14 October in military history: the Battles of Hastings, Hochkirch, Jena and Auerstedt

English Heritage gives 14 October 1066. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle dates it to the day of Pope Calixtus and a Caen annal to the day before the Ides of October, while the chronicle of Florence of Worcester gives a different day, the eleventh of the Kalends of November.

The sources disagree. Florence of Worcester says he fell at twilight and Orderic Vitalis in the first onset; the Carmen de Hastingae Proelio has four men, the duke among them, cut him down. English Heritage says the arrow in his eye on the Bayeux Tapestry was added during 19th-century repairs.

In the night of 13 to 14 October Field Marshal Daun's Austrians attacked Frederick the Great's camp in darkness and fog. Field Marshal Keith was killed and the Prussians withdrew towards Doberschütz. Frederick put his loss at no more than 3,000 men and wrote that 51 heavy guns were missing; Carlyle gives 101 guns and above 8,000 men lost.

Two. Napoleon fought the army of Hohenlohe and Rüchel at Jena, while Marshal Davout's III Corps fought the main Prussian army at Auerstedt. Napoleon's bulletins counted them as one battle, which Petre puts down to his wish for glory.

His report gives 26,000 French combatants against 54,000 Prussian infantry and more than 12,000 cavalry. Petre, following Lettow-Vorbeck and Höpfner, counts 49,800 Prussians and calls it an inferiority of 1 to 2.