Trial of Penenden Heath [SEP] point in time
Trial of Penenden Heath
The trial of Penenden Heath occurred in the decade after the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, probably in 1076, and involved a dispute between Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, half-brother of William the Conqueror and Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury and others.
Background.
Odo de Bayeux was previously Earl of Kent and the primary landowner of the region subsequent to his half-brother William the Conqueror's invasion of England in 1066. In 1070, Archbishop Lanfranc succeeded to the see of Canterbury
estates, William needed to reassert that the rights of the Crown, which he claimed to have inherited, had not suffered in the process. His Norman followers tended to evade the liabilities of their English predecessors. The successful trial of Odo de Bayeux at Penenden Heath near Maidstone in Kent less than a decade after the conquest was one example of the Crown's growing discontent at the Norman land-grab of the years following the invasion. Historians believe the survey was to aid William in establishing certainty and a definitive reference point as