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Culture centred round the church. The Normans were very Christian and they built vast churches and cathedrals. The ordinary people were totally under the control of the wealthy and the priests. Monasteries, and monks and priests, grew in numbers. In 1066AD there were 1,000 monasteries in England but by 1200AD the number had grown to about 12,000. In 1076AD at the Council of Westminster, it became law that you couldn't marry without a priest being present and I bet you had to pay them to be there. In 1200AD another law said you had to announce your wedding 3 times in church before it could take place. This still happens today, look up about “reading the bans”. Marriages were usually arranged by parents. The Normans, although they invaded from France, were originally Vikings who had conquered that area and settled there. Their culture was similar to the Viking one. Law and order was controlled by the Lord of the Manor. Punishment might be a fine or people could be put in the stocks and others throw rotten fruit at them. On feast days, and there were a lot of them, ordinary people would have simple games, like wrestling, jumping and archery. The Lords would spend much time fighting in tournaments and hunting but hunting was forbidden to the poor. Some young boys would be sent away, often to France, to serve as a page in other families. King Wenceslas obviously had a page, if you know the carol. Sometimes rivers would freeze over and people tied animal skins under their shoes and skated. They may have even have used poles to push themselves along, an early form of skiing.

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