1066 and all that

Sailing from Calais to Dover as the white cliffs approach you can’t help wondering what all those Normans must have been thinking as they neared the British coast.

Whatever it was it certainly wasn’t a debate about what to purchase in the Tax-Free Shop, or whether another bottle of wine really is a sensible idea after lunch – let’s face it these are Norman Conquerors we’re talking about, of course they had another bottle after lunch.

As the cold salt water bit into their armour did they argue about which level they had parked the horse and cart on? No, this is 1066 they didn’t have any levels, and hadn’t brought their own horse and cart anyway; they were planning to steal somebody else’s the minute they reached England.

Yes things must have been pretty different when Guillaume le Conquérant, or William the Bastard as he was fondly called by his loyal English subjects, crossed the channel bringing with him Camembert, Catholicism and a whole load of knights, whose double-barrel-surnamed offspring were set to fill the society pages of Tatler 1000 years later.

And the poor old English, stuck on their Island without a ferry service to take them the other way resigned themselves to their fate: no more Kingdoms, no more Merlin and no more mead. Merd!

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