HIST 444 - The Norman Conquests of England, Sicily and South Italy (3 credits)

(Prereq: HIST 101) This course introduces students to the complexities and consequences of military action undertaken by the newly-Christianized Normans as they conquered the kingdoms of Anglo-Saxon England and Byzantine/Muslim Sicily and South Italy. The Normans, only minor nobles of little consequence at the outset, soon became the dominant feudal monarchs of Western Europe. Their acculturation in their new lands, and their political, artistic, textual and legal strategies introduced Western Europe to new expressions of individual power and state authority.