Dr George Garnett has been awarded a Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship to allow him to write a history of the changing interpretation of the Norman Conquest in English historical writing, from the Conquest to the twentieth century. The Conquest has generally been seen as a - perhaps the - defining event in the history of England. No-one has previously attempted to cut a trench through the history of English historical scholarship over such a long timescale. Dr Garnett hopes that his book will have implications for more than the history of historiography. It will supply a much needed historical perspective to anxious contemporary debates about England and Englishness.