0:00:04 > 0:00:06The story of the British
0:00:06 > 0:00:10is one of the most extraordinary tales in history.
0:00:12 > 0:00:17It's a tale of conflict and struggle,
0:00:17 > 0:00:20of invasions and civil war.
0:00:22 > 0:00:26It is a story of resistance and endurance,
0:00:26 > 0:00:30and at times, sheer bloody-minded defiance.
0:00:30 > 0:00:34And it was the people themselves who made our history.
0:00:37 > 0:00:41Often in the face of adversity, it was the people who
0:00:41 > 0:00:43won our rights - one of our great legacies to the world.
0:00:48 > 0:00:51And if there's one time when these ideas emerge at grassroots,
0:00:51 > 0:00:55it's the time between the Norman Conquest and Magna Carta.
0:00:55 > 0:00:58A time when the histories of all our peoples -
0:00:58 > 0:01:02Scots, Irish, English and Welsh - are drawn together.
0:01:02 > 0:01:06In the next chapter of our story, the coming of the Normans,
0:01:06 > 0:01:10Magna Carta and the first fights for freedom.
0:01:25 > 0:01:28At the year 1,000, the first millennium,
0:01:28 > 0:01:31many in Christendom thought the world might end.
0:01:31 > 0:01:37But it didn't, and afterwards people looked forward with a new optimism.
0:01:37 > 0:01:41'Across Britain, the standard of living rose with stable governments.
0:01:41 > 0:01:43'England became one of the wealthiest countries in Europe,
0:01:43 > 0:01:47'but that made it a prize, and in the 11th century
0:01:47 > 0:01:51came the most fateful invasion in British history.'
0:01:53 > 0:01:56Just imagine the scene - it's late September.
0:01:56 > 0:02:00600 or 700 ships floating on the morning tide.
0:02:00 > 0:02:06Troop ships, supply vessels carrying everything from portable forges
0:02:06 > 0:02:10to the prefabricated pieces of a wooden motte-and-bailey castle.
0:02:10 > 0:02:14There's only maybe 8,000 or 9,000 frontline troops,
0:02:14 > 0:02:17but they're the hardest men you could imagine.
0:02:17 > 0:02:20Their goal is the conquest of England.
0:02:21 > 0:02:23These events here on Pevensey beach
0:02:23 > 0:02:26will not only engulf not only the whole of England,
0:02:26 > 0:02:29but Wales and even Ireland.
0:02:29 > 0:02:35We've reached the most famous date in the history of Britain, 1066.
0:02:43 > 0:02:48England in 1066 was a good place to live by the standards of the day.
0:02:51 > 0:02:55It had a national law, a strong sense of national identity.
0:02:59 > 0:03:03It had many towns, local government and a money economy.
0:03:03 > 0:03:05'And the wealthiest part of England
0:03:05 > 0:03:08'was the fertile lands of East Anglia.'
0:03:11 > 0:03:17This is the wonderfully named parish of Old Newton, Gipping and Dagworth.
0:03:17 > 0:03:20A little corner of Anglo-Saxon England.
0:03:20 > 0:03:24300 people in scattered farmsteads
0:03:24 > 0:03:26along the valley of the River Gipping.
0:03:28 > 0:03:32And we come here to find one Anglo-Saxon farmer,
0:03:32 > 0:03:37a man who had 150-200 acres. A mill, a little church.
0:03:37 > 0:03:38His name was Breme.
0:03:38 > 0:03:43In Anglo-Saxon, it means "the renowned", and "the famous".
0:03:43 > 0:03:46As we will see, he will live up to his name.
0:03:50 > 0:03:53Breme was a free man. He lived here in Little Dagworth,
0:03:53 > 0:03:56in the depths of the countryside.
0:03:56 > 0:03:58But he had a voice in local and national affairs,
0:03:58 > 0:04:02through the meetings of the courts of hundred and shire.
0:04:02 > 0:04:05This is the site of his farm,
0:04:05 > 0:04:07and like countless family houses in Britain,
0:04:07 > 0:04:10it's got quite a tale to tell.
0:04:10 > 0:04:13Some Australians turned up
0:04:13 > 0:04:17and said that they'd tracked their own ancestry to Dagworth.
0:04:17 > 0:04:20And that they were living in a place also called Dagworth, I think.
0:04:20 > 0:04:22A sheep station.
0:04:22 > 0:04:24I think there's meant to be some sort of link
0:04:24 > 0:04:26to the writing of Waltzing Matilda, wasn't there,
0:04:26 > 0:04:29- on that sheep station?- Yes.
0:04:29 > 0:04:31The birth of Waltzing Matilda in Dagworth!
0:04:31 > 0:04:34We really are on a historical ley line here.
0:04:34 > 0:04:38Originally it would have been an open hall house,
0:04:38 > 0:04:41one large space.
0:04:41 > 0:04:43A fire somewhere in the middle of the hall,
0:04:43 > 0:04:46and probably just an opening in the roof.
0:04:46 > 0:04:51Back in 1066, there was an Anglo-Saxon man who lived here.
0:04:51 > 0:04:55He probably was married, and maybe had three little boys,
0:04:55 > 0:04:57for all I know.
0:04:57 > 0:05:01There is Breme, with his carucate and a half,
0:05:01 > 0:05:04maybe 175 or 180 acres - something like that.
0:05:04 > 0:05:0913 cows, 12 pigs, 16 sheep and 40 goats.
0:05:09 > 0:05:11And two plough teams.
0:05:11 > 0:05:13Do you know how they used to plough?
0:05:13 > 0:05:15By horses or by oxen.
0:05:15 > 0:05:22But I think 40 goats sounds rather useless today.
0:05:22 > 0:05:23HE LAUGHS
0:05:27 > 0:05:31The story of 1066 has been told many times -
0:05:31 > 0:05:34King Harold, William the Conqueror.
0:05:34 > 0:05:38But this is the tale of an ordinary person,
0:05:38 > 0:05:40swept up in those great events.
0:05:40 > 0:05:44Breme and his wife and kids, if he had them,
0:05:44 > 0:05:47had no reason to think their world would change.
0:05:47 > 0:05:51Here in a delightful hall by the River Gipping,
0:05:51 > 0:05:55they could still go on pilgrimage to Bury St Edmonds.
0:05:55 > 0:05:58Hold their customary feasts for their workers.
0:06:00 > 0:06:04They could go to the market and spend their silver pennies.
0:06:06 > 0:06:08But there was a catch.
0:06:08 > 0:06:12Breme, as a free man, owed military service to his king
0:06:12 > 0:06:14- and if war came,
0:06:14 > 0:06:19he had to take his coat of mail and his spear and his horse
0:06:19 > 0:06:20to go to fight in the war.
0:06:22 > 0:06:27In the autumn of 1066, war came.
0:06:29 > 0:06:31# Of our own will, we took the field
0:06:31 > 0:06:36# Our spears like stands of pine. #
0:06:36 > 0:06:38From the start, luck was against the English.
0:06:38 > 0:06:42When the Normans landed the English King Harold was up in the north,
0:06:42 > 0:06:44fighting the Vikings.
0:06:44 > 0:06:49# Far to the north, we put to flight An army twice this size. #
0:06:49 > 0:06:52'So the English were exhausted
0:06:52 > 0:06:56'when they faced William's New Model Army with their shock weapon.
0:06:57 > 0:06:59'Cavalry.'
0:07:03 > 0:07:07October 14th, 1066 was a catastrophe for the English people.
0:07:08 > 0:07:12"A havoc of our dear nation", as a chronicler said.
0:07:12 > 0:07:16# And under bitter sky
0:07:16 > 0:07:19# Pierced by the cruellest, blackest rain
0:07:19 > 0:07:22# The heart of England lies. #
0:07:22 > 0:07:24"The flower of England fell that day,"
0:07:24 > 0:07:26says the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
0:07:26 > 0:07:31With them, under the banner of his lord, Earl Gurth of East Anglia,
0:07:31 > 0:07:35'the faithful free man, Breme of Dagworth.'
0:07:35 > 0:07:38He was killed at the Battle of Hastings.
0:07:38 > 0:07:43They've made a war memorial for him, in the book, with his name.
0:07:43 > 0:07:48- The local people here have remembered him.- A real local hero.
0:07:48 > 0:07:51And we're still talking about him now, 1,000 years later.
