Edward the Confessor

Edward the Confessor was King of the English from 1042 until his death in 1066, and the last reigning monarch of the House of Wessex. He was the son of AEthelred the Unready and Emma of Normandy, and he succeeded his half-brother Harthacnut, restoring the rule of the House of Wessex after a period of Danish rule. When he died in 1066 he was succeeded by his brother-in-law Harold Godwinson, who was defeated and killed the same year at the Battle of Hastings by William the Conqueror. Historians disagree about his 24-year reign: his nickname reflects a traditional image of him as unworldly and pious, while some biographers portray him as an energetic and sometimes ruthless king whose achievements were tarnished by the Norman Conquest that followed his death. About a century after his death, in 1161, Pope Alexander III canonised him, and he was one of England's national saints until Edward III adopted Saint George around 1350.