In the hands of diplomatists like William and Lanfranc, all these arguments, none of which had in itself the slightest strength, were enough to turn the great mass of continental opinion in William's favour.But he could add further arguments specially adapted to different classes of minds.He could hold out the prospect of plunder, the prospect of lands and honours in a land whose wealth was already proverbial.It might of course be answered that the enterprise against England was hazardous and its success unlikely.
But in such matters, men listen rather to their hopes than to their fears.To the Normans it would be easy, not only to make out a case against Harold, but to rake up old grudges against the English nation.Under Harold the son of Cnut, Alfred, a prince half Norman by birth, wholly Norman by education, the brother of the late king, the lawful heir to the crown, had been betrayed and murdered by somebody.A widespread belief laid the deed to the charge of the father of the new king.This story might easily be made a ground of national complaint by Normandy against England, and it was easy to infer that Harold had some share in the alleged crime of Godwine.
It was easy to dwell on later events, on the driving of so many Normans out of England, with Archbishop Robert at their head.Nay, not only had the lawful primate been driven out, but an usurper had been set in his place, and this usurping archbishop had been made to bestow a mockery of consecration on the usurping king.The proposed aggression on England was even represented as a missionary work, undertaken for the good of the souls of the benighted islanders.
For, though the English were undoubtedly devout after their own fashion, there was much in the ecclesiastical state of England which displeased strict churchmen beyond sea, much that William, when he had the power, deemed it his duty to reform.The insular position of England naturally parted it in many things from the usages and feelings of the mainland, and it was not hard to get up a feeling against the nation as well as against its king.All this could not really strengthen William's claim; but it made men look more favourably on his enterprise.
The fact that the Witan were actually in session at Edward's death had made it possible to carry out Harold's election and coronation with extreme speed.The electors had made their choice before William had any opportunity of formally laying his claim before them.This was really an advantage to him; he could the better represent the election and coronation as invalid.His first step was of course to send an embassy to Harold to call on him even now to fulfil his oath.The accounts of this embassy, of which we have no English account, differ as much as the different accounts of the oath.Each version of course makes William demand and Harold refuse whatever it had made Harold swear.These demands and refusals range from the resignation of the kingdom to a marriage with William's daughter.And it is hard to separate this embassy from later messages between the rivals.In all William demands, Harold refuses; the arguments on each side are likely to be genuine.
Harold is called on to give up the crown to William, to hold it of William, to hold part of the kingdom of William, to submit the question to the judgement of the Pope, lastly, if he will do nothing else, at least to marry William's daughter.Different writers place these demands at different times, immediately after Harold's election or immediately before the battle.The last challenge to a single combat between Harold and William of course appears only on the eve of the battle.Now none of these accounts come from contemporary partisans of Harold; every one is touched by hostile feeling towards him.Thus the constitutional language that is put into his mouth, almost startling from its modern sound, has greater value.A King of the English can do nothing without the consent of his Witan.They gave him the kingdom; without their consent, he cannot resign it or dismember it or agree to hold it of any man;without their consent, he cannot even marry a foreign wife.Or he answers that the daughter of William whom he promised to marry is dead, and that the sister whom he promised to give to a Norman is dead also.Harold does not deny the fact of his oath--whatever its nature; he justifies its breach because it was taken against is will, and because it was in itself of no strength, as binding him to do impossible things.He does not deny Edward's earlier promise to William; but, as a testament is of no force while the testator liveth, he argues that it is cancelled by Edward's later nomination of himself.In truth there is hardly any difference between the disputants as to matters of fact.One side admits at least a plighting of homage on the part of Harold; the other side admits Harold's nomination and election.The real difference is as to the legal effect of either.Herein comes William's policy.The question was one of English law and of nothing else, a matter for the Witan of England and for no other judges.William, by ingeniously mixing all kinds of irrelevant issues, contrived to remove the dispute from the region of municipal into that of international law, a law whose chief representative was the Bishop of Rome.By winning the Pope to his side, William could give his aggression the air of a religious war; but in so doing, he unwittingly undermined the throne that he was seeking and the thrones of all other princes.
