man standing. It all begins around the time of the coronation of Edward the Confessor (played by Eddie Marsan) and ends with the Battle of Hastings. Whilst Harold and William are portrayed as heroic figures and family men; Edward is portrayed as a weak, over pious man with no interest in women. In the drama he is easily manipulated by his mother Emma of Normandy (played by Juliet Stevenson) and later his
wife, Gunhild (played by Bo Bragason). In a show of defiance he batters his mother to death with the crown. Although this is fiction it is widely believed that she was plotting against her son the king.
Although the portrayal of Edward the Confessor may be exaggerated it is probably an attempt to show him in contrast to the machismo of Harold and William. However there is considerable evidence that Edward, whose wife was also Harold’s sister was celibate partly for religious reasons hence the title Edward the Confessor – though the desire to thwart the Godwin clan’s dynastic ambitions was clearly another pressing motive.
There’s all sorts of other historical inaccuracies in the series. But, of course, this is not a drama-documentary but historical fiction like Shakespeare’s romps through the Wars of the Roses and the Hundred Years War with France. The series does, however, manage to capture the feudal power play of the period. In its favour the series does not take the side of either protagonist; Harold was simply the most powerful man in England whilst William may have been Edward the Confessor’s preferred successor. In the final analysis William triumphed on the battlefield.
Meanwhile King & Conqueror makes enjoyable and gripping entertainment with epic battle scenes in the final episodes. Finally however tough life may have been for the likes of William and Harold life was much harder for their subjects.