0:07:55 > 0:07:57With the death of death of King Harold
0:07:57 > 0:07:59and the annihilation of the English army,
0:07:59 > 0:08:02Duke William had won England,
0:08:02 > 0:08:04with one blow.
0:08:06 > 0:08:09William brought over his aristocracy,
0:08:09 > 0:08:13but for working-class people like us, as an Anglo-Saxon,
0:08:13 > 0:08:17so much seemed to have been ripped away from us.
0:08:22 > 0:08:27Our connection with that leadership was replaced with a foreign language.
0:08:27 > 0:08:31Our aristocracy was wiped out in the battles.
0:08:31 > 0:08:37Working-class people, you somehow feel that today -
0:08:37 > 0:08:40that the position was usurped.
0:08:40 > 0:08:43I love the fact you use this term "the working-class people".
0:08:43 > 0:08:47Because, of course, in 1066 and long after, virtually all of us
0:08:47 > 0:08:50were the working people of England.
0:08:50 > 0:08:51That's all they ended up doing, wasn't it?
0:08:51 > 0:08:54Making us do the stuff for them.
0:08:54 > 0:08:56It was a brutal occupation.
0:08:56 > 0:08:59And the English remembered it.
0:08:59 > 0:09:02The end of the world as we know it.
0:09:05 > 0:09:09So began what would become know as "the Norman Yoke".
0:09:09 > 0:09:12The loss of English liberties
0:09:12 > 0:09:15at the hands of a new aristocracy of French-speaking Barons.
0:09:18 > 0:09:23'As autumn went into winter, William ravaged south-eastern England,
0:09:23 > 0:09:24'burning fields and villages.
0:09:24 > 0:09:28'Forcing the surviving English leadership to meet him.'
0:09:28 > 0:09:31This is where representatives of the English nation -
0:09:31 > 0:09:35and the English did believe they had a nation in 1066 -
0:09:35 > 0:09:37submitted to William the Conqueror.
0:09:41 > 0:09:44The Archbishop of York, the earls of the Midlands and the north,
0:09:44 > 0:09:48surviving nobility and "all the best men of London",
0:09:48 > 0:09:50the citizens of London,
0:09:50 > 0:09:54already the richest most influential civic body in the country.
0:09:55 > 0:10:00And they surrendered to William "out of force of circumstance,"
0:10:00 > 0:10:03says the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
0:10:03 > 0:10:07After the Normans had done their worst, devastating the countryside.
0:10:08 > 0:10:13And William promised he would be a gracious lord to them.
0:10:14 > 0:10:16They all knew what that meant.
0:10:16 > 0:10:21As a contemporary observed, from this moment cold heart
0:10:21 > 0:10:24and iron hand now ruled the English land.
0:10:28 > 0:10:32'And William wasn't a man to cross. Even his friends said that.'
0:10:32 > 0:10:36If anyone wants to know what kind of man King William was, listen to me.
0:10:36 > 0:10:40For I knew him and lived in his court.
0:10:40 > 0:10:42King William had great wisdom and power,
0:10:42 > 0:10:46but he was a harsh and cruel man, and utterly given over to greed.
0:10:51 > 0:10:52Over the next three years,
0:10:52 > 0:10:56the Normans crushed English resistance.
0:10:56 > 0:10:58William ravaged the whole of the North,
0:10:58 > 0:11:01reducing the people, so it was said,
0:11:01 > 0:11:05to eating rats and grass and even human flesh.
0:11:08 > 0:11:12And everywhere, said an eyewitness, he built castles,
0:11:12 > 0:11:14to oppress the poor people of England.
0:11:16 > 0:11:18There were around 500 of them altogether.
0:11:18 > 0:11:22At first, simple earth mounds with wooden stockades,
0:11:22 > 0:11:24which have long since gone.
0:11:27 > 0:11:29Here in Mount Bures in Essex,
0:11:29 > 0:11:32the Normans threw up a gigantic mound,
0:11:32 > 0:11:34which has given its name to the village.
0:11:37 > 0:11:41The mound sits on land owned by 92-year-old Ida McMaster,
0:11:41 > 0:11:45who invited archaeologists led by Carenza Lewis to investigate.
0:11:45 > 0:11:47CHEERING
0:11:47 > 0:11:49Welcome!
0:11:49 > 0:11:51Lovely. Thank you, boys.
0:11:51 > 0:11:52At last! How many years has it been?
0:11:52 > 0:11:54Well we found some roots.
0:11:54 > 0:11:58We haven't found any traces of a structure. We found two post holes.
0:11:58 > 0:12:01It doesn't look as if anyone was ever actually living here.
0:12:01 > 0:12:04I've waited 40 years to have this dig,
0:12:04 > 0:12:10I couldn't believe it when they said Carenza was going to mastermind it.
0:12:14 > 0:12:17The dig fulfils a promise Ida made to her late husband, Bill,
0:12:17 > 0:12:21who all his life was fascinated by the story of the village
0:12:21 > 0:12:23and its Norman mound.
0:12:23 > 0:12:27When he brought me out here first of all,
0:12:27 > 0:12:30and described what was here in this field,
0:12:30 > 0:12:33I absolutely fell in love with it.
0:12:34 > 0:12:39I couldn't do anything else but try and find out all about it.
0:12:39 > 0:12:43This is the top of the motte, the castle mound,
0:12:43 > 0:12:45and these are introduced by the Normans.
0:12:45 > 0:12:49'Most of the villagers are involved in this community dig,
0:12:49 > 0:12:52'hoping to solve the mysteries of the mound.'
0:12:52 > 0:12:56Tiny population in Mount Bures. It's only like 30 peasants.
0:12:56 > 0:12:58It's of no significance whatsoever.
0:12:58 > 0:13:01It's very strange they should have such an enormous earthwork
0:13:01 > 0:13:03for such a small place at that time.
0:13:03 > 0:13:06And it's ten metres high, it's on the top.
0:13:06 > 0:13:08A class one motte, the top category of motte.
0:13:08 > 0:13:10One of the tallest in the country.
0:13:14 > 0:13:17It's a perfect symbol of the Norman impact.
0:13:17 > 0:13:21You've got to imagine this huge fighting platform,
0:13:21 > 0:13:22made of wood, on top.
0:13:24 > 0:13:28And if there was an outer bailey - an enclosure around the church -
0:13:28 > 0:13:31that would have been packed with buildings.
0:13:31 > 0:13:33Claustrophobic. Granaries and barracks.
0:13:33 > 0:13:38Stables, forges, especially for the metal working you needed
0:13:38 > 0:13:41to maintain the army with armour and weaponry.
0:13:41 > 0:13:44A blitzed landscape all around.
0:13:44 > 0:13:48And not a tree standing behind which the poor benighted
0:13:48 > 0:13:53Anglo-Saxon peasants could get anywhere near this.
0:13:53 > 0:13:56This was a brutally functional fighting platform.
0:13:56 > 0:14:02Bristling with weaponry at the top of the local pyramid of domination.
0:14:07 > 0:14:09The Normans were a minority.
0:14:09 > 0:14:12An armed elite - maybe only 30,000 newcomers.
0:14:12 > 0:14:16Unlike the Saxons and the Vikings, you'd be hard-pushed to find them
0:14:16 > 0:14:18in our British DNA.
0:14:18 > 0:14:21But they left their mark.
0:14:22 > 0:14:25People with French names are still the richest Britons today.
0:14:25 > 0:14:27Better educated, better-off, longer-lived.
0:14:27 > 0:14:31From Beaulieu to Belgravia,
0:14:31 > 0:14:33they've still got the best real estate.
0:14:33 > 0:14:36Jane Austen's Mr D'Arcy was a Norman.
0:14:42 > 0:14:46In winter, 1085, with his grip on the land now secure,
0:14:46 > 0:14:48William ordered a survey of England,
0:14:48 > 0:14:51to find out what there was, who owned it,
0:14:51 > 0:14:53and how much tax could be got out of it.
0:14:54 > 0:14:58'The result was the first detailed portrait of England -
0:14:58 > 0:15:00'Domesday Book.'
0:15:03 > 0:15:07This, is the Exeter Domesday Book.
0:15:08 > 0:15:10The local draft,
0:15:10 > 0:15:14before the final, compressed version.
