How did Harold himself die? Lately there's been an attempt to read the death scene in the Tapestry as though he was the figure cut down by the horseman, not the warrior pulling the arrow out of his eye, the story you and I grew up with. But it seems to me perfectly clear that the words "Harold Rex" occur directly and significantly above the arrow-struck figure. Then certainly the knights would have been on him, cutting him down, leaving him disembowelled. The Thanes bravely mounted a last stand, defending the body of their King, but for many it was now a lost cause. It was time to save one's neck, to get out of the way. There are such sad stories of what follows, and perhaps some of them are true. One of them has Harold's lover, Edith Swan Neck, walking through the heaps of gory corpses to identify the dead King by marks on his body, known only to her. What we do know is that around half the nobility of England perished on that battlefield.


哈罗德是怎么死的？最近有人试图解读，挂毯上哈罗德死亡的一幕，认为他似乎是那个被骑兵砍死的人。而非我们从小听到的那个从眼中拔箭拔的战士。不过在我看来，眼部中箭的人，头顶出现的哈罗德·莱克斯字样不言自明，当然骑士，有可能和他交手，并将他打落马下，将他开膛破肚。护卫们筑起了最后的防线，誓死保护他们国王的遗体，大多人都束手就擒。为了保命，他们给敌方让了路。战争之后流传着很多悲伤的故事，或许有些是真的。哈罗德的爱人便是其一，伊迪斯·斯旺内克，尸横遍野中，试图辨别她死去的丈夫。他身上的印记，只有她才认得出。我们确定的事实是在那场战斗中，英格兰半数的贵族命丧当场。