"In 2010, David Bates presented the Ford Lectures in British History at the University of Oxford ... [this] book was born from these lectures. It provides an interpretative analysis of the history of the cross-Channel empire created by William the Conqueror in 1066 to its end in 1204 when the duchy of Normandy was conquered by the French king, Philip Augustus, the so-called 'Loss of Normandy'. Bates proposes that historians of the Normans can learn from the methods of social scientists and historians of other periods of history - such as making use of such tools as life-stories and biographies - and he employs such methods to offer an interpretative history of the Normans, as well as a broader history of England, the British Isles, and Northern France in the eleventh and twelfth centuries."--Provided by publisher.