0:15:14 > 0:15:17It's the raw data of history.
0:15:17 > 0:15:22One scribe taking over from another scribe in the middle of an entry.
0:15:22 > 0:15:26Some of them not very familiar with English, by the look of it.
0:15:26 > 0:15:32How for instance did they manage to make "Bulfestra" out of Buckfast?
0:15:32 > 0:15:33I don't know.
0:15:36 > 0:15:40'Domesday lists almost 13,000 places with their human population
0:15:40 > 0:15:43and even their animals.
0:15:43 > 0:15:47HE SPEAKS OLD ENGLISH
0:15:51 > 0:15:55"It is a shame to tell this, but he thought no shame to do it".
0:15:55 > 0:15:57HE SPEAKS OLD ENGLISH
0:16:02 > 0:16:07He didn't leave out a single ox, a single cow, a single pig.
0:16:10 > 0:16:14'Domesday reveals that England in 1086 had 2 million people,
0:16:14 > 0:16:18'mainly rural, but more than 100 towns.'
0:16:18 > 0:16:22'More than half of the English were tied peasants,
0:16:22 > 0:16:27'15% free men and women, and one in ten still slaves.'
0:16:27 > 0:16:29All this information was gathered
0:16:29 > 0:16:32by the old Anglo-Saxon system of local government.
0:16:32 > 0:16:36The local juries, courts of the hundreds, shires and boroughs.
0:16:36 > 0:16:39Like Shakespeare's Stratford, for instance.
0:16:39 > 0:16:43We have about 1,700 acres of arable.
0:16:43 > 0:16:46There are 29 households,
0:16:46 > 0:16:4721 of them villeins,
0:16:47 > 0:16:49and seven small holders.
0:16:49 > 0:16:52We have land for 31 plough teams,
0:16:52 > 0:16:55five acres of meadow on the Avon,
0:16:55 > 0:16:59and a mill that gives ten shillings a year
0:16:59 > 0:17:01and 1,000 eels.
0:17:05 > 0:17:07For most places in England,
0:17:07 > 0:17:10it's the first time they appear in history.
0:17:10 > 0:17:12Take Long Melford, in Suffolk.
0:17:13 > 0:17:17In our big community dig, we'd already found that Melford
0:17:17 > 0:17:20had been a busy place in Roman times.
0:17:20 > 0:17:23We'd like to get through to something from Roman or Saxon time.
0:17:23 > 0:17:26'In the Dark Ages it almost vanished,
0:17:26 > 0:17:29'but now in Domesday, it's thriving,
0:17:29 > 0:17:32'with 400 people, sheep flocks,
0:17:32 > 0:17:34'a church and the mill that gave the town its name.'
0:17:34 > 0:17:36Who did that?
0:17:36 > 0:17:38Did you do that one? Did you help?
0:17:42 > 0:17:45In our dig, we were hoping to find traces of the ordinary people
0:17:45 > 0:17:47listed in Domesday.
0:17:47 > 0:17:50The un-free villeins and cottagers.
0:17:50 > 0:17:53Of the 50 test pits in Melford,
0:17:53 > 0:17:58two were in hamlet called Kentwell, separately listed in Domesday.
0:17:59 > 0:18:04One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight,
0:18:04 > 0:18:05nine.
0:18:05 > 0:18:09The three trays there, and that tray at the back are all medieval.
0:18:09 > 0:18:11There's nothing in it except medieval pottery.
0:18:11 > 0:18:15So we're looking at a 40 centimetre-thick deposit,
0:18:15 > 0:18:17dating to the early medieval period.
0:18:17 > 0:18:21I think this is a very late shard of Thetford ware.
0:18:21 > 0:18:22It's early medieval.
0:18:22 > 0:18:25But the point of that is, it probably dates
0:18:25 > 0:18:28to around the time of the Domesday Book.
0:18:28 > 0:18:32There's not only Long Melford, but there is a little account
0:18:32 > 0:18:34of a separate manor called Kentwell, in 1086.
0:18:34 > 0:18:36And that's - well I'd love to know -
0:18:36 > 0:18:41held by an Anglo-Saxon farmer freely, whose name was Alfgar.
0:18:41 > 0:18:44Living on this little estate, were seven villeins,
0:18:44 > 0:18:48who are like semi-free peasants, one bordar,
0:18:48 > 0:18:51who's like a dependant peasant - a cottager.
0:18:51 > 0:18:53Five beasts.
0:18:53 > 0:18:5730 pigs, 80 sheep in 1066.
0:18:57 > 0:19:01It's a wonderful specific detail again,
0:19:01 > 0:19:04and you just wonder if this could have been part
0:19:04 > 0:19:06of that tiny little estate.
0:19:06 > 0:19:08There's a very good chance that in your list of names
0:19:08 > 0:19:12in the Domesday Book, some of them actually used these pots.
0:19:12 > 0:19:16They're the right date - 1070, 1080, 1090.
0:19:17 > 0:19:21So the English faced up to living under foreign occupation.
0:19:21 > 0:19:23The Normans didn't mix with them.
0:19:23 > 0:19:26For three or four generations, there's no inter-marriage.
0:19:26 > 0:19:29The French-speaking Normans saw themselves as socially
0:19:29 > 0:19:31and ethnically superior.
0:19:31 > 0:19:34The Anglo-Saxons lived under a kind of apartheid.
0:19:37 > 0:19:41From the big house, the Norman lords observed their new subjects
0:19:41 > 0:19:45with a mixture of curiosity and lofty Gallic distaste.
0:19:47 > 0:19:53The English have places in every village that they call "ale houses".
0:19:57 > 0:20:01There, the English peasants sit at the benches
0:20:01 > 0:20:03with their pots of ale.
0:20:04 > 0:20:06And believe it or not,
0:20:06 > 0:20:08at prayer time,
0:20:08 > 0:20:11they don't go to church.
0:20:11 > 0:20:13They just stand up,
0:20:13 > 0:20:16pray and carry on drinking.
0:20:20 > 0:20:25That's why the Normans say,
0:20:25 > 0:20:29"In every English pub, you'll see the devil".
0:20:38 > 0:20:43'But beyond the ale houses, life was nasty, brutish and short.
0:20:43 > 0:20:44'The English lower classes
0:20:44 > 0:20:47'could be arrested and executed with no trial.'
0:20:47 > 0:20:51What an amazing vista that is.
0:20:51 > 0:20:54'Habeas corpus simply didn't exist.'
0:20:54 > 0:20:57North-east, over to Leicester over there,
0:20:57 > 0:20:59towards Market Harborough over there.
0:20:59 > 0:21:01This is the quarry.
0:21:01 > 0:21:04It's always spectacular if you come up here of an evening.
0:21:04 > 0:21:08I wanted to do a photography project where I explored
0:21:08 > 0:21:12how the quarry and nature could co-exist together.
0:21:12 > 0:21:15But in doing that, I suddenly realised there a lot more here
0:21:15 > 0:21:18to see than just the quarry.
0:21:18 > 0:21:22'What Colin discovered was that Croft Hill
0:21:22 > 0:21:24'was a Norman execution site.'
0:21:24 > 0:21:28When you walk down through those and you see them you just think about
0:21:28 > 0:21:33people perhaps hanging from the trees, dying their miserable deaths.
0:21:33 > 0:21:36On a December day like this. Wintertime, isn't it?
0:21:36 > 0:21:38The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle tells the story.
0:21:38 > 0:21:42They say that many of them suffered unjustly.
0:21:42 > 0:21:44I think the Normans were trying to say, "We're in charge.
0:21:44 > 0:21:46"It doesn't matter what you think.
0:21:46 > 0:21:53"We're going to impose our rule on you, and you'll do what we say.
0:21:58 > 0:22:00In this same year, before Christmas,
0:22:00 > 0:22:03Ralph Basset held a court of the king's thanes
0:22:03 > 0:22:06at Hundhoge in Leicester.
0:22:06 > 0:22:10And hanged there more thieves than anyone had before.
0:22:12 > 0:22:1444 men were killed in no time.
0:22:15 > 0:22:18Six of them were blinded and castrated.
0:22:18 > 0:22:22And honest people said many of them suffered very unjustly.
0:22:24 > 0:22:27But our lord, God, from whom no secrets are hid,
0:22:28 > 0:22:33sees the poor oppressed by every kind of injustice.
