2066 and all that

What will the celebrations of 1066 be like when the time comes? As it must. Time rolls on and the day of the centenary of the last invasion of Britain will arrive. At school the answer to the question, “Who won the Battle of Hastings?” used to be “They did”. Yet this generation are taught to say, “We did”.
I dispute that citing as evidence the eminence of the English language. The Normans tried to ban it, forbad the speaking of English in Royal Court in favour of Norman French. Yet the great documents of the day, the Doomsday Book and the Magna Carta, were written in Latin and then translated into English. The Normans burned all copies of our written constitution and imposed their own, which we were forced to adhere to but declined to adopt in spirit. The Norman one never got written down as one document, apparently. They let it evolve as fast as it needs to, and gradually included our own heartfelt feeling of right and wrong, of fairness and equality, of honour.
Having closed down all local amenities and means of government the Normans set about making new ones in their own image. Schools that had been taken over were to be run by monasteries, leaving women to illiteracy. We lost the education system developed over hundreds of years, for apprenticeships and academia – both practical and intellectual talent harnessed and brainwashed. It didn’t work; our old system of law still survives as English Common Law and as Scottish Law.
The old written constitution is said to have regarded women and men as equals. So girls and boys got whatever education was available or required. Women had equal ownership rights as men, daughters could inherit in the same way as sons did without fear of let or hindrance. Men and women ran businesses and took profits for investment, but that was all taken away by the Norman conquerors. Women were to be chattels from then on. So who won? The Normans invaders did. It took more than 900 years to get women’s rights back to as they should be in England, a free country once more.
We assimilated the Normans and let them stay. But we were the first great nation of Europe to hold a revolution and behead a king. Not since the days of ancient Greece had democracy been so important.
So what will we do on the anniversary in 2066? Should we allow the Royal family and aristocracy, apparent successors of the Normans, to claim victory or face reality and reinforce our grip on the rights of self-determination they took from us for so long?
Whatever we do to mark the day let it be of higher profile and more in tune with England than that planned in Normandy.