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Birth:          ABT 1025 of Wessex
Death:          ABT 1086 

Notes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edith_the_Fair
Edith the Fair (Old English: Ealdg?ð Swann hnesce, "Edyth the Gentle Swan"; c. 1025 
– c. 1086), also known as Edith Swanneck,[note 1] was the first wife of King Harold 
Godwinson.[1] "Swanneck" (or Swan-Neck) comes from the folk etymology which 
made her in Old English as swann hnecca, "swan neck", which was actually most 
likely a corrupted form of swann hnesce, "Gentle Swan" .[2] She is sometimes 
confused with Ealdgyth, daughter of Earl Ælfgar of Mercia, who was queen during 
Harold's reign.
Consort of King Harold[edit]

She may be identical with Eadgifu the Fair, who was one of the wealthiest magnates in 
England on the eve of the Norman conquest. Their children included Gunhild of 
Wessex, who became the mistress of Alan Rufus, and Gytha of Wessex, who was 
taken by her grandmother to Denmark in 1068.[1] Gytha was addressed as "princess" 
and married the Grand Duke of Kiev, Vladimir II Monomakh.[3]

Though King Harold II is said to have lawfully married Ealdgyth, the daughter of Earl 
Ælfgar, the widow of the Welsh ruler Gruffydd ap Llywelyn whom he had defeated in 
battle, that marriage in spring 1066 is seen by most modern scholars as one of political 
convenience.[4] Mercia and Wales were allied against England, and the marriage 
gave the English claim in two very troublesome regions, and also gave Harold 
Godwinesson a marriage deemed "legitimate" by the clergy, unlike his longtime 
common law marriage with Edith the Fair.

Edith the Fair was remembered in history and folklore chiefly because it was she who 
identified Harold's body after the Battle of Hastings.[5] The body was horribly 
mutilated after the battle by the Norman army of William the Conqueror, and, despite 
pleas by Harold's mother, Gytha Thorkelsdóttir, for William to surrender Harold's body 
for burial, the Norman army refused, even though Harold's mother offered Harold's 
weight in gold. It was then that Edith the Fair walked through the carnage of the 
battle so that she might identify Harold by markings on his chest known only to her. It 
was because of Edith the Fair's identification of Harold's body that Harold was given a 
Christian burial by the monks at Waltham Abbey.[6] This legend is recounted in the 
well-known poem by Heinrich Heine, "The Battlefield of Hastings" (1855), which 
features Edith the Fair (as Edith Swan-Neck) as the main character and claims that 
the "marks known only to her" were love bites.

In his 2015 monograph investigation into the identity of the visionary of Our Lady of 
Walsingham, Edith the Fair, the historian Bill Flint identifies Edith Swanneshals as the 
Walsingham visionary who has been known colloquially in history as "Rychold" or 
"Richeldis de Faverches". In this work, Flint overturns many of the previous 
assumptions made about Edith's relationship with Harold Godwinson, including the 
fidelity of the couple's marital union and Christian devotion. Flint argues that Edith and 
Harold were almost certainly married under the Danish more danico or hand-fast 
marriage custom. As evidence for this, he cites a number of dowry bequests that were 
made at the time of Edith's union to Harold. Flint notes that the bequests made 
included Walsingham Manor, making Edith in all probability "the lady of the manor" 
during the year of 1061, which was identified by Tudor historian Richard Pynson as 
the year of the foundation of the shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham.

Flint claims that the mores danico union of Edith and Harold is legitimate from a 
Catholic perspective, arguing that "The changes confirming the Sacramental nature of 
Christian marriage had only recently been promulgated from Rome. Throughout the 
Danelaw and widespread among the nobility of England who now had many such 
Scandinavian bloodlines, the hand-fast marriage, which was customary and widely 
accepted throughout northern Europe, should not be referred to as an illegitimate 
union." (p. 9). In fact, the Anglo-Saxons had practiced hand-fast marriage long before 
Danish conquest.

Flint's identification of Edith as the Walsingham visionary is rooted in his belief that 
the earlier date of shrine's foundation, given by Richard Pynson as 1061, is credible. 
Pynson's history, which is given in a narrative poem known as the Pynson Ballad, had 
been previously thrown out by historians on the grounds it was unreliable as an oral 
narrative, but Flint defends the ballad on the grounds that Pynson was a respected 
historian, employed by King Henry VII, who also collaborated with John Leland. Flint 
contests the theories of J.C. Dickinson (1959) on the grounds that the 1131 Norfolk 
Roll, which Dickinson claims refers to the foundation of the shrine, actually refers to 
the foundation of the Priory of the Austin Friars, which preceded the foundation of the 
Walsingham Shrine (see p.xxii). He also notes that Edith Swanneshals was known 
within the court as "Rychold", meaning "fair and rich", and the appellatory title given 
by Pynson could therefore refer to the Anglo-Saxon Queen—a reference which is 
consistent with the original date given in the Pynson Ballad as 1061, for Edith 
Swaneshals was the Lady of the Walsingham Manor in this period (p.xxvii). Flint 
therefore establishes Edith Swaneshals as a Christian Queen and the legitimate 
spouse of Harold Godwinson; as well as defending her Christian character as the 
probable visionary of the Shrine of Walsingham. In defending Edith's Christian 
character Flint cites her friendship with Wulfstan of Worcester.

Historical fiction[edit]
Helen Hollick - Harold the King
G. A. Henty - Wulf the Saxon (1894)
Julian Rathbone - The Last English King (1997)
Edward Bulwer-Lytton- Harold, the Last of the Saxons (1848)
G K Holloway - 1066: What Fates Impose (2013)
Carol McGrath - The Handfasted Wife (2013)
Judith Arnopp - Peaceweaver (2009)
Elizabeth Alder - The King's Shadow (1995)

Ealdgyth was portrayed by Janet Suzman in the top-part BBC TV play Conquest 
(1966), part of the series Theatre 625.

The German poet Heinrich Heine wrote Schlachtfeld bei Hastings (published 1851, in 
Romanzero).[7] In this poem, Edith and two monks (Asgod and Ailrik) search the 
battlefield for the body of King Harold.


Marriage To GODWINSSON Harold II (ABT 1022 - 14 Oct 1066)
    m.  

Notes

Parents
____ Godwin (ABT  992 - 15 Apr 1053)
THORKELSDOTTIR Gytha (Thyra) (ABT  997 - ABT 1069)

Children by GODWINSSON Harold II ABT 1022 - 14 Oct 1066
OF WESSEX (HARALDSDOTTIR) Gytha (Gyda) (ABT 1053 - 1097)

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