0:22:33 > 0:22:39Deprived of their property and their lives. A terrible year was this.
0:22:51 > 0:22:54In Dagworth, a Norman colonist was rewarded with Breme's house.
0:22:54 > 0:22:58His name was Gros, Guillaume Gros.
0:23:00 > 0:23:03What happened to Breme's family, we don't know.
0:23:03 > 0:23:05Maybe they lived on their own land as tenants.
0:23:10 > 0:23:15By 1086, only two leading English landowners were left out of 1,400.
0:23:15 > 0:23:18The top of English society had gone,
0:23:18 > 0:23:22their land stolen by Norman feudal lords.
0:23:22 > 0:23:26All over the country, English people
0:23:26 > 0:23:28now had to rent their land, as Domesday says,
0:23:28 > 0:23:31miserably and with a heavy heart.
0:23:43 > 0:23:46But, brutal as the Norman Conquest was,
0:23:46 > 0:23:49it unleashed huge energies in British society.
0:23:51 > 0:23:54The close links with Normandy and France opened up trade
0:23:54 > 0:23:56and galvanised the economy.
0:23:59 > 0:24:03Bristol, for example, hardly merits a mention in Domesday Book.
0:24:03 > 0:24:05'But it was a strategic port
0:24:05 > 0:24:07'on the sea routes to Wales and Ireland,
0:24:07 > 0:24:09'and in the 12th century, it boomed.'
0:24:11 > 0:24:15Bristol rose very rapidly in the Middle Ages
0:24:15 > 0:24:17to become the third greatest city in Britain.
0:24:18 > 0:24:20Of course it would remain the outlet
0:24:20 > 0:24:22to Ireland and the North Atlantic
0:24:22 > 0:24:27right down to the time of Brunel's Great Britain
0:24:27 > 0:24:28and Great Western Railway.
0:24:28 > 0:24:32But the real clue to Bristol is in its name.
0:24:34 > 0:24:38In Anglo-Saxon, Brycgstow - "the meeting place by the bridge".
0:24:38 > 0:24:43What made Bristol tick throughout its history was trade.
0:24:45 > 0:24:47And the Bristolians traded anything.
0:24:47 > 0:24:51Skins, wine, fish and slaves.
0:24:51 > 0:24:54The earliest trade in Bristol recorded in detail
0:24:54 > 0:24:56was the slave trade of the 12th century.
0:24:56 > 0:24:59Welsh slaves, English slaves,
0:24:59 > 0:25:03being ultimately sent across to the developed countries of the world.
0:25:03 > 0:25:07Which is the Moorish states of Spain.
0:25:09 > 0:25:12Norman Bristol made money.
0:25:12 > 0:25:13In a few generations,
0:25:13 > 0:25:17the town's population shoots up from Domesday's few hundred people
0:25:17 > 0:25:19to 10,000.
0:25:19 > 0:25:22"Virtute et industria".
0:25:22 > 0:25:26It's like all these cities that made their wealth on hard work.
0:25:26 > 0:25:29This is actually part of a medieval building.
0:25:29 > 0:25:33You have this medieval arch doorway here, which is sort of blocked in.
0:25:33 > 0:25:36'And to help attract business,
0:25:36 > 0:25:39'the good burgers of Bristol rebranded their town.'
0:25:39 > 0:25:41Bristol petitions against Gloucester having been made
0:25:41 > 0:25:43an independent head port, and Gloucester's saying,
0:25:43 > 0:25:48"We're older, we're much older, We were founded by Caesar in 45AD."
0:25:48 > 0:25:51And Bristol comes back to it and says, "Oh yeah,
0:25:51 > 0:25:53"but we were founded by the Trojans. We were founded by..."
0:25:53 > 0:25:55- "..Brutus the Trojan".- Yes.
0:25:55 > 0:25:58And that's them there? That's the Trojans?
0:25:58 > 0:26:01So brilliant, isn't it? What a beautiful corner.
0:26:03 > 0:26:08So Norman Bristol took a new path. As well as furs from the north
0:26:08 > 0:26:09and Irish flax,
0:26:09 > 0:26:13the market here now offered Mediterranean spices
0:26:13 > 0:26:16and French wines.
0:26:16 > 0:26:20The Normans were slowly beginning to change the English.
0:26:20 > 0:26:22And the English were starting to emulate the Normans.
0:26:22 > 0:26:25These are the original trading tables,
0:26:25 > 0:26:28called the "nails" in Bristol - these bronze nails.
0:26:28 > 0:26:31This is actually where people would do business
0:26:31 > 0:26:34from the Middle Ages onwards.
0:26:34 > 0:26:36If you want to pay someone your debt back,
0:26:36 > 0:26:38you can pay in cash on the nail in Bristol,
0:26:38 > 0:26:40or you can use it to write out contracts.
0:26:42 > 0:26:44That's from my argosy to Aleppo.
0:26:44 > 0:26:47- That's my fee. - THEY LAUGH
0:26:49 > 0:26:50Come on - we don't run to that much.
0:26:54 > 0:26:57In the early 12th century, using Bristol as base,
0:26:57 > 0:27:00the Normans invaded South Wales.
0:27:01 > 0:27:04In Pembrokeshire alone, they built 50 castles,
0:27:04 > 0:27:10and the first systematic exploration of one of them is here at Nevern.
0:27:11 > 0:27:17The Normans, when they arrive here, probably about 1108, 1109,
0:27:17 > 0:27:20put up this large earth mound, probably with forced local labour.
0:27:20 > 0:27:22This creates a defensive headland.
0:27:26 > 0:27:31Here in Wales too, the Normans removed the top of the ruling class.
0:27:31 > 0:27:32But learning their lessons
0:27:32 > 0:27:35from their alienation of the English,
0:27:35 > 0:27:38here they co-opted many locals.
0:27:38 > 0:27:41The Anglo-Norman lords simply came in,
0:27:41 > 0:27:44took over the existing social organisation,
0:27:44 > 0:27:46the existing land structures.
0:27:46 > 0:27:51And simply supplanted the very top of the aristocratic elite.
0:27:51 > 0:27:55Many Welsh laws were retained. Many Welsh customs were retained.
0:27:58 > 0:28:01Here in Pembrokeshire, the Normans created an enclave
0:28:01 > 0:28:04studded with castles, which even today
0:28:04 > 0:28:06is distinctive in its language and customs.
0:28:08 > 0:28:10The dividing line is known as "the Lanska Line".
0:28:10 > 0:28:14It runs through towns and villages and even splits some places in half.
0:28:14 > 0:28:16Like Narberth.
0:28:19 > 0:28:21This part of West Wales
0:28:21 > 0:28:23became known as "Anglia Transwalliana",
0:28:23 > 0:28:26"England, the other side of Wales".
0:28:29 > 0:28:32One thing that happens as the Anglo-Norman world evolves,
0:28:32 > 0:28:34and has contact with the Welsh,
0:28:34 > 0:28:37is that you start to get Welsh princes and lords
0:28:37 > 0:28:42who are starting to do things in a more Anglo-Norman way.
0:28:42 > 0:28:44They build castles.
0:28:45 > 0:28:49Curiously, forming their castles and their settlements,
0:28:49 > 0:28:53they now give the fixed points from which Wales can be held.
0:28:54 > 0:28:59So, by the late 13th century, Edward I is able to march to Wales,
0:28:59 > 0:29:03capture key Welsh castles, and the Welsh lose power
0:29:03 > 0:29:07because by now you have got Wales in control centres.
0:29:07 > 0:29:12The Welsh create their own kind of yoke, as it were.
0:29:12 > 0:29:16So the Norman Conquest of England,
0:29:16 > 0:29:18in time drew in Wales and Ireland, too.
0:29:18 > 0:29:22Leaving legacies we're still trying to untangle today.
0:29:22 > 0:29:25On the horizon, though they couldn't see it yet,
0:29:25 > 0:29:27glimmerings of a greater Britain.
0:29:30 > 0:29:33But history never stands still.
0:29:33 > 0:29:36By the 1180s - 100 years after Domesday -
0:29:36 > 0:29:40through a gradual, almost imperceptible process of change,
0:29:40 > 0:29:43the Normans are starting to become English.
0:29:47 > 0:29:50'London is now the pre-eminent city,
0:29:50 > 0:29:52'the financial and commercial capital,
0:29:52 > 0:29:56'building on its Anglo-Saxon foundations.'
