who could not defend them, recognized him as king of the North. His son, Canute the Great, had to contend with a rival more worthy of him, (Edmund Ironside.) Returning from Denmark at the head of a considerable force, and aided by the perfidious Edric, Canute ravaged the southern part of England and threatened London. A new division of the kingdom resulted; but, Edmund having been assassinated by Edric, Canute was finally recognized as king of all England. Afterward he sailed to conquer Norway, from which country he returned to attack Scotland. When he died, he divided the kingdom between his three children, according to the usage of the times.
Five years after Canute's death, the English assigned the crown to their Anglo-Saxon princes; but Edward, to whom it fell, was better fitted to be a monk than to save a kingdom a prey to such commotions. He died in 1066, leaving to Harold a crown which the chief of the Normans settled in France contested with him, and to whom, it is said, Edward had made a cession of the kingdom. Unfortunately for Harold, this chief was a great and ambitious man.
The year 1066 was marked by two extraordinary expeditions. While William the Conqueror was preparing in Normandy a formidable armament against Harold, the brother of the latter, having been driven from Northumberland for his crimes, sought support in Norway, and, with the King of Norway, set out with thirty thousand men on five hundred vessels, and landed at the mouth of the Humber. Harold almost entirely destroyed this force in a bloody battle fought near York; but a more formidable storm was about to burst upon his head. William took advantage of the time when the Anglo-Saxon king was fighting the Norwegians, to sail from St. Valery with a very large armament. Hume asserts that he had three thousand transports; while other authorities reduce the number to twelve hundred, carrying from sixty to seventy thousand men. Harold hastened from York, and fought a decisive battle near Hastings, in which he met an honorable death, and his fortunate rival soon reduced the country to submission.