William certainly lived up to his title. He conquered the English and then went on to succeed as King; but it was not easy and William tried and used many tactics and tricks to make sure he secured his victory. The Battle of Hastings Before William even began preparing to invade, there was a great debate on whether or not the Normans should risk invading England, as it was quite a strong country at the time. William of Normandy won the battle because was well prepared and had a good army. The Normans had knights on horseback who were skilful fighters.
William was extremely determined to be King of England and would not let anything stand in his waynot even successful warrior Harold Godwineson-. In the Bayeux Tapestry, it shows William’s army getting ready and preparing huge ships. Another component on William’s side was luck. The wind changed, and so the Normans managed to cross the Channel and arrive earlier than anticipated leaving the English in the North unprepared. The Bayeux Tapestry has pictures of William making a speech to his soldiers. William arranged his troops carefully with the knights at the front.
William also had archers; which gave him a huge advantage over the unprepared English who were still recovering from their previous battle with Harold Hardraada. Castles After William won the Battle of Hastings, his next task was to secure his place as a worthy English monarch. A big part of his takeover was the building of castles; an entirely new building to England. There were mixed opinions about this, as it had previously been a law that no building was to be taller than the Church. Castles were a very good way for the Normans to expand their grip on the English people.
The English population outnumbered the Normans, and the Normans had to make sure they had some control over the English. Castles were a sign of Norman power and might. They could be easily seen and quickly spread fear among the English. The castles warned the English that Norman soldiers lived in these castles and that any attempts to attack them would be met with battles. The castles also gave the Norman soldiers a safe place to live. They were, after all, quite new to England. The Feudal System The feudal system was also a big part of William’s takeover as it placed him in an unreachable position at the top of the pecking order.
This way, he could give out orders and would be obeyed by everyone. The way the feudal system worked meant that everybody paid homage to those above them. Showing homage means showing respect and honour to those of more importance than you in a public way. This was very crafty of William although some historians believe that only a weak King would use the Feudal system to fight their battles. The Domesday Book In December 1085, William the Conqueror decided to carry out a survey of his new kingdom.
There were three reasons why William decided to do this. (1) The information would help William discover how much the people of England could afford to pay in tax. (2) The information would help William discover the truth about whom money really belonged to. (3) The Domesday Book also showed William where the population of England was located. William sent out his officials to every town and village in England. They asked questions about the ownership of land, animals and farm equipment and also about the value of the land and how it was used.
When the information was collected it was recorded in a book. About a hundred years after it was produced, the book became known as the Domesday Book. Domesday means “day of judgement”. Which Helped William the Most? I think the most important feature of William’s takeover was the Domesday Book; as he was new to England and the Domesday Book provided detailed information about everyone in his entire Kingdom. This made William’s job so much easier as he now knew who could afford to give him the most tax and who he would not need to pay much attention to.
This was especially helpful as England’s population was quite large and it was handy to know that he only had to talk to some people and not the roughly calculated 1. 5 million people population that England had at the time. However, despite this being (in my opinion) the most important feature, all of these points added up to success for William. This was because William made sure he knew everything about the English. After fighting them in the Battle of Hastings, William knew that the English were weak when it came to drink.
He also built buildings higher than Churches showing him as powerful and an exception to authority. The Feudal system placed William once again on an untouchable pedestal and showed that he was their leader whether they liked it or not. However, some English did like William as he paid everybody, even the servants who had previously been forced to work unpaid, were now receiving wages from William. This was a wise move from William as many English men wanted to work for William; building castles and weapons. This, in my opinion, is how William undoubtedly took control of England and was one of the most successful Kings.
