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Dan Snow’s Norman Walks
From Wednesday 4 August, 10pm, ´óÏó´«Ã½ Four

Historian Dan Snow puts his walking boots on and sets off to see what the great British landscape can teach us about our Norman predecessors. From their violent arrival on these shores, to their most sustaining legacies, Dan's three walks follow an evolutionary path through the Normans' era from invasion, to conquest, to successful rule and colonisation.

Episode 1: Sussex: The Invasion Walk

In the first episode of the series, Dan Snow's exploration on foot through Norman Britain begins on the Sussex coastline, on the cliffs overlooking the Channel where William the Conqueror and his army first encountered British soil in the run-up to Hastings. But while the end result of William's invasion is in no doubt, how much do we really know about events leading up to the Battle? From Hastings to the town of Battle, Dan's first walk traces events in the two-week period between the Norman landings and the battle itself. By exploring the coastline and investigating what the opposing armies did for two weeks, Dan begins to satisfy his curiosity about why the battle took place when and where it did. But by studying the coast and countryside, Dan discovers that there's a marked lack of hard evidence and a sizeable amount of myth surrounding the most famous date in British history.

Episode 2: Herefordshire & Monmouthshire: The March Of Wales

Dan Snow's second Norman Walk explores what the invaders did next, as they aimed to cement their rule across a diverse nation. Despite William the Conqueror being confirmed as king, the Normans had only completed stage one of their British colonization and few areas were as unstable as the Welsh borders. Challenging topography and a multitude of local chieftains made for an uncivilised region and Dan's walk around the Monnow river system is dominated by the motte and bailey castles that sprang up throughout the Norman era. These were the handiwork of ambitious barons who made their mark on the "march" – a border zone from which the Normans pushed their influence west into Wales and Ireland. Dan's very rural walk is still touched by the agriculture, forests and common ground established by the Normans and he discovers that one of the present-day land-owning families have held their lands for almost a thousand years, since the arrival of the Normans.

Episode 3: Yorkshire: The Northern Abbeys

Dan Snow's final Norman Walk takes him north, to lands brutally devastated by the Normans four years after the Invasion. But the genocide of the Harrying of the North was the final act that brought the whole of England under Norman control. And Dan's walk explores how the north became the setting for one of the Norman's greatest legacies – the abbeys and monasteries of northern England. From Helmsley Castle to Rievaulx Abbey, Dan investigates how one local lord established an institution that would revolutionise the community and commerce of the moors. With numerous similar abbeys the ambitious Normans would create a new era that defined Northern England throughout the Middle Ages.

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Treasures of the Anglo-Saxons

Art historian Dr Janina Ramirez charts the development of Anglo-Saxon art from the beautiful jewellery that adorned the first violent Pagan invaders through to the stunning Christian manuscripts they would become famed for. Examining many of the greatest Anglo Saxon artworks– such as the Sutton Hoo Treasures, the Staffordshire Hoard, the Franks Casket and the Lindesfarne Gospels, she unearths for the first time the world of secret codes and symbols that tell the facinating story of the Anglo Saxon’s pagan past and their Christian future. A cultural legacy brought to an abrupt and tragic end by the Norman Invasion of 1066.

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The Making of King Arthur

In The Making of King Arthur, poet Simon Armitage reveals the greatest masterworks of Arthurian literature. He shows how the legend of Arthur matured in the years after the Norman invasion, telling Arthur’s own tragic story in the process and asking what role Arthur serves in our national consciousness.

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