Return to Anglo-Norman Historians
"When the Normans saw the English flying they pursued them relentlessly through the whole night till Sunday, to their own harm. For by chance long grasses concealed an ancient rampart, and as the Normans came galloping up they fell, one on top of the other, in a struggling mass of horses and arms."
Orderic Vitalis, Ecclesiastica Historia
Although Orderic is the only contemporary source to mention the Malfosse incident, which he consigns to the end of the battle, as the defeated English are pursued by the Normans, this dramatic scene from the Bayeux Tapestry depicting fallen men and horses may well represent it. Henry of Huntington, at least, speaks of William's men simulating a feigned flight before coming upon "a large ditch, cunningly hidden. A great number of them fell and were trampled." William of Malmsesbury, too, who may have based his narrative on the Tapestry, speaks of the English defending a knoll and there being "a precipitous ditch." And one does see stakes driven into the ground.