0:29:56 > 0:29:59Look at that, Tower of London - over on this side, here.
0:29:59 > 0:30:02And this little pattern of streets, here.
0:30:02 > 0:30:04It gives you a fantastic idea.
0:30:04 > 0:30:06Much better than the modern A-to-Z.
0:30:06 > 0:30:10Jetties coming out to the river and a host of ships in the Middle Ages.
0:30:12 > 0:30:14'In the 13th century, these wharfs were frequented
0:30:14 > 0:30:18'by merchants from France and Germany and the Baltic.
0:30:18 > 0:30:22'One of them named after Matilda. the daughter of the Norman king,
0:30:22 > 0:30:24'Henry I.'
0:30:25 > 0:30:28Dowgate is Anglo-Saxon, and Queenhithe.
0:30:28 > 0:30:33The one wharf of the medieval world that still survives.
0:30:34 > 0:30:37'Queenhithe was used by Londoners to bring in their corn,
0:30:37 > 0:30:40'from the Normans till the 20th century.'
0:30:42 > 0:30:44'Across England and Scotland, too,
0:30:44 > 0:30:49'towns brought a commercial revolution.'
0:30:49 > 0:30:52First driving force is the rise in the population,
0:30:53 > 0:30:57and also a gigantic explosion in the money supply.
0:31:00 > 0:31:02This was the only currency, don't forget.
0:31:02 > 0:31:06All the money in the 12th and 13th century is just silver pennies.
0:31:06 > 0:31:11Although you have pounds, shillings, pence, marks, there is just one coin.
0:31:11 > 0:31:13And there are 240 of these.
0:31:13 > 0:31:14'And the more money you have,
0:31:14 > 0:31:17'the more you need markets to spend it in.'
0:31:17 > 0:31:21I won't get you to roll it all out. If you walk backwards a little bit...
0:31:21 > 0:31:24'The 13th century was the golden age for the creation of markets
0:31:24 > 0:31:26'across Britain.'
0:31:26 > 0:31:29Lots of grants of new markets and fairs.
0:31:30 > 0:31:34And it's on these roles they're all recorded. Keep going.
0:31:34 > 0:31:35You'll have to go on and on.
0:31:35 > 0:31:40Throughout the course of the 13th century, over 2,000 of these grants
0:31:40 > 0:31:43setting up new markets and fairs, were issued.
0:31:45 > 0:31:50And look, the very second entry is a pardon
0:31:50 > 0:31:55to the Abbot of Hales, of the palfrey which he has given the king
0:31:55 > 0:32:01to have one market each week, lasting for two days at Hales.
0:32:01 > 0:32:05And the only condition of pardon is that he's got to use the money
0:32:05 > 0:32:08he would have spent on the palfrey buying two chalices for the abbey.
0:32:10 > 0:32:12MUSIC: "Apache" by The Shadows
0:32:12 > 0:32:15And like Long Melford In Suffolk,
0:32:15 > 0:32:16or Kibworth in Leicestershire,
0:32:16 > 0:32:18Halesowen in the Black Country is typical.
0:32:21 > 0:32:26The market here was founded in 1220, and is still a market today.
0:32:28 > 0:32:31Down here we have a rebuilt, admittedly,
0:32:31 > 0:32:34Dancer's outfitters.
0:32:34 > 0:32:38where I bought this jacket, and my first suit in 1968.
0:32:40 > 0:32:44'The latest fashions. Food, too. This is a medieval new town,
0:32:44 > 0:32:47'with a grand Norman parish church.'
0:32:47 > 0:32:51It's a magnificent building. It is huge.
0:32:51 > 0:32:55And you look in Domesday Book, there are two priests.
0:32:55 > 0:33:00What more to do you want to show the importance of the place?
0:33:00 > 0:33:04Black Country, Smethwick and West Bromwich,
0:33:04 > 0:33:07Birmingham just over the hills there.
0:33:07 > 0:33:11Not perhaps the most resonant historical landscape in Britain,
0:33:11 > 0:33:12you might have thought.
0:33:12 > 0:33:15but the roots of the Industrial Revolution here in the Black Country
0:33:15 > 0:33:20go much, much further back than you could ever have guessed.
0:33:20 > 0:33:24There's an incredible continuity of live and work and even
0:33:24 > 0:33:29political action by ordinary people back at least until the 1200s.
0:33:30 > 0:33:34'Back then the town was owned by the lord of the manor, the local abbot.
0:33:34 > 0:33:39Now, like today, Halesowen was also a metal-working place.
0:33:39 > 0:33:44Nailers and cutlers making the tools in a mainly agricultural society.
0:33:45 > 0:33:48But they were only licensed to work with the abbot's permission.
0:33:50 > 0:33:54Into the court at the manor of Halesowen in 1312.
0:33:54 > 0:33:56The abbot gives permission to Robert Smith of Dudley,
0:33:56 > 0:34:02now living in Halesowen, to fund and build a forge at Haymill Bank.
0:34:05 > 0:34:11To make metal for which he may forge hatchets and other tools.
0:34:11 > 0:34:13For the term of his life.
0:34:16 > 0:34:20'And you can still find the sites of those medieval cottage industries
0:34:20 > 0:34:24'hidden behind the modern townscapes
0:34:24 > 0:34:27- the roots of our industrial past -
0:34:27 > 0:34:30'for which the Black Country will become famed across the world.'
0:34:30 > 0:34:32It may look un-prepossessing,
0:34:32 > 0:34:35but this is a wonderful spot of for history.
0:34:35 > 0:34:39You have the Telford bridge here and a medieval mill site.
0:34:39 > 0:34:42And this must be the place where Hugh the Cutler
0:34:42 > 0:34:47made his grinding shop in 1346,
0:34:47 > 0:34:49to practice the art of the metalworker.
0:34:55 > 0:34:57Here in Halesowen, Hugh the Cutler,
0:34:57 > 0:35:02and all the workers on the manor, and the traders in the market, too,
0:35:02 > 0:35:06needed the abbot's license to sell the product of their labour.
0:35:13 > 0:35:15It's going to be a very useful field,
0:35:15 > 0:35:17because it hasn't been walked before.
0:35:19 > 0:35:24The field walkers are here to survey the abbot's domain.
0:35:25 > 0:35:27Put your right arm out,
0:35:27 > 0:35:30and touch the shoulder of the next person.
0:35:30 > 0:35:33Come on, push him along. That's right.
0:35:33 > 0:35:37As the borough's archaeological officer, I need this evidence,
0:35:37 > 0:35:41I need this information. I couldn't work without these lads.
0:35:41 > 0:35:45It's a crucial task, searching for the material evidence,
0:35:45 > 0:35:48gathering the raw data of local history.
0:35:50 > 0:35:53I like to get out in the countryside as much as I can,
0:35:53 > 0:35:54and being interested in history,
0:35:54 > 0:36:00particularly local history, it's a good way of combining the two.
0:36:00 > 0:36:04It's a family outing today,
0:36:04 > 0:36:06and they're all interested.
0:36:06 > 0:36:10It's a base of a pot, Roman.
0:36:10 > 0:36:12Very pleased with that. That's a nice piece.
0:36:12 > 0:36:16It's just adding the bigger picture of what was going on here,
0:36:16 > 0:36:18in the medieval period and before.
0:36:20 > 0:36:22Look at that!
0:36:22 > 0:36:25Now that is a really important piece.
0:36:25 > 0:36:29It may be a bowl, but look at the decoration of it.
0:36:29 > 0:36:32It's a very valuable piece, that's wealth.
0:36:36 > 0:36:42We're standing just about here. This side, this piece of masonry.
0:36:44 > 0:36:49The whole complex is about 190 feet from east to west,
0:36:49 > 0:36:52and 100 feet north to south.
0:36:54 > 0:36:57Into the chapter house.
0:36:57 > 0:37:02'From 1215 to 1538, the abbot ruled the people's lives here.
0:37:02 > 0:37:04'For the un-free, jobs, housing, marriage,
0:37:04 > 0:37:07'even death duties, in the hands of the lord.'
0:37:07 > 0:37:10Looks like a medieval roof.
0:37:10 > 0:37:12Absolutely beautiful.
0:37:12 > 0:37:15Medieval crown posts.
