Tostig Godwinson

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Image:Tostig book.JPG Tostig Godwinson (1026? – September 25, 1066) was an Anglo-Saxon earl of Northumbria and brother of King Harold II of England, the last Anglo-Saxon King of England.

Tostig was born the third son of Godwin, Earl of Wessex and Kent, and Gytha Thorkelsdóttir. In 1051, he married Judith, the daughter of Count Baldwin IV, half-sister of Baldwin V of Flanders, and maternal aunt of Matilda who married William the Conqueror.

That same year, 1051, Tostig and his father were banished from Northumbria to which they forcefully returned in 1052. Three years later in 1055, Tostig became the Earl of Northumbria upon the death of Earl Siward. In order to secure his rule of the northern district of Northumbria, Tostig introduced martial law. Those who violated his authority were severely punished, which made him extremely unpopular. The Northumbrians revolted against Tostig in 1065 and replaced him with Morcar, brother of Edwin, Earl of Mercia, who declared Tostig an outlaw. The rebels forced Tostig to flee southward, where they followed until met by Earl Harold at Oxford who, for his own royal ambitions, granted their demands against the will of King Edward the Confessor.

Having sailed to Flanders, Tostig sought employment with Duke William, who was preparing an invasion of England, in Normandy. Tostig raided the Isle of Wight and the Kentish and Lincolnshire coasts, stayed in Scotland, visited Norway, and in the River Tyne, he joined King Harald III Hardraade of Norway. With Hardraade's aid, Tostig sailed up the Humber and defeated Earls Morcar and Edwin at Gate Fulford. Hardraade's army invaded York.

On September 25, 1066, King Harold II of England (Tostig's brother) marched his army from the south of England where they were awaiting the Normans up to York and halted the Norwegian invasion at the Battle of Stamford Bridge, in which Tostig and Harald III were killed. Tostig was killed by King Harold II's squire (who later became his foster son) when he(Evyn) stabbed him in the stomach with a dagger. After the death of Tostig, his two sons took refuge in Norway, while his wife Judith married Duke Welf of Bavaria.

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