William of Normandy landed at Pevensey on 28 September and on 13 October Harold of England fought his last battle. It ended an era as decisively for Anglo-Scandinavian York as for those regions which first felt the iron hand of the Conqueror. The picture of ecclesiastical life and culture at York in the Scandinavian era must be to some extent falsified by the holocaust of books and other written records which took place in 1069. Nevertheless there is no evidence to suggest that York remained an outstanding centre of religion and learning. The ecclesiastical structure had been badly shaken by the Danish invasions, which imperilled the supply of clergy to the northern churches and placed their estates in alien hands, whence neither Alfred nor his successors could wrest them. When new spiritual impulses came from abroad, they came from Italy and France, not unnaturally finding their earliest response in southern England. For Benedictine monasticism the northern clergy stood as yet unprepared and its triumphs among them were deferred until after the Norman Conquest. The Church and School of York suffered in addition from the non-residence of archbishops, since from the accession of St. Oswald in 972 until 1016, and again for a while in 1040, the occupants of the see were also permitted to hold that of Worcester. They were frequently active at court and elsewhere on secular business; their very lack of northern biographers seem to tell its own story.
Despite the submission of Edwin and Morcar, the Conqueror exercised little authority north of the Humber during 1067, and in this confused period no organized body of Norman troops is likely to have operated in the north. Between December 1067 and March 1068 while William busied himself in suppressing the west country, the first movement of revolt in the north was coming to a head. That York was the centre of this movement, as indeed of its successors, is made explicit by the chroniclers. The Norman, Ordericus, writes: Eboracensis civitas ardentissime furit, quam sanctitas pontificis sui [i.e. Archbishop Ealdred] sedare nequit, while William of Malmesbury from his very different viewpoint produces a 'noble panegyric' on the role of York as the refuge of rebellions, whence patriots so frequently defied the tyrant. The first rising, which took place in the summer and autumn of 1068, came to nothing: Edwin and Morcar let fall the northern cause and York had no alternative to submission when William marched rapidly north from Nottingham. On hearing of his approach, the citizens sent out an embassy with the keys of the city and with hostages; and these the king accepted. Before leaving the city he built a castle, and set 500 picked knights to guard it. The subsequent months speedily justified William's distrust of the city.
When in January 1069 the men of Durham massacred a force of Normans, those of York followed suit with remarkable alacrity and slew one of the commanders at York with many of his men. This northern rising initiated a formidable alignment against the Conqueror. Its leaders, Merleswein—an important figure in the Domesday account of York—and Cospatric, had abandoned the compromised earls, and had taken up as their candidate the Wessex prince Edgar Ætheling. Welcomed at York by the rebellious citizens, variously called 'portmen' and 'burhmenn' by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Edgar and his supporters began an attack on the castle, whence the sheriff William Malet reported to the king that in default of assistance he would be driven to surrender. With astonishing speed William returned to York and slew, captured, and scattered his adversaries. While the Ætheling fled to Scotland, the king 'harried the burh' and, according to one account, dishonoured the minster, perhaps disregarding its rights of sanctuary. He now built a second castle and shortly marched south to keep Easter at Winchester. Very soon after his departure a stubborn body of northern rebels reassembled to attack both the York castles, but were defeated 'in a certain valley' by William FitzOsbern, Earl of Hereford, whom the king had left in charge.
Meanwhile, a Danish invasion fleet entered the Humber early in September 1069 and was joined by the old leaders, Edgar, Cospatric, Merleswein, and Archil. In addition, Waltheof, the son of Siward, abandoning both his understanding with the Conqueror and his earldom of Northampton, hastened northward to join the movement. It was at this moment that Archbishop Ealdred died. During these latter years he is said to have striven to maintain the new régime while resisting the oppressions of the sheriff. Either just before or soon after his death the invading host arrived, apparently on foot, before the city. They were at once acclaimed by a population which had learned nothing from the king's clemency. Faced by the approach of this powerful assembly of forces, the Normans employed their favourite weapon; they fired the houses near the castle to prevent their use as débris for filling the ditches. The flames spread rapidly, consuming a great part of the city and embracing the minster itself. Two days later when, according to Florence of Worcester, the city was still burning yet not wholly destroyed, the invaders occupied the area and encountered an imprudent sally by the Normans. In after-years northern skalds and English chroniclers recounted the feats of Waltheof, who stood by the gate as the enemy crowded out, decapitating one after another with mighty blows of his battle-axe. The slaughter ended with the capture of both Norman commanders, together with the sheriff's wife and two children. The subsequent destruction of both castles has not unreasonably been regarded as an emotional gesture; it indicates that the northern world to which York still clung was making no serious attempt to learn the new modes of warfare.
The king, 'moved by both grief and wrath', hastened north once more with a force of cavalry and, finding the Danes plundering Lindsey, forced them to re-cross the Humber in confusion. He then returned to consolidate his line of communication in the Midlands. It was presently rumoured that the Danes intended to reassemble and keep Christmas at York, a fact which, like certain subsequent events, indicates that the city had not undergone the degree of destruction implied by the more lurid phrases of the chroniclers. Whatever the intention of the Danes, the king determined to forestall them and, though checked at Castleford in his first attempts to cross the Aire, directed his march upon York by some more circuitous route through the Pennine area. During the delay at Castleford, he may have been negotiating with the Danes, whose speedy withdrawal from the York neighbourhood, of which the king was apprized before reaching his objective, suggests a prior agreement. Certainly the story that he regained the city after a battle appears the pure fabrication of a late chronicler. Leaving a force to repair the castles, William mercilessly depopulated a large area of Yorkshire by fire and sword. When he returned to keep Christmas and to wear his crown at York, he had at last broken the Northumbrian spirit of resistance. Five years passed before the Danes again intervened in the affairs of northern England; on this occasion their reception proved very different and their achievement utterly trivial. The armada which then appeared in the Humber consisted of 200 ships and was led by Cnut, son of King Swein, and by an earl named Håkon. There is no evidence that they received local support, though some of them succeeded in reaching York upon a plundering expedition, breaking into the minster and stealing its treasure. 'But', says the chronicle, 'all died that were of that counsel, namely the son of Earl Håkon and many others with him.' If the York men needed one more proof of the bankruptcy of the old Scandinavian partnership, it was here demonstrated.