0:37:15 > 0:37:17So what was it? Give us a clue?
0:37:17 > 0:37:18I go with the infirmary,
0:37:18 > 0:37:21but there are other people who are not convinced.
0:37:21 > 0:37:25And it's, quite plausibly, the abbot's house.
0:37:25 > 0:37:28There's certainly a very glamorous building.
0:37:28 > 0:37:31And resented, quite clearly in the court rolls,
0:37:31 > 0:37:32by quite a few of the peasants.
0:37:32 > 0:37:35Hugely, particularly the higher-class peasants.
0:37:35 > 0:37:38Who knew the score and who knew their legal background.
0:37:43 > 0:37:46'And we know what the ordinary peasants of Halesowen
0:37:46 > 0:37:47'thought about their lords,
0:37:47 > 0:37:52'thanks to an amazing treasure trove here in Birmingham Central Library.'
0:37:53 > 0:37:57Gosh, so any idea how many miles of shelves you've got here?
0:37:57 > 0:38:00We think it's currently about...
0:38:00 > 0:38:06'A collection of 215 court rolls survives from medieval Halesowen,
0:38:06 > 0:38:09recording hundreds of sessions of the abbot's court.
0:38:13 > 0:38:16And one of them tells the story of a peasant activist
0:38:16 > 0:38:19whose battle with the abbot became bitterly personal.
0:38:20 > 0:38:23His name was Roger Kettle.
0:38:23 > 0:38:25Roger Kettle is very easily found,
0:38:25 > 0:38:29because his name appears constantly in these records.
0:38:29 > 0:38:32As a thorn in the flesh of the abbey,
0:38:32 > 0:38:37who he sees as making unreasonable impositions on the tenants.
0:38:38 > 0:38:42They realise that their conditions have deteriorated,
0:38:42 > 0:38:47and they see the lords as being the people who have oppressed them,
0:38:47 > 0:38:49and they see the king as a protector.
0:38:49 > 0:38:53They can see that if only they could get back to the good old days
0:38:53 > 0:38:56when the king was fully in control,
0:38:56 > 0:39:00and you didn't have this middle band of lords
0:39:00 > 0:39:02squeezing them,
0:39:02 > 0:39:06squeezing rents and services and payments of money from them.
0:39:06 > 0:39:09What it says is that he made a fine with the abbot
0:39:09 > 0:39:12"for the offence
0:39:12 > 0:39:16"of having impleaded him in the court of the lord king".
0:39:16 > 0:39:20The peasants of Halesowen have clubbed together to provide
0:39:20 > 0:39:23what we would now call a "fighting fund"
0:39:23 > 0:39:28to pay a lawyer to put their case to the king's judges.
0:39:28 > 0:39:31- Did they succeed?- No.
0:39:31 > 0:39:34Almost never did they succeed.
0:39:34 > 0:39:37They thought that the law was impartial.
0:39:37 > 0:39:40they thought that the king could be persuaded to be on their side,
0:39:40 > 0:39:44but they hadn't taken into account, of course, that the law
0:39:44 > 0:39:49was run by aristocrats in favour of aristocrats.
0:39:49 > 0:39:53So that constantly the lords' interest would be protected
0:39:53 > 0:39:56and defended by the lawyers and by the judges.
0:39:57 > 0:39:59So what happens to Kettle in the end?
0:39:59 > 0:40:03- The abbot arrested him and he died in custody.- Wow.
0:40:09 > 0:40:13So the feudal system was still against the ordinary people,
0:40:13 > 0:40:16and the violence caused by such tensions comes out
0:40:16 > 0:40:21in a new source for our social history, the coroner's rolls.
0:40:21 > 0:40:25About bedtime on 22nd August, 1266,
0:40:25 > 0:40:28Henry Colburn of Great Barford went out of his house,
0:40:28 > 0:40:29there to drink a pot of ale.
0:40:32 > 0:40:35At dawn the next day, his mother, Agnes Colburn, went to search for him
0:40:35 > 0:40:37and found him dead.
0:40:38 > 0:40:42His body having seven wounds about the heart and in the stomach.
0:40:43 > 0:40:45Apparently made with a knife.
0:40:45 > 0:40:50Four in the head, apparently made with a pick,
0:40:50 > 0:40:53and others in the throat, on the chin and in the head and in the brain.
0:40:56 > 0:40:59She immediately raised the hue, which was followed
0:40:59 > 0:41:01and found pledges from Humphrey and Thomas Quarrell.
0:41:06 > 0:41:08I swear by almighty God that the evidence I give...
0:41:08 > 0:41:11The English Coroner is a product of that time -
0:41:11 > 0:41:13a response to the tide of random killing.
0:41:13 > 0:41:17It was a Norman innovation, using the English jury.
0:41:20 > 0:41:23It came formerly in 1194,
0:41:23 > 0:41:26which I think was the reign of Richard I.
0:41:26 > 0:41:31And it seemed to me then that it was just an opportunity
0:41:31 > 0:41:35of raising money from the oppressed population of the country.
0:41:35 > 0:41:39And the one way of doing that is if anybody died unexpectedly,
0:41:39 > 0:41:42that was a way you could try and cash in on it.
0:41:42 > 0:41:46Of course, under the legislation, if you were killed,
0:41:46 > 0:41:50if you killed somebody by your horse
0:41:50 > 0:41:52or by your cart,
0:41:52 > 0:41:55that horse or cart would, under - it was called "deodand", I think -
0:41:55 > 0:41:57would be forfeit to the crown.
0:41:57 > 0:42:00So if somebody ran out in front of you, and you ran him
0:42:00 > 0:42:03over with your horse, then bad news,
0:42:03 > 0:42:06because they'd take your horse as a penalty to the crown,
0:42:06 > 0:42:08unless you could raise the money.
0:42:08 > 0:42:10Which might be your only source of livelihood.
0:42:10 > 0:42:12Might be the only source,
0:42:12 > 0:42:14so this is why coroners were not terribly popular.
0:42:14 > 0:42:16Not like today, of course(!)
0:42:18 > 0:42:20The Bedford coroner's rolls
0:42:20 > 0:42:22are one of the most amazing sources
0:42:22 > 0:42:25for the real lives of our 13th century ancestors.
0:42:25 > 0:42:29And the jaw-dropping violence of everyday life.
0:42:31 > 0:42:34And it was out of their world
0:42:34 > 0:42:36that the most famous legend of the time arose.
0:42:37 > 0:42:41The story of an outlaw who stood against the tyrant King John.
0:42:43 > 0:42:49A hero who we know by a 13th century criminal nomme de plume.
0:42:49 > 0:42:50Robin Hood.
0:42:50 > 0:42:53Right, for one of the king's deer, is your right hand.
0:42:53 > 0:42:57If you admit your guilt and save us time, the punishment is lessened.
0:42:57 > 0:42:59We can take a finger.
0:42:59 > 0:43:01The tale is a distant mirror
0:43:01 > 0:43:05of a time when for everybody, the issue was,
0:43:05 > 0:43:07"Who is the law supposed to serve?"
0:43:07 > 0:43:08No appeal?
0:43:10 > 0:43:13What the...?!
0:43:14 > 0:43:16Who's there!?
0:43:16 > 0:43:20The tale of Robin Hood and bad King John is a myth,
0:43:20 > 0:43:24but like all myths, it has a kernel of truth.
0:43:24 > 0:43:29The law wants respect. Shouldn't the punishment fit the crime?
0:43:29 > 0:43:33'King John's abuse of the law had antagonised both the people
0:43:33 > 0:43:35'and the nobles.
0:43:35 > 0:43:39'The barons increasingly now saw themselves not as Norman,
0:43:39 > 0:43:41'but as English.
0:43:41 > 0:43:44'And, alert to the opinions of their fellows countrymen,
0:43:44 > 0:43:49'they moved against the king, to fight arbitrary royal power.'
0:43:52 > 0:43:57In 1205, a meeting in Oxford, what they called a "parliament",
0:43:57 > 0:44:02forced the king to swear that he would preserve the rights
0:44:02 > 0:44:04of the English kingdom.
0:44:04 > 0:44:07And in that simple phrase is the idea
0:44:07 > 0:44:10that our rights are the possession,
0:44:10 > 0:44:12not of the king,
0:44:12 > 0:44:14but of his subjects.
