The Norman Conquest in English History, Volume I: A Broken Chain?, by George Garnett

This book is the first volume of a study on the history of the Norman Conquest in English history. Together, Volumes One and Two will consider how historical interpretations of the Conquest were constructed and used from the late eleventh to the late seventeenth centuries. The first book—the subject of this review—covers the majority of this period, from c.1190 to the point in the seventeenth century at which, George Garnett explains, ‘the bulk of what were then recognised as the most important sources on the Conquest and what had preceded it had become widely available in print’ (p. 2). The forthcoming second volume, yet to be published at the time of writing, will investigate how these materials were used from the later years of Elizabeth I’s reign to the end of the seventeenth century, ‘when the Conquest rapidly became an even more contested issue than it had been in the twelfth’ (p. 2).