In 1066 a newly crowned Harold was killed in the Battle of Hastings which lead to Normandy's William the Conqueror taking over control of England. During this time, English nobles were replaced by their Norman counterparts. Because of this, the Norman language was used more frequently and it eventually overtook Old English as the language that was used for record keeping. Although this didn't impact spoken language since as drastically since there was already a disparity between the spoken language of commoners and upper class, written Middle English differs from region to region due to the fact there is no standardized way to write it.
William the Conqueror depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry
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