battle of hastings

[ljunberg8]

how far is stamford bridge to hastings

[Hammond Egg]

I presume you mean the two battlefields!

By modern roads, 270 miles; probably a little shorter by the route Harold would have taken.

[kempie]

...and 220 miles as the crow flies.

[MustafaTickl]

Or about 400,000 paces for the average man. They marched from one to the other and it is no wonder that Harold's lot were knackered when they arrived at Hastings.

[paddywak]

But before the Battle took place the site was called Senlac Hill (or Ridge) just to add tom the confusion.It wasnt called Battle untill William built an abbey there to celebrate his victory

[MustafaTickl]

Blimey, another 12,000 paces from Hastings to Senlac Ridge!! No wonder they are described as footsore and weary. Harold's wife had the lovely name of Edith Swan-neck. I was at Bayeux the other day where the battle is depicted on the Tapestry - here is the entrance to the Bayeux Tapestry and here here is Bayeux Cathedral.

[kempie]

The two figures given at the head of this thread are distances between the two battlefields. If a more accurate distance is required, the proverbial crow would need to flap for 220 miles and 1496 yards (355.423 km) between the commemorative plaques at Stamford Bridge and Battle Abbey.

[dundurn]

I thought it was fairly certain that most of the men who fought at Stamford Bridge didn't travel to Hastings. Many of those who did make the journey did so by horse or had baggage horses. Anglo-Saxons didn't fight on horses but did use them to get around. Harold went to York with just his housecarls and had to raise the local fyrd when he got there. The southern fyrd had been on alert for most of the year and had been sent back to their farms before the news came through of Hardrada's landing. On the way south, after Stamford Bridge, Harold did keep some of the northern troops but picked up more from East Anglia. They also came from as far as Dorset and Hampshire as well as Kent and Sussex. The only way they could have been alerted in time to make it across to Hastings was by courier riders taking the summons south and west ahead of Harold and the returning housecarls. I'm not belittling Harold's success in getting men south in the time he had but he broke his journey at London and rested up for 4 or 5 days before continuing into Sussex so the image of dusty troops trudging all the way from Yorkshire straight into a battle is a bit misleading.