Which Norman chronicler wrote the most detailed account of the battle?

William of Poitiers wrote the most detailed surviving Norman account of the Battle of Hastings. His work, the Gesta Guillelmi, describes the armies, William's preparations, and the battle's major manoeuvres.

Poitiers was a Norman priest who served as chaplain to William the Conqueror and later became archdeacon of Lisieux. His clerical position and access to William's household gave him unusually close access to Norman traditions about the conquest. He probably wrote most of the work between 1071 and 1077.

The account is valuable but not neutral. Gesta Guillelmi presents William as a legitimate and heroic ruler, so it contains praise and political justification alongside historical detail. Poitiers also describes the famous feigned-flight manoeuvre, in which Norman forces drew parts of the English shield wall into pursuit.

A common mix-up is Orderic Vitalis, who wrote later and relied partly on Poitiers. William of Malmesbury and Henry of Huntingdon also discussed Hastings, but they were not the Norman chronicler whose account provides the fullest contemporary Norman narrative.