BISHOPS in the olden days lived relatively quiet lives, and were very fond of writing books. In particular, they liked to chronicle the derring do of local potentates, and thus it happens that Guido, Bishop of Amiens, has left us a mine of information about a great event that occurred 930 years ago today. His epic poem De Bello Hastingensi Carmen, or "Song of the Battle of Hastings", gives a blow by blow account of that momentous happening.
William, Duke of Normandy as he was then, assembled his fleet at the mount of the River Dive on the northern coast of France in the summer of 1066. The wind, however, was from the north, and Norman vessels, having only one rectangular sail, needed an almost following wind for headway, so William and his fellow Normans had to sit and wait. Early in September, the wind backed to the west for a time, and William was able to move his ships to St. Valery en Somme, a little closer to his destination, but then once again the weather imposed a nervous inactivity on the would be conquerors.
The Duke, it seems, sought help from anywhere he could, and was a frequent visitor to the local minister to pray for better conditions for his undertaking. Guido tells the Duke's story using the ancient Greek names for the cardinal winds:
He watched the weather cock upon the Minster tower;
First Boreas, blowing from the north, diverted Auster
From the shore, and there were tears of sorrow; But Auster, from the south, returned and he was joyous.
The prayers were answered on September 27th. The wind changed to southerly, and William set sail to land at Pevensey in Sussex on September 28th, 1066. Two weeks later he gained his title "the Conqueror" by defeating the forces of King Harold near the town of Hastings.
The timeliness of the southerly wind was crucial to the outcome. It gave William the opportunity of landing at Pevensey while Harold was still busy in the north of England repulsing an attack by Hardrada, the King of Norway, which he did successfully at the battle of Stamford Bridge. If William had been unable to sail around the time he did, Harold would have had sufficient time to reach the south, and might well have deprived the Normans of their easy landing. Had the wind continued to blow from the north even for another week, the course of history in these parts might well have been quite different.