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Harold was a son of Godwin (c. 1001 –1053), the powerful Earl of Wessex, and of Gytha Thorkelsdóttir, whose brother Ulf the Earl was married to Estrid Svendsdatter (c. 1015/1016), the daughter of King Sweyn Forkbeard [2] (died 1014) and sister of King Cnut the Great of England and Denmark.
Gytha Thorkelsdóttir (c. 997 – c. 1069), also called Githa, was a Danish noblewoman.She was the wife of Godwin, Earl of Wessex, and the mother of King Harold Godwinson and Edith of Wessex, the latter of whom was the queen consort of King Edward the Confessor.
Godwin of Wessex (Old English: Godwine; died 15 April 1053) was an Anglo-Saxon nobleman who became one of the most powerful earls in England under the Danish king Cnut the Great (King of England from 1016 to 1035) and his successors. Cnut made Godwin the first Earl of Wessex (c. 1020). Godwin was the father of King Harold II (r.
Godwin's second son, Harold, succeeded him in the earldom of Wessex, while Harold's old earldom of East Anglia was taken by Ælfgar, son of the earl of Mercia. [16] Godwin's eldest son, Sweyn, could not be considered for any title since he had gone on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and indeed was to die in September 1052 on the return journey. [22]
Edith may have been the mother of Harold's daughters Gunhild of Wessex, [5] who became the mistress of Alan Rufus, and Gytha of Wessex, who was taken by her grandmother to Denmark in 1068. [1] Gytha was addressed as "princess" and married the Grand Duke of Kiev, Vladimir II Monomakh .
Edith was the firstborn of Godwin's three daughters, which included her sisters Gunhild (or Gunhilda) (c. 1035 – 1080) and Ælfgifu (c. 1035 – ?). The exact birthdates of the Godwin children are unknown, but Sweyn was the firstborn and Harold was the second son. [5] Harold was aged about 25 in 1045, which makes his birth date around 1020 ...
The family is named after Harold's father, Earl Godwin, who had risen to a position of wealth and influence in the 1020s under Danish King Cnut the Great. In 1045 Godwin's daughter, Edith, married King Edward the Confessor, and by the mid-1050s Harold and his brothers had become dominant, almost monopolising the English earldoms. Godwin's ...
Harold's family was one of the most powerful in Anglo-Saxon England: his paternal grandfather was Godwin, Earl of Wessex, and his father was Harold Godwinson, who inherited the same title and was crowned king of England at the beginning of 1066.