of England was briefly to return to its Anglo-Saxon lineage. The house of Wessex reigned again as Edward the Confessor was brought out of exile in Normandy and made a treaty with Harthacnut, his half-brother. As in his treaty with Magnus, it was decreed that the throne would go to Edward if Harthacnut died with no legitimate male heir. In 1042, Harthacnut died, and Edward was king. His reign secured Norman influence at court thereafter, and the ambitions of its dukes finally found fruition in 1066 with William the Conqueror's invasion of England and crowning, fifty years after Cnut was crowned in 1017. If the sons of Cnut had not died within a decade of his death, and if his only known daughter Cunigund, who was to marry Conrad II's son Henry III eight months after his death, had not died in Italy before she became empress consort, Cnut's reign might well have been the foundation for a complete political union between England and Scandinavia, a North Sea Empire with blood ties to the Holy Roman Empire. Bones at Winchester Cnut died at Shaftesbury in Dorset and was buried in the Old Minster, Winchester. With the events of 1066 the new regime of Normandy was keen to signal its arrival with an ambitious programme of grandiose cathedrals and castles throughout the High Middle Ages. Winchester Cathedral was built on the old Anglo-Saxon site and the previous burials, including Cnut's, were set in mortuary chests there. During the English Civil War in the 17th century, plundering Roundhead soldiers scattered the bones of Cnut on the floor and they were spread amongst the various other chests, notably those of William Rufus. After the restoration of the monarchy, the bones were collected and replaced in their chests, although somewhat out of order. Marriages and children 1 – Ælfgifu of Northampton Sweyn Knutsson, King of Norway Harold Harefoot, King of England 2 – Emma of Normandy Harthacnut, King of Denmark and England Gunhilda of Denmark, wed Henry III, Holy Roman Emperor. Family tree Cnut's skalds The Old Norse catalogue of skalds known as Skáldatal lists eight skalds who were active at Cnut's court. Four of them, namely Sigvatr Þórðarson, Óttarr svarti, Þórarinn loftunga and Hallvarðr háreksblesi, composed verses in honour of Cnut which have survived in some form, while no such thing is apparent from the four other skalds Bersi Torfuson, Arnórr Þórðarson jarlaskáld