This book provides the first rounded account of the new and highly influential ruling elite of England in the century after the Norman conquest of 1066, in which the old English aristocracy was swept aside. It focuses on four main themes: land (the transfer of land to the aristocracy, and the organization of the great estates), power (the nature of power and its vitality), politics (the aims and strategies of the nobles), and society (kinship, the role of women, and piety).