WI: William the Bastard dies in 1067

So I was wondering, what happens if William the Conqueror dies shortly after taking England in 1066? Would his children inherit, or one of his brothers, or would the Normans be pushed out?
 
Thingy of Boulogne will invade...

I think

He was going to at some early stage

Memory is not my strongest thingamajig

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
Eustace of Boulogne? I'm not sure he would have been capable of taking the whole kingdom for himself, hmm.

I think either one of the Viking Kings from Scandinavia would try to set themselves up again or we would see a common rebellion to place the Athelings on the throne again.
 
To be blunt, all buggery will erupt.

None of William's sons is at this stage old enough to hold onto the kingdom effectively; Robert, the oldest, is still a teenager; Henry will never even be born.

The Saxon aristocratic remnant is still active at this stage (Morcar et al made their stand the following year IIRC) then you have the Danes, the Normans barons, Harold's sons etc.

I suspect it would be an earlier Anarchy, on steroids. Your guess is as good as mine as to who would come out on top. My feeling is that the Normans are probably too established even at this stage to be pushed out wholesale, but you never know.
 
The Earldom of Northumbria may revert to independence for a time. The Normans probably hold on in the South. Any Saxon revolt or Danish invasion forces them to rally round Eustace or whoever is available. Eventually they probably resume the offensive.
 
You are forgetting William's half brothers, Bishop Odo and Count Robert of Morain. Either of them could become a regent for William's older son Robert. With the loss of a strong central figure however Normandy would collapse into anarchy with many of the Norman invasion force scrambling for home to make sure of their Norman lands.

Things would be hectic in England as well with two parties forming: the sons of Harold supported by their grandmother who holds Exeter and the west country and Edgar Etheling supported by Earls Edwin and Morcar holding the midlands and the north..

The most likely scenario is a rump Norman invasion force allowing itself to be bought off so that the non-Norman mercenaries can be paid off and the Norman remnant returning home to secure their existing fiefs.

The two English factions would be aware of the losses suffered by the Kingdom during 1066 and important figures in both factions and nationwide would be aware of the danger’s posed by foreign adventurers waiting in the wings (the king of Denmark especially).

Events would probably follow the lines of the major standoff between Earl Godwin and Edward the Confessor in the 1050’s where both side threatened violence but in the end were reluctant to fight due to their awareness of the probable consequences. This would be magnified in 1067 by the losses each of the factions suffered the year before. I would guess that there would be some compromise with Edgar confirmed as King and with one or two of Harold’s sons confirmed to the old Godwinson earldoms. Edgar would possibly be married to one of Harold’s daughters to seal the deal.

Of course as soon as Robert of Normandy reaches his majority (assuming he survives) and secures his duchy I think a possible 2nd Norman invasion is on the cards although he was not the general and politician his father was.
 
What if Robert de Mortain hastened to Normandy to ensure his nephew's succession and the almighty Odo took the reins of government in England in his nephew's name?
 
What if Robert de Mortain hastened to Normandy to ensure his nephew's succession and the almighty Odo took the reins of government in England in his nephew's name?

There would still be a state of anarchy in Normandy although whether this was major or minor is hard to say. It is worth remmbering that during Williams's own minority 2 or 3 of his guardians were killed and William himself had to hide at one point with his mother's family. No wonder he turned out to be a hard and pityless bastard:( We should also not forget what happened after William's death in OTL as his body was abandoned by his retinue.

My guess is that those who'd been cowed by William would have taken the opportunity to reassert themselves and settle some old scores. Those Norman nobles in England would have been uneasy about this and since in those days loyalities tended to be personal to a great lord or commander many would not have regarded themselves as duty bound to remain aboard whilst their lands were under threat.

Even if Bishop Odo created a rump adminstration in London whilst Count Robert went back to Normandy the Conquest would not have progressed as it did. Much as I dislike William the Conqueror(being a Yorkshireman born in a village notable for not been marked in the Domesday Book as "waste") I have to recognise he was a superlative general and warlord.

We should also remember that later on in OTL Bishop Odo was imprisoned by William for conspiring against him. There is no guarantee that Odo and Robert would co-operate very well.
 
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