Imagining the medieval face of battle: the ‘Malfosse’ incident and the battle of Hastings, 1066–1200*

Abstract

Abstract One hundred years after the battle of Hastings (1066), two historians wished to ask new questions about what the experience of the battle was like. Their approach – both sophisticated and seemingly modern – supplemented existing knowledge with imaginative recreation to fashion a fuller historical account of the battle. This article analyses the reporting of the ‘Malfosse’ incident, a deadly quasi-legendary episode in the encounter, in Wace’s Roman de Rou and the anonymous Chronicle of Battle Abbey, in relation to their sources and the Bayeux Tapestry. It argues that the prospect of historical detachment galvanized chroniclers into narrating the battle in a way that centred on experience.