The Death of King Harold

Another year, another crackpot Battle of Hastings theory. Last year it was 'the battle was fought somewhere else'. This year it's 'King Harold survived the battle'. This one is, if anything, even more feeble and confused, so let's put it to bed as soon as possible.

Evidence for Harold's death:

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, D version (English, contemporary)
'King Harold was slain, and Leofwine, his brother, and Earl Gyrth, his brother, and many good men'.

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, E version (English, contemporary)
'Harold marched from the north, and fought against him [William] before all his host came up; and there he fell with his two brothers, Gyrth and Leofwine.'

William of Poitiers (Norman, contemporary)
'The king himself and his brothers and not a few of the nobles of the kingdom had perished'.

William of Jumieges (Norman, contemporary)
'Harold was slain, pierced with mortal wounds, during the first assault'

The Carmen de Hastingae Proelio (French, contemporary, before 1068)
'The first, cleaving his [Harold's] breast through the shield with his point, drenched the earth with a gushing torrent of blood; the second smote off his head below the protection of the helmet, and the third pierced his innards with his lance'

The Bayeux Tapestry (Anglo-Norman, contemporary, before 1082)
HERE KING HAROLD IS KILLED

Eadmer of Canterbury (English, 1090s)
'Harold fell in the thick of the fray'

Baudri of Bourgeuil (French, before 1102)
'A shaft pierces Harold with deadly doom'

Henry of Huntingdon (Anglo-Norman, 1120s)
'Meanwhile the whole shower sent by the archers fell around King Harold, and he himself sank to the ground, struck in the eye. A host of knights broke through and killed the wounded king.'

John of Worcester (Anglo-Norman, 1130s, and very pro-English)
'But afterwards, when very many had fallen on both sides, he [Harold] himself fell, alas, at dusk'

Simeon of Durham (Anglo-Norman, 1130s)
'In that battle he [Harold] fell with almost the whole English army'

And [NB], The Waltham Abbey Chronicle (Anglo-Norman, post 1177)
'The king.... was slain by his fierce foe'


'Evidence' that Harold survived:

The Vita Haroldi, a work of fantasy written at Waltham Abbey in the early thirteenth century, 150+ years after the event. (And available in print since 1885).