King edward the confessor biography definition

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Strongly inclined towards peace, his reign was a time of prosperity and, following the Norman Conquest was remembered with nostalgia by the non-elite especially, who saw their Norman rulers as foreign.

William of Normandy, who had visited England during Godwin's exile, claimed that the childless Edward had promised him the succession to the throne, and his successful bid for the English crown put an end to Harold's nine-month kingship following a 7,000-strong Norman invasion.

On the one hand, he may not have been the saint of later tradition. The magnates were not prepared to engage them in civil war and forced the king to make terms. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994.

The Anglo-Saxon lay and ecclesiastical nobility invited Edward back to England in 1041; this time he became part of the household of his half-brother Harthacanute (son of Emma and Canute), and according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was sworn in as king alongside him.

Also under Edward, a marked change occurred in Anglo-Saxon art, with continental influences becoming more prominent (including the "Winchester Style" which had become known in the tenth century but prominent in the eleventh), supplanting Celtic influences prominent in preceding painting, sculpture, calligraphy and jewellery (see Benedictional of St.

Æthelwold for an example of the Winchester Style).

Edward's reign is memorialized in an eight panel stained glass window within St Laurence Church, Ludlow, England. Alfred died soon after as a result of his torture. Channel 4. His familiarity with Normandy and its leaders would also influence his later rule: the refuge he was given in Normandy, vis a vis the disregard the Normans paid him while he was there, would leave him both grateful and bitter towards his kinsmen.

Earl Godwin returned with an army following a year later, however, forcing the king to restore his title and send away his Norman advisors. Edward was accordingly styled Edward the Confessor, partly to distinguish him from his canonized predecessor Edward the Martyr. On this occasion the honor of preparing a sermon was given to Aelred, the revered Abbot of Rievaulx, to whom is generally attributed the vita (life) in Latin, a hagiography partly based on materials in an earlier vita by Osbert de Clare and which in its turn provided the material for a rhymed version in octasyllabic Anglo-Norman, possibly written by the chronicler Matthew Paris.

Edgar Ætheling was elected king by the Witan after Harold's death but was brushed aside by William. Evaluation of Edward's legacy is complicated by the myth-making that surrounds his name. The Witan’s political and advisory power continued and after Edward had experienced its power before in 1052, he did not want to challenge it any more.

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle indicates the popularity he enjoyed at his accession—"before Harthacanute was buried, all the people chose Edward as king in London." Edward was crowned at the cathedral of Winchester, the royal seat of the West Saxons on April 3, 1043. Centuries later, Westminster was deemed symbolic enough to become the permanent seat of English government under Henry III.

The Abbey contains a shrine to Edward which was the centrepiece to the Abbey's redesign during the mid-thirteenth century. The Earls of Mercia and Northumbria, who were two senior noblemen, were still loyal to Edward, and since Godwin was outnumbered, he decided to leave England and live in Flanders with his family.

Edward made an increase in the amount of Normans advising him at court between 1051 and 1052.