0:44:14 > 0:44:16And that idea is what lies behind
0:44:16 > 0:44:20the most famous document in British history,
0:44:20 > 0:44:23possibly in world history. Magna Carta.
0:44:23 > 0:44:26So there it is.
0:44:26 > 0:44:31'The barons forced King John to agree to limit his own power.
0:44:31 > 0:44:33'Copies were sent out all over England,
0:44:33 > 0:44:37'this one in Hereford Cathedral, from 1217.'
0:44:37 > 0:44:40It is sort of an incredible, iconic, document.
0:44:40 > 0:44:42Everybody's heard of Magna Carta.
0:44:42 > 0:44:46If you talk to people in the street, nine times out of ten
0:44:46 > 0:44:49they will have heard of 1066 and Magna Carta.
0:44:49 > 0:44:54It's taken away the arbitrary nature of royal power,
0:44:54 > 0:44:57and particularly in the reign of King John.
0:44:57 > 0:45:01Before the Magna Carta, of course, the king's will decided everything,
0:45:01 > 0:45:04rather than any written papers.
0:45:04 > 0:45:08Magna Carta was a bill of rights. It was basically gathering all laws,
0:45:08 > 0:45:11and free men were already quite free, weren't they?
0:45:11 > 0:45:15Yes, there's not so much that's very new in here,
0:45:15 > 0:45:18it's just actually setting out formally,
0:45:18 > 0:45:19"These are the feudal laws.
0:45:19 > 0:45:22"These are the conditions by which we abide."
0:45:22 > 0:45:24There are many clauses that talk about free man
0:45:24 > 0:45:26and the right of free man
0:45:26 > 0:45:28Today, our idea of free man is everybody, isn't it?
0:45:28 > 0:45:32Whereas in this context, we're talking about a feudal society
0:45:32 > 0:45:35where the majority of people were tied to the their landowners
0:45:35 > 0:45:38and their lords,
0:45:38 > 0:45:40so the free men we're talking about
0:45:40 > 0:45:42are actually the elite top cream.
0:45:42 > 0:45:45So this is actually an elitist document.
0:45:45 > 0:45:48It's very conservative - it's not the thing it has become.
0:45:50 > 0:45:53And the most famous clause of all.
0:45:53 > 0:45:56"Every free person has the right to a fair trial".
0:46:13 > 0:46:15In English law, the roots of that system went back to
0:46:15 > 0:46:20Anglo-Saxon times, to the local juries elected in every village.
0:46:23 > 0:46:27In those days, the jury were all men over 12 years of age
0:46:27 > 0:46:29from two or three surrounding villages.
0:46:31 > 0:46:33And unlike now, where,
0:46:33 > 0:46:36if the jury knows anything about the case, they're disqualified.
0:46:36 > 0:46:38In those days, the more the merrier,
0:46:38 > 0:46:39because out of the villages,
0:46:39 > 0:46:41and the dozens of people that might come,
0:46:41 > 0:46:44somebody ought to know something about it.
0:46:45 > 0:46:49And here in Laxton, England's last working open field village,
0:46:49 > 0:46:51you can still see the jury
0:46:51 > 0:46:54supervising the regulation of the fields.
0:46:54 > 0:46:56As is has since the 13th century.
0:46:58 > 0:47:00Right, gentlemen, I'll call the court to order.
0:47:01 > 0:47:05Oyez, oyez, oyez. All manner of persons who own suit
0:47:05 > 0:47:10and service to the Court Leet of the Queen's most excellent majesty.
0:47:10 > 0:47:14Morning, gentlemen. We'll swear in the jury. With the foreman first.
0:47:14 > 0:47:16Take the bible in your right hand.
0:47:16 > 0:47:19Bill Haig, you as foreman of the jury,
0:47:19 > 0:47:21with the rest of your fellows...
0:47:21 > 0:47:24Watching the court day here at Laxton, you understand
0:47:24 > 0:47:27something absolutely central
0:47:27 > 0:47:31to the beginnings of representative government, here in England.
0:47:31 > 0:47:32The jury.
0:47:32 > 0:47:35...Nothing from hatred or malice, but in all things you shall true
0:47:35 > 0:47:39and just presentment make, according the best of your understanding,
0:47:39 > 0:47:40so help you God.
0:47:41 > 0:47:4312 good men and true.
0:47:43 > 0:47:48The like oath, which Bill Haig has taken on his part,
0:47:48 > 0:47:50you and every one of you shall well and truly observe.
0:47:50 > 0:47:54Bound together by solemn oaths which connect each other,
0:47:54 > 0:47:58and express their allegiance to the king or the queen or the ruler.
0:47:58 > 0:48:01And in the old days, they regulate not only the fields,
0:48:01 > 0:48:02but law and order -
0:48:02 > 0:48:06the whole way that the community got along together.
0:48:06 > 0:48:11It's an entirely co-operative communally organised system.
0:48:11 > 0:48:13And it's what the English, the British,
0:48:13 > 0:48:15later exported to the rest of the world.
0:48:17 > 0:48:20OK, onto the suit roll.
0:48:20 > 0:48:23- S Noble.- Present.
0:48:23 > 0:48:25- S Rose.- Present.
0:48:25 > 0:48:29From the free man of the manor to the local knights of the shire,
0:48:29 > 0:48:31it's how the people's opinions were conveyed
0:48:31 > 0:48:32to the makers of Magna Carta.
0:48:34 > 0:48:36- J Walker.- Absent.
0:48:36 > 0:48:39It wasn't democracy, but it was consultation.
0:48:39 > 0:48:41D Brown.
0:48:42 > 0:48:44He's here, but not speaking.
0:48:44 > 0:48:46And that's the key to what follows.
0:48:46 > 0:48:48Onto the minutes of the last court.
0:48:50 > 0:48:52The presentment paper was received for top field.
0:48:52 > 0:48:55S Rose had allowed spray to drift onto...
0:48:55 > 0:48:59In the 13th century, with the increasing peasant literacy,
0:48:59 > 0:49:04these ideas were percolating everywhere at the grass roots.
0:49:05 > 0:49:10In Wales, too, after the English Conquest of 1282,
0:49:10 > 0:49:12the jury system was introduced.
0:49:14 > 0:49:18And, even as the rulers of England were attacking Wales,
0:49:18 > 0:49:21we can see how it worked.
0:49:21 > 0:49:24Here in Rhuthun, in the border lands, where the two cultures met.
0:49:26 > 0:49:31Court of Llanerch, 10th June, 1294.
0:49:31 > 0:49:34Caddoc Blethyn accused Henry Rigby, of Lancaster,
0:49:34 > 0:49:37of theft of an iron-grey horse.
0:49:37 > 0:49:40He put the matter before a jury of six English men
0:49:40 > 0:49:44and six Welsh men, who said that Henry did take the horse
0:49:44 > 0:49:48without his leave, but not thievishly.
0:49:49 > 0:49:55Though of course, in war, there are always profiteers and opportunists.
0:49:55 > 0:49:59Court of Clanach, 26th August, 1295.
0:49:59 > 0:50:03William Howell complains that Madeline Kite occupied his house
0:50:03 > 0:50:08in the time of Llewelyn's revolt against the English.
0:50:08 > 0:50:10And that afterwards, when William came to town,
0:50:10 > 0:50:12with the army of King Edward,
0:50:12 > 0:50:15he found Madeline running a brewery there.
0:50:15 > 0:50:17The jury say that she is guilty.
0:50:17 > 0:50:21And in war, old enmities can always return.
0:50:21 > 0:50:23Court of Clannach, 10th, June, 1294.
0:50:23 > 0:50:27Yorath of Kenwick is accused of disturbing the peace.
0:50:27 > 0:50:28He cursed a constable,
0:50:28 > 0:50:31and swore by the body of Christ. Assumed the constable and the
0:50:31 > 0:50:35English will hear such rumours and not wish to come to Wales again.
0:50:37 > 0:50:42Magna Carta initiated dramatic changes in English politics.
0:50:42 > 0:50:47Back in 1215, King John promised to protect all ranks of society.
0:50:47 > 0:50:48The whole community.
0:50:49 > 0:50:52The "communa totius terrae" -
0:50:52 > 0:50:56the community of the whole land.
0:50:56 > 0:51:00And in the French translation - King John was a French speaker -
0:51:00 > 0:51:04it's "la commune de tout Angleterre".
