Preface

Summary

The eleventh annual Battle Conference, which was held from 22 to 27 July 1988, at Pyke House, Battle, was the last to be directed by Professor R. Allen Brown. He died on 1 February 1989, after a long and heroic struggle against cancer. The Battle Conferences have been rightly described as one of the ‘great historical enterprises’ which he inaugurated and inspired. For more than a decade they have brought together scholars from many parts of Europe and North America, as well as the Middle East and Japan, to take part in an interdisciplinary forum for the presentation and study of the latest research in Anglo-Norman and late Old English history. Papers on archaeology, architecture, literature and language have all been prominent alongside those on every aspect of history. A notable feature has been the practical study of arms and amour, accompanied on one occasion by a demonstration of the way in which fully armed Norman knights wuld charge on horseback up the hill at Battle. Over the years the conferences have become a centre of warmth and friendship as well as good scholarship. Allen Brown gave them an impetus that will ensure their survival. Our sense of loss now is great; but the Battle Conferences wilt continue in future years as a fitting memorial to him.

The papers in this volume were all read in the course of the eleventh conference. Allen Brown himself attended almost to the end, and it was appropriate that the news of his appointment by the French government as ‘Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres’ came through on the last day. During the excursion to Lewes he led the participants, undeterred by thickets of brambles, to the summit of both mottes. The visit to Lewes Priory was kindly organised and led by Dr F. E. M. Anderson, to whom especial thanks are due. Mrs Gillian Murton and her assistants at the East Sussex County Council, and Mr Peter Birch and his staff at Pyke House, again gave invaluable support and help in organising the conference and providing for the camfort of the participants.