ourable weather conditions this late in the season, but more importantly because of King Harold’s absence in the north. This latter fact meant that William’s landing was unopposed, which would not have been the case before 8 September, when Harold was still maintaining his coast watch. It has been suggested that William knew of the disbandment of Harold’s coastal defence forces and that he chose to set sail at this time in order to exploit this circumstance. However, it is likely that King Harold would have remained in London even after the disbandment of the coastal garrisons, and that he could have moved rapidly against William’s forces before they became established. It was Harold’s absence in the north that enabled William to secure seventeen clear days in which to disembark his army and consolidate his position in England, the distraction of the Norwegian invasion proving the vital factor in his unopposed landing. It has also been suggested that William knew about the Norwegian invasion and arranged his crossing to exploit Harold’s absence. This is very unlikely; William of Poitiers makes it quite clear that the change in wind direction was the crucial factor in William’s actions at this point rather than any knowledge of Harold’s circumstances. In addition, he shows that William only learned of Harald of Norway’s invasion after his own landing in England. There is no reason to doubt William of Poitiers’ account on these points, and it fits with English reports of surprise at the Norwegian invasion.
Soon after his landing, Duke William began to construct a castle at Pevensey in order to consolidate his foothold. However, the unsuitability of his landing place as a base of operations quickly persuaded him to move along the coast to the nearby port of Hastings. The security afforded by Harold’s absence in the north, and his knowledge of it, allowed him to carry out this move successfully on 29 September. There, based on the narrow peninsula on which the town of Hastings stood, William was in a position to protect the escape route to his ships anchored in the harbour. If the need arose, he could defend the base of the peninsula with a rearguard while the bulk of his army re-embarked safely. Here William ordered another castle to be built, while his forces combined scouting with raiding the surrounding countryside. This raiding was necessary because the Norman army was now short of supplies, but it may also have been intended to provoke an English response.
The measures William took in the first few days after his landing were sensible precautions to adopt in a strange land when he was still unsure of the situation. However, he remained in this same position at Hastings for a total of seventeen days, which seems rather a long time. This has been seen as a prudent policy of remaining near to the coast and his line of retreat. Although a certain amount of caution had undoubtedly been an important element of William’s previous campaigns, his present invasion of England had, so far, been anything but prudent. He may simply have returned to his more familiar policy of wariness, but if so it seems an odd time to have done so. William was in a restricted position at Hastings, where he would have found availability of supplies gradually reduced as his troops denuded the surrounding area. It is difficult to see how he hoped to win the kingdom by remaining near his line of retreat until he ran out of supplies. It would surely have been preferable for his cavalry to move out into more open country, where he could make full use of the advantage conferred by their mobility both to secure provisions and to conquer the kingdom. Indeed, he could probably have taken advantage of Harold’s absence in the north to advance on Dover, Canterbury or Winchester. So why did William fail to adopt a more active course of action? The answer probably lies in the news he received soon after his landing.
The news that Duke William received, probably on the day after his landing, was that King Harold had secured a crushing victory at Stamford Bridge. T