Harold, or the Norman Conquest is an opera in four acts with music by the British composer Frederic H. Cowen with a libretto by Edward Malet, edited by Frederic Edward Weatherly, adapted into the German by L.A. Caumont, and first performed at Covent Garden, London on 8 June 1895.
Harold, Earl Godwin's son, who had joined the hunting party uninvited to gain access to Edith, with whom he is in love (and her with him), disguised as an outlaw (as he had been banished from the kingdom), and who had brought down a deer with a bow and arrow at five hundred yards, is brought in.
Armed soldiers of King Edward the Confessor, led by Siward, enter in an attempt to arrest Harold.
Malet, realising that Harold may become king when Edward dies, schemes with Duke William.
As Siward's soldiers advance to arrest him, Duke William interposes claiming that Harold is his friend and will be returning to Normandy with him.
In a bower in the Duke of Normandy's garden at Bayeux Princess Adela and her maidens are singing and wreathing flowers.
That evening in the interior of Bayeux Cathedral, prayers and singing prelude the procession of an ark covered in a pall carried by monks.
Shortly after the Bishop and monks enter followed by Adela, Harold, Malet, ladies and knights.
The monks reverently lift the pall from the ark to reveal a jewelled skeleton of a saint.
He swears his love for Edith, who is surprised, but replies that it is too late, as she had committed herself to the church in vows given on her father's deathbed, thinking that Harold was betrothed to another.
Edith asks Harold to promise her that he will take the crown, and with sad resolve replies ‘your will, not mine’.
This enrages the noblemen and people, and they are about to rush Malet when Harold interposes stating that he is now King.
Harold takes up the gauntlet, telling Malet to return to his master, renouncing his oath and his claim to William's daughter, because he loves England more.
Edith, in Nun's attire, is seated on a pallet, in despair as she wrestles with the past, praying that God will show her the way.
This vision fades and is replaced by one of the plains of Hastings, with Saxon forces passing on their way to battle.
The Royal standard, of which the pole is broken, half remaining in the socket, lies by the King.
Monks and nuns, some carrying torches, are wandering among the groups of fallen men chanting ‘Requiem aeternum’.