Rating: 
Summary: Free anglo-saxons - Brutal battles - Doubtful title
Review: The title "the last English king" is quite doubtful: In the battle with Hastings (1066) the last anglo-saxon king Harold Godwinson fell. The following norman rulers continued to call themselves kings of England. The term England was deduced from the tribe of the "Angeln". The English nation in the today's sense should result however only later from the fusion of the different peoples (Celts, Anglo-Saxons, Danes, Norwegians and french Normans). Walt, the ony survivor of King Harold's body guard, reaches on his migrations until small Asia. There he, who had lost his right hand at the battle of Hastings, tells his story till the end of the battle to his way companions . He describes the complicated relationships between the former scandinavian and anglo-saxon kings, as well as their connections to the normans. Beyond that the reader gets a view of social conditions of the time before William the conquerer, in which old traditions of legislation, administration were determining taxes and iurisdiction. The king had to succeed in relation to regional rulers and was dependent on their support in the Witan. Beside the noble ones and their attendants the national defense was incumbent on the duty of a people army of all free men (Fyrd). Some church dignitary did not take it too exactly with the canonical right and had wife and/or a loving. The feudalism of the invaders, which they along-brought from normandy, prepared, in the shoulder conclusion with the Roman church, an end for these conditions. A taut and centralistic leaning system suppressed from now on the in former times quite free population and it exploited with taxes and deliveries. The military affairs of the conquerers, which beside armored, noble riders (knights), who had already proven their superiority against the sign barrier from foot people at Hastings, based on the structure of strong castles whose sould lend those the norman England a singular impact force. The open and honest epilog of the author puts aside the discussion more numerously speak and conceptual anachronisms. In modern Prosa the written, nevertheless as the one which can be designated historically, novel avails itself of a crude, sometimes brutal and vulgaeren language. The battles of Stamford Bridge (against the Norwegian king Harald Hardrada) and Hastings are described in drastic way in detail and are nothing for readers with tender mind. While the passages, which are concerned with events from anglo-saxon view interesting and informative are, work those from Walt's journey something fatiguing. Additional visualization by a historical map and a family tree of the kings, would have amounted to to a better understanding and the novel revaluations to know. Summa summarum the novel is to be evaluated with three amazonstars.
Rating:
Summary: a groundling view of the norman conquest
Review: This rip-snorting novel uses the back door to illuminate a key event of Western civilization: the Norman
Conquest of England in 1066. Chief protagonist Walt - an nondescript Saxon soldier - sums up the
consensus view of professional historians when he overhears an opposing general address his Norman
forces thus (page 55): "Today this little offshore island with its barbaric folk will be drawn into the wider
world of continental Europe, will enter the mainstream of history."
There is a massive scholarship on the Norman Conquest, the last time in recorded history that
Britain was invaded (think Churchill and the spring of 1940 for the closest modern instance). Our
narrator Walt, intimate with Harold (that "last English king"), tells his story circa 1170 en route to the
Holy Land. We are led into the convoluted claims made for the English throne as Edward the
Confessor lays dying. Who had the best claim: the Saxon Harold, the Norwegian Harold, or the
Norman William? Professional historians still dispute the point.
This is a rollicking, roaring tale of medieval low-life. Readers comfortable with their English
history will enjoy it immensely; those less familiar with it may flounder. To get some context, check out
the Bayeux tapestry website ... and Chapter 2 (plus accompanying
videocassette) of the splendid Robert MacNeil et al 1986 THE STORY OF ENGLISH. [220 words]
Rating:
Summary: Not the Best Book about King Harold
Review: This story chronicles the life of King Harold of the English as remembered by King Harold's only surviving bodyguard Walt as he travels to the Holy Land with ex-monk Quint. The scenes he conjures up for Quint are moving and at times exciting. However, the philosophical and other references in the book are distracting and quite frankly boring. I did not much enjoy the "Middle East" travel descriptions as I wanted to read only about the Norman Conquest. If you like pure historical fiction not cluttered with obscure references to things otherwise boring-DO NOT READ THIS NOVEL. There are many other novels about this era in history that are more well written and engaging! Harold the King by Helen Hollick, Gildenford, The Norman Pretender & The Disputed Crown by Valerie Anand, and The Conquest by Elizabeth Chadwick are much better reads to name just a few.
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