0:51:04 > 0:51:06The implication of that,
0:51:06 > 0:51:09although they couldn't say in it in so many words,
0:51:09 > 0:51:12was that the opposition
0:51:12 > 0:51:16had the right to speak for, and to act for,
0:51:16 > 0:51:19the community, against the king.
0:51:21 > 0:51:24And in 1264, that's exactly what happened.
0:51:25 > 0:51:28In a battle at Lewes in Sussex, the reforming barons defeated
0:51:28 > 0:51:30and captured King Henry III.
0:51:30 > 0:51:34Speaking for the whole community of the realm,
0:51:34 > 0:51:37they hoped to use Magna Carta to create
0:51:37 > 0:51:39the first constitutional monarchy.
0:51:42 > 0:51:45They were lead by the charismatic Earl of Leicester,
0:51:45 > 0:51:47Simon de Montfort.
0:51:47 > 0:51:51The first English people's hero.
0:51:51 > 0:51:54He is the pioneer, if you like, of democracy, as we know it.
0:51:54 > 0:51:57It was a germ. It had to grow,
0:51:57 > 0:52:00but it did mark the beginning of something greater
0:52:00 > 0:52:03I feel that's important for us today.
0:52:03 > 0:52:05It was the first time that ordinary people
0:52:05 > 0:52:08had some say in government, apart from the aristocracy.
0:52:08 > 0:52:12It's this big issue of ruler's authority versus subject's rights.
0:52:12 > 0:52:16Starts with Magna Carta. Simon de Montfort is its first big test.
0:52:16 > 0:52:18He'd bothered to learn English.
0:52:18 > 0:52:20He'd bothered to get in touch with people,
0:52:20 > 0:52:23and that is why I feel he had the common touch.
0:52:24 > 0:52:29'The king's supporters now raised an army over the channel, in France,
0:52:29 > 0:52:32'to invade England and overthrow the revolution.
0:52:32 > 0:52:38'To meet the threat, de Montfort' mobilised the English people.
0:52:38 > 0:52:41That summer, with the king in his power,
0:52:41 > 0:52:46de Montfort summoned the greatest army that had ever been gathered
0:52:46 > 0:52:49in England to meet him near the Kentish coast.
0:52:49 > 0:52:53At a place called Barham Down,
0:52:53 > 0:52:54today on the A2.
0:53:00 > 0:53:03Shades of the Armada, Napoleon, the Battle of Britain.
0:53:03 > 0:53:08A people's army fighting, as they said, for England to be free.
0:53:11 > 0:53:16Imagine a vast encampment stretching as far as the eye can see.
0:53:16 > 0:53:18Thousands of tents.
0:53:18 > 0:53:22In that summer of 1264, every village in England had been summoned
0:53:22 > 0:53:24to send men to this spot.
0:53:24 > 0:53:28Each one of them with money provided by their neighbours
0:53:28 > 0:53:31for 40 days of food supplies.
0:53:35 > 0:53:38It was the first time in our history
0:53:38 > 0:53:40that such a huge gathering of people
0:53:40 > 0:53:43had come together, not just for defence,
0:53:43 > 0:53:45but for a great political cause.
0:53:47 > 0:53:52"We say that the king must be subordinate to the law.
0:53:54 > 0:53:58"We say that the precedence goes to the community of the realm".
0:54:09 > 0:54:13'The invasion of England never came, but the following year
0:54:13 > 0:54:16'the barons fell out and de Montfort was killed at Evesham.
0:54:18 > 0:54:20'Ever since, he's been seen as a symbol
0:54:20 > 0:54:22'of the English people's long march to freedom.
0:54:22 > 0:54:25'The pool where he died became a place of pilgrimage.'
0:54:27 > 0:54:31People came from far and wide to make use of this water,
0:54:31 > 0:54:34which they believed had miraculous powers.
0:54:34 > 0:54:36Why is this event
0:54:36 > 0:54:39so important in the history of the people of England?
0:54:39 > 0:54:44Why does this make such a mark, and why is it so significant?
0:54:44 > 0:54:47It's because, really for the first time in history,
0:54:47 > 0:54:50we get the sense of a popular movement.
0:54:51 > 0:54:55It's difficult to find any such example any earlier than 1265.
0:55:00 > 0:55:03So our first great constitutional revolution failed,
0:55:03 > 0:55:05but it was never forgotten.
0:55:08 > 0:55:10We've reached the year 1300.
0:55:11 > 0:55:14The boom time is over.
0:55:14 > 0:55:19Across the British Isles, climate change brought a mini ice age.
0:55:19 > 0:55:23Which lead to failed harvests, famine and disease.
0:55:23 > 0:55:26The French-speaking rulers of England, though,
0:55:26 > 0:55:29still waged their futile wars across Britain.
0:55:30 > 0:55:36In 1314, as the great famine began, Edward II invaded Scotland,
0:55:36 > 0:55:39to be defeated by Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn.
0:55:45 > 0:55:46In the aftermath,
0:55:46 > 0:55:49the Scottish barons made their own declaration of freedom.
0:55:49 > 0:55:53Fired by the same great ideas that had inspired de Montfort
0:55:53 > 0:55:55and the English.
0:55:55 > 0:55:59The primacy of the people and the community of the realm.
0:55:59 > 0:56:04"The deeds of cruelty, massacre, violence, pillage, arson.
0:56:04 > 0:56:09"Sparing neither age, nor sex, religion, nor rank.
0:56:09 > 0:56:13"No-one could describe, nor fully imagine,
0:56:13 > 0:56:16"unless he had seen them with his own eyes".
0:56:17 > 0:56:22"But from these countless evils, we have been set free.
0:56:22 > 0:56:27"By our most tireless prince, king and lord. The Lord Robert".
0:56:29 > 0:56:31"It is in truth not for glory, nor riches,
0:56:31 > 0:56:34"nor honours that we are fighting".
0:56:34 > 0:56:37"But for freedom. For that alone."
0:56:37 > 0:56:41"Which no honest man gives up.
0:56:41 > 0:56:43"But with life itself".
0:56:47 > 0:56:50That text has been called the greatest statement
0:56:50 > 0:56:52of Scottish nationhood ever made.
0:56:52 > 0:56:56Can I just ask you all what drives you re-enact it?
0:56:56 > 0:56:58That statement on its own,
0:56:58 > 0:57:00is one of the main structures of this nation.
0:57:02 > 0:57:04It's to keep the history alive,
0:57:04 > 0:57:09and to remember where the structure for the nation evolved from.
0:57:09 > 0:57:12A lot of people in Scotland don't realise
0:57:12 > 0:57:14the importance of the declaration.
0:57:14 > 0:57:17And by doing the re-enactments as we do them
0:57:17 > 0:57:19- just very short re-enactments -
0:57:19 > 0:57:21it brings it back to people's attention.
0:57:21 > 0:57:24It really is a basic statement of the people's interest,
0:57:24 > 0:57:27and their own well-being,
0:57:27 > 0:57:31and how the nations are going to take more interest in their own affairs.
0:57:35 > 0:57:38The bitterness of the Declaration of Arbroath towards the English
0:57:38 > 0:57:40and their war crimes -
0:57:40 > 0:57:44"Things that had to be seen to be believed," it says -
0:57:44 > 0:57:48was an inevitable consequence of the English onslaught
0:57:48 > 0:57:51on the Celtic people's of Britain, and indeed Ireland,
0:57:51 > 0:57:53in the 13th century.
0:57:53 > 0:57:57I call them English, but of course the rulers of English were
0:57:57 > 0:57:59not English, they were foreigners.
0:57:59 > 0:58:04The Angevins and the Plantagenets were successors of the Normans,
0:58:04 > 0:58:06and in their attack on the Celtic peoples of Britain,
0:58:06 > 0:58:09they were furthering a Norman project.
0:58:10 > 0:58:14Before 1066, the Anglo-Saxon achievement had been
0:58:14 > 0:58:16to create England.
0:58:18 > 0:58:21It would be the Normans and their successors
0:58:21 > 0:58:25who attempted to create Great Britain.
0:58:25 > 0:58:26And, as it looks from the 21st century,
0:58:26 > 0:58:31it appears that they didn't succeed quite so well.
0:58:54 > 0:58:57Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd