Authenticated by historical research
If you are studying the Norman Invasion or the Battle of Hastings for school or higher education you will find information here you will not find on any other web sites.
Don't read the out of date stuff repeated ad infinitum across the academic world without getting the latest information here - this is the latest information - tell your teacher or mentor to check it out - we are changing history here. Throw the books that say the Normans landed at Pevensey away and the ones that say the Battle was at the site at Battle Abbey - that site has absolutely no archaeology at all to support it.
This web site is and has been the leading web site for the Norman Invasion, subject since first published in 1994, because it proves where the Normans actually landed and confirms that Victorian interpretations of texts were wrong.
Described by the Guardian newspaper as "A really good read - why hasnt someone published this?" - a good question!! I guess they might now!!!
The Domesday evidence and Bayeux Tapestry work in particular has received praise from the leading experts in the country, now read why the Battle site is also in the wrong place.
This is a new section of the massively successful web site Secrets of the Norman Invasion web site. It, like the first part of this site, is published now because road developers have proposed yet another route through the Norman Invasion site at Wilting Manor (2009). The people who propose this road are guilty of supreme arrogance, because they know that the claim exists against the Wilting site and despite a huge amount of money being spent at the last Public Inquiry in 1996, they have chosen a route that crosses the main area of archaeological interest on that site.
The arrogance in their claim is twofold in that a route was identified at the last Inquiry (1996) that was the cheapest (route S3A). A route that would preserve the integrity of the Norman Invasion site, whether the claim was upheld in the course of time or not. However rather than choose the cheapest route, which was also identified by the Highways Agency engineers as having the least cultural or environmental impact, they have adopted the view that because the Inspector at the last Inquiry chose to allow the adoption of a route that went south of the site, they are entitled to transect the main area of the site, without reference to any of the archaeology that was found or historical documents that support it. The excuse being that the Inspector at the last Inquiry reported that he had not seen proof of the Norman Invasion taking place there, and therefore those who propose a new road through this site have assumed that the case was and can never be supported.
Technically the Inspector's decision was correct, in the same way an Inspector could rightly say that he has not seen proof that Druids used Stonehenge. A trick issue, since people believe the Druids used Stonehenge, because like the Norman Invasion, they were told that at school. In fact the Druids are very unlikely ever to have used Stonehenge, and like the Norman Invasion site, there is no archaeology that will provide definitive proof. That does not remove Stonehenge, or Woodhenge down the road, from a list of monuments that need protection - just because Woodhenge is a circle of holes in the ground where posts once stood.
The claim at the time was not that the Normans landed at Wilting, but like all people who study history seriously, that the Normans probably landed at Wilting on the balance of historical proof. The archaeology that will prove this site is authentic is extremely difficult to obtain, but undoubtedly there. It is a specialist field that neither of the teams who have visited the site have asked for or used, and is of course also dependant upon funding that has not been provided yet.
I am therefore put in the intolerable position, yet again, of having my judgment trashed by people who claim to be Norman experts, who have not studied Norman history as their specialist subject.
At the last Inquiry Wessex Archaeology and Dr Gardiner, who represented them, tried to make me take down my web site, stating that I was damaging their business by telling the world what they said at the Inquiry. I refused that intimidation and want to make it clear that I will report everything again. My letter to the Inspector is here because I have pulled out of that process. I consider the rules they were seeking to subject me to amounted to Academic Abuse, which I am obliged by the rules of fair play to reject.
I invited the Oxford Archaeology team, who are this time representing the road builders, to accompany me around the site and offer them help in 2005, when they started their work for the road builders. They decided for their own reasons not to respond and as a result have presented their case without doing their due diligence of checking other sites which might impinge upon their own. A copy of that letter is here.
As a consequence of ignoring my assistance they have no knowledge of the work being done on the connected as yet unauthorised site of the Battle of Hastings. That site is connected to the Norman Invasion site and one cannot be true without the other - something that has escaped the thinking of those who are looking after their own yards and not the nation's. It is a madness to assume that history is not interconnected and a serious flaw in their judgment.
The summary of research offered by those proposing this new road to the Inspector is woefully inadequate, and out of date by twelve years, in relation to my work. There has been no attempt to even try to find out what may or may not be relevant. I had hoped that the Inspector would see through this sham of a level playing field and that those who care about the issues of our national heritage will awaken to what is happening in the name of financial gain on the County Council, who are responsible for this madness. There can be no conceivable reason to build a road through this site, when a cheaper non intrusive road exists. My thesis has been described by Mr Julian Munby of Oxford Archaeology as "Ingenious", which suggests invention, which I think I am entitled to take offence to. Maybe I would if I wasn't so thick skinned. However I am not paid to do this work, as he is, and not one archaeologist or historian has offered a serious critique in twelve years. The assumption that this work is somehow created to defeat his employers attempt to build this new road shows a sad lack of respect for documentary evidence.
As a consequence of the events I witnessed at the Public Inquiry the other day I realised that it was not acting in the interests of cultural heritage to continue to present evidence, when parameters had been set to dismiss the evidence even before it was given. Since there are no sites currently supported by Norman archaeology it is a blatant abuse of position for that requirement to be needed to dismiss my case. I was effectively being set up for a fall - like the last Inquiry. The time has come to draw a line in the sand. Free academic debate was being put on trial and the goal posts placed in different positions at each end of the pitch, depending upon which side you were playing. I therefore withdrew from that Inquiry and will let myself and my work be judged by history and not an Inquiry that is based upon an inherently flawed premise, that historical documents cannot confirm the Norman Invasion site.
Some final comments: These pages are formatted to be read on any width browser. If you find it a little wide, because you have a new high resolution screen, just grab the edge of your browser and drag the edge across the page to reduce the browser page width to look something approaching book size. Due to the speed of events not all chapters are live yet - just watch this space - it will all be up here shortly. You are the judge on this issue - this isn't going to go away. Thank you for your support and the thousands of readers every year - read now the evidence, for historical truth to be revealed.
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