One of the stranger events I attended while still in Oxford (a category of thing of which I have now told you almost all) was a debate staged at the then-new Ertegun Centre, over the motion: “1066: the most important date in English history?” It was the public-school format, of course, with a speaker for, a speaker against and the option of a reply from each one, but what made it look interesting to attend was that the speaker for was Dr George Garnett, one of my more singular colleagues in the Faculty, and the speaker against was Dr George Molyneaux, repeatedly given first place as lecturer by my pupils on the British History 300-1087 course and also George Garnett’s doctoral pupil. Would the pupil now become the master? and so on.
The manuscript of Greater Domesday: the final judgement!
In actual fact, though the debate was not uninteresting, and could probably be said to have been won by George Garnett in as much as he was prepared to throw much more into the rhetoric of the occasion and also had a single point of focus that meant his opponent either had to pick another or be solely negative, the real interest for me and most others there seemed to be the meta-debate of what we as historians would consider significant change and how they could be rated against each other. Both Georges had chosen to rest their cases largely on duration, on changes that endured like cathedrals, language, towns, laws and landholding, and differed primarily on the question of whom these changes affected: in the case for it was everyone, in the case against those changes mentioned in the case for 1066 were dismissed as affecting only the aristocracy. (George Garnett then argued in his reply that if we let Marx set our criteria like that then nothing actually changed in England till the Industrial Revolution anyway.) But many more such arguments arose once the floor was opened. One contention for 1940 was resisted with the idea that only people since 1940 had been affected by it, so that older changes would be more significant by sheer demography of impact. The idea that counter-factuals were a tool for assessing such importance was damned as a trick of Niall Ferguson‘s and defended as being inherent in any historical judgement; and, thankfully, the question was also raised of whether we had enough evidence to make judgements like this anyway and what new evidence could unseat either George’s position. (George Garnett considered his position to be bolstered by so much evidence that evidence of other things couldn’t change it.) Probably this sort of thing could happen nowhere but Oxford, and even its participants questioned its worth as an intellectual exercise, but as a way of provoking conversation about what change actually is it proved unexpectedly stimulating.
A Corner of Tenth-Century Europe 
I am disappointed that there was apparently no speaker specifically arguing the case that 55BC was the most important date in English history, since it is notoriously the only other memorable date in history.
I didn’t notice the gap there till you mentioned it, but now the wind of disillusion races through it howling…
The most important date in English history is 1314. Obviously.
I feel as if the other side’s claim may be better…
AD 43: Roman conquest of Britain. Everything else is a consequence of that.
There is actually a frightening amount of truth to that!
I think there is a case for arguing that 1016 (the death/murder? of Edmund Ironside) is the more significant date since it prompted a definite changes of direction in so many ways unexpected for decades afterwards.
Interesting! I’d probably prefer to argue that those changes were well under way by his accession due to the prolonged disaster that was the reign of Æthelred II. What would you say happened in 1016 which didn’t pretty nearly happen in 1013?
The original question was what was the most important date. Not what was nearly the most important date.
What you say, Jonathan is true, of course it is. Changes were well under way before AEthelred’s flight in 1013. But the point is that Sweyne’s dominance was fleeting and Cnut couldn’t sustain it. It was a transitory episode on the way to 1016.
In 1013 Edmund hadn’t secured the succession by fathering two sons and Cnut was not strong enough, militarily or in nationwide popularity to enforce his taking the throne. Native English leaders were for the most part still in place.
In 1016 all that changed. England was re-set politically on a Scandinavian course; Scandinavians became the new elite; the stage was irrevocably set for a future claim by Edmund’s descendants to emerge in 1066.
None of that was conceivable in 1013.
I do see what you mean, but if the end game in 1016 was a return by Edmund’s descendants, surely that was more plausible in 1013 than it became after they spent decade on decade in exile? If that’s the game we’re playing then surely 1042 is the greater point of change, as it’s the one in which the “Scandinavian course” was revealed as abortive, and never to be repeated?
I don’t think so. In 1016 the two children were both babies; there was no chance of their claiming the throne for the foreseeable future and they weren’t even born in 1013! Almost all of AEthelred’s male children were killed or murdered by 1016.
