As the English advanced from the bridge, Hardrada made the best of a disastrous position. That raven standard was thrust into the ground, with the standard of Tostig alongside it, and Godgifu could hear the thin calls of horns. Men with shields, some still pulling on mail coats, lined up in a rough circle. Hardrada’s purpose was to form a fortress of shields, so that the English could not turn his flanks even on the open flat ground. It was an ingenious strategy, and a brave one. But the skjaldborg was patchy, the men strung out thin.

And the English closed. The shield walls clashed with a sound like thunder, a sound that had echoed across English battlefields for centuries.

Before the advancing wave of English the Norse fell back, and that neat circle was flattened - but it held. Swords and axes hacked down over the shield line, and again blood splashed. Godgifu could smell it, a stink like hot iron - and she smelled fouler stenches too, the sewage spilled from the guts of dying or terrified men. The roar was continuous, a merger of yells, insults and screams from six, seven, eight thousand throats.

‘Come on.’ Her sleeve was plucked. It was Estrith. Godgifu knew Estrith meant well - that she was trying to save her life - but Godgifu shook her off. Estrith gave up. ‘Suit yourself.’ The baggage train moved on, leaving Godgifu standing alone on her ridge.

The Norse line broke. The English roared and surged forward, and for a moment the battle dissolved into chaos. But the raven standard pulled back from the mêlée, and to brisk shouting and the thin song of the horns, the Norse front-line troops withdrew to form a fresh wall. The English fell back too. As both sides receded from the heart of the battlefield, pulling back like a tide, they left a ground covered by fallen and mutilated bodies - some of them moving, crawling like slugs.

The English ranks churned as the men in the front line were replaced by fresher bodies. The Norse closed up their circle once more, but it was noticeably smaller than before. But there was a new cry, as more Norse approached from the east: reinforcements from the ships.

Harold gave the Norse no more time. Again the English line hurled itself forward; again the shield walls clashed, and again the bloody froth of death poured over the ground. It didn’t last long. The Norse fought with spirit, but their lines shrank until they were reduced to a knot battling around the raven standard. The reinforcements, exhausted after running miles in their heavy armour, were easily dealt with.

Surrounded by his war band the last of the Vikings did not die easily. But at last the raven standard fell - and Hardrada and Tostig with it.

Godgifu looked for the sun. No more than two hours could have passed since the English lines had first advanced.