Edward the Confessor

Edward the Confessor (c. 1004-January, 1066) was the penultimate Saxon king of England. His reign foreshadowed the country's later connection with Normandy, whose duke William II was to supplant Edward's successor Harold as England's ruler.

The king Ethelred the Unready, Edward and his brother Alfred were taken to Normandy by their mother Emma, sister of Normandy's duke Richard II[?], to escape the Danish invasion of England in 1013. During his quarter-century of exile, Edward developed a familiarity with Normandy and its leaders which was to influence his later rule.

Returning to England with Alfred in an abortive attempt (1036) to displace Harold Harefoot from the throne, Edward escaped to Normandy after Alfred's capture and death. He was invited back to England in 1041, this time as co-ruler with his half-brother Harthacanute (son of Emma and Canute), on whose death on June 8, 1042, he ascended the throne. Edward was crowned at Winchester Cathedral on April 3, 1043.

Edward's sympathies for Norman favourites frustrated Saxon and Danish nobles alike, fuelling the growth of anti-Norman opinion led by Godwin, Earl of Wessex, who had become the king's father-in-law in 1045. Exiled in September 1051, Godwin returned with an armed following a year later, forcing the king to restore his title. Godwin died in 1053, but his son Harold accumulated even greater territories, and in January 1066 took the throne upon Edward's death.

Edward married Edith of Wessex on January 23, 1045. It was a platonic marriage, with Edward refusing to consummate it for religious reasons.

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 7000-strong Norman invasion.

Edward's reign marks a transition between the 10th century West Saxon kingship of England and the Norman monarchy which followed Harold's death. The great earldoms established under Canute grew in power, while Norman influence became a powerful factor in government and in the leadership of the Church.