The drawing of him in the manuscript of the Encomium Emmae, written by a cleric of St-Omer for Queen Emma, is the best likeness we have. In it he appears with trimmed hair in a fringe and a short, wavy beard with perhaps the hint of a moustache. While in the Vita, written for his wife, Edith, he is described as ‘a very proper figure of a man – of outstanding height, and distinguished by his milky white hair and beard, full face and rosy cheeks, thin white hands and long translucent fingers … Pleasant, but always dignified, he walked with eyes downcast, most graciously affable to one and all’.1 He could also be thought ‘of passionate temper and a man of prompt and vigorous action’, but Edward was no soldier. The medieval writer who said ‘he defended his kingdom more by diplomacy than by war’ had it right; but failure to act as a commander of men was a grave disadvantage in this period.2 We should be under no illusion but that the Scandinavian conquest and the frequent switches of dynasty during the first half of the eleventh century had greatly weakened the kingdom.
What do You think about The Battle Of Hastings (2012)?