There was no obvious English candidate in 1016 – a clean break.
As for 1042 and the Scandinavian course being finally rejected, that was just not so because of Sven Estrithsson and Harald Hardraade’s claims in 1066 and beyond.
But because of 1042, as it turned out, the Scandinavian course would never again be viable. Obviously this is to speak with hindsight, but so is the whole conversation, so… I mean, there are people even now who claim the throne of the Palaeologans, but it’s pretty clear they won’t be getting it. In 1066, yes, that may not have been clear, though perhaps it should have been given that even the North was divided on Scandinavian royal candidacies. But after that, surely.
As for 1013, obviously then the viable candidate for a recovery was Edmund Ironside. That so nearly happened that I don’t think we even need dispute it. However, by 1016 it was clear that Æthelred’s line, and therefore Cerdic’s if you like, would continue, failing regular mortality. But do we even need that? There was no Cerdicing candidate on location in 1066, but the heirs to the line were then, at least one, of viable age. And still the witan chose someone more English than Scandinavian rather than accept an outside ruler. When do you think this would have been different, if against all dynastic expectations that was then the best answer ?
This does assume that Harold Godwineson was NOT a Cerdicinga and did not descend from AElfred’s elder brother…
It does, true. I assume that if that was not true, it would probably have been necessary to invent it. But it’s odd, isn’t it, how few sources mention it? Is there more than one? Enough negative evidence, in any case, to suggest that in the concerns of the moment Harold’s genealogy was not the paramount concern…
Perhaps it was the case that the sources were suppressed or destroyed…
Well, there is canonically no reply to that particular argument from silence. But in this case there’s at least half of one. Between Eadmer and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle we are not lacking sources which present a hostile view of the Norman Conquest (“and always after that it grew much worse”…). If there was in general a suppression of anti-Guillemine sentiments, how did these two, one working under an Anglo-Norman appointee (I don’t know what happened in Peterborough straight off), make it through the censor? I think that means there wasn’t one. The sources may of course have existed and just not been copied, because no-one saw any interest in them… but then we’re back to my last comment again, aren’t we?
To be more precise I think it was more the case that the post-1066 Norman sources specifically excluded information which might provide any basis for resistance. As for the pre-1066 Saxon sources they would not have needed to state the obvious, the things that were already known. for example, nowhere in the ASC does it bother to state that Edmund was AEthelred’s son. There was no need.
Fair enough, but firstly, I chose my two examples because they were both, as we have them, written after the Conquest; the A (Winchester ex-Canterbury) manuscript of the ASC goes on till 1070, D (Worcester) until 1080 and the Peterborough one, E, until 1154 as I’m sure you know. Furthermore, we get differences in attitudes between manuscripts; thus, the Abingdon MS (C) says that William (not Harold) was Edward’s kinsman, even though it also has a short poem about what a splendid choice Edward made in appointing Harold – which doesn’t mention any kinship between them. But the Worcester one, which calls William the Bastard, also doesn’t offer a pedigree for Harold, when surely it would have fitted. So firstly, little sign of that censor here, but also no sign of a pro-Harold genealogy. And Eadmer wrote in 1124! I really wasn’t talking about pre-1066 sources.
A better translation of ‘kinsman’ in Abingdon (C) would be ‘relative’ (accurate because it was true on Edward’s mother’s side) and adds nothing to William’s claim. Anyway, Abingdon (C) was written AFTER the conquest, even though still in 1066.
And Eadmer’s work, I believe, was composed 1095-1115 and bears witness to his being a contemporary of the events described.
Um, yes, that was my point, that these were post-conquest sources such as would in theory have been involved in the agenda of suppression you were suggesting, but show no sign of holding back on criticism of the Normans all the same. The E manuscript of the Chronicle makes that case better, however, as one might otherwise try to argue that C stops in 1066 exactly because it was suppressed…
A better translation of ‘kinsman’ in Abingdon (C) would be ‘relative’ (more accurate because it was true on Edward’s mother’s side). Harold is described as a ‘princely earl’. Abingdon (C) becomes retrospective propaganda because it was written after the Conquest even though still in 1066.
Eadmer’s work was, I believe, written 1095-1115 and from the content bears witness to his having been a contemporary to the events described.