THE NORMAN CONQUERORS AND THEIR SUCCESSORS 



weeks, when he was succeeded by his son Canute, who was then a boy 

 of eighteen. This seemed to be Aethelred's opportunity, and he 

 returned with some success. When he died he had a worthier successor 

 in Edmund Ironside, but he was robbed of his chance by the defection 

 of a number of the Saxon Nobles. Although most of the fighting was 

 on land Canute owed the greater part of his success to his Danish 

 seamen, and it was to reward them that the country was squeezed 

 unmercifully in the early part of his reign. After that he settled down 

 to be a thoroughly good King with a real understanding of sea power, 

 and partly by his reputation and partly by the maintenance of a fleet 

 he kept the country free from pirate raids. Norway had declared itself 

 independent on the death of Sweyn, but as soon as he had England 

 pacified Canute reconquered it, although on this occasion the fleet 

 employed appears to have been more Saxon than British. The three 

 Kingdoms and his numerous vassal states brought about a big increase 

 in trade, and as England was the centre of the Empire she obtained the 

 cream of it. Within a few years of his death this Empire had fallen to 

 pieces and England had shrunk within her limits again, to fall still 

 further under the weak rule of his successors. Finally, the Chief Power 

 of the Kingdom fell into the hands of Harold, son of Earl Godwin, one 

 of Canute's men. He was strong enough to make the regency respected, 

 while King Edward the Confessor busied himself with his churches and 

 his monks, and he maintained a considerable fleet on the militia 

 principle. He intended to make himself the successor of his master, 

 and in due course he was successful, although not in the way he had 

 dreamed. 



CHAPTER III— THE NORMAN CONQUERORS AND 

 THEIR SUCCESSORS 



The Vikings and Normandy. 



In Britain it is usual to regard the Norman invasion as being 

 essentially a French movement, whereas it was really almost civil war. 

 The invaders spoke a French of sorts and had many French ways, but 

 they were little more French than English. The beginnings of the 

 Normans were in the days of King Alfred, when Norse invaders got 

 short shrift and soon learned to leave England alone. For a time they 

 ruled themselves in the north country in something like autonomy, but 

 this soon palled, and as the English power gradually extended they 

 decided to seek happier hunting grounds. Having embarked, their 

 natural course was south, and so they came to land and finally to estab- 

 lish themselves in Normandy, where they dispossessed the French rulers, 

 but in true Norse fashion soon became identified with the soil and 

 adopted its ways. This was only a century and a half before the 

 invasion, after they had been kept out of Spain by the war-like Moors, 

 so that it was really a Viking raid on a large scale rather than a French 

 invasion, which helps us to understand many things. Canute and 



14 



