Welcome to the British History Podcast.

My name is Jimmy and this is episode 428, tightening the grip.

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Five years of fighting.

The conquest of England wasn't something that was resolved on a single day in October

of 1066.

William had been fighting this thing for five years, and they were long years.

Ever since Hastings, the Normans had faced rebellion after rebellion, sometimes multiple

rebellions in multiple towns at the same time.

Exeter had rebelled, twice, Canterbury had rebelled, Hereford and Shrewsbury had rebelled,

most of Mercia had rebelled, Eustace of Ballon had rebelled and Dover, the sons of Harold

Godwinson had rebelled, the widow of Harold Godwinson had rebelled, Durham had rebelled,

Ealy had rebelled, and fighting alongside the English rebels, we see clergy members,

the Scots, Irish pirates, the Welsh, the Danes, and in the case of Eustace, even a few

French soldiers.

So it's safe to say that the Normans were not greeted as liberators, nor were they

accepted as some sort of inevitable tide of history.

They weren't welcome on the island, England had fought back, and they fought hard.

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