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Lucien
Musset, trans. Richard Rex.
The
Bayeux Tapestry.
Boydell
Press, Sept 2005.
ISBN
1843831635.
Hardback.
25 x 21
cm.
272pp
with c.95 colour and c.15 b/w illus.
Publisher's
recommended price £25.00/$49.95
FAMOUS AS one of the most
extraordinary artefacts to survive from the eleventh century, the
Bayeux Tapestry is an extremely fragile work of art measuring almost 70
metres long. The harmony and brightness of its colours and the richness
of its workmanship make it an object of great fascination. And the
events of 1064 to 1066 surrounding the contested accession to the
English throne are so vividly portrayed that we can almost watch the
artists’ minds at work as they created it. In addition to the
historical narrative, it provides an irreplaceable picture of
eleventh-century life.
This erudite and highly readable study presents the Tapestry in such a
way that the reader can discover it frame by frame. Every episode is
illustrated in colour and accompanied by a detailed commentary, which
at the same time places the scene in the context of the Tapestry as a
whole.
The late LUCIEN MUSSET was Emeritus Professor of the University of Caen
and studied the Tapestry for nearly fifty years.
- The
Tapestry is believed to date from the eleventh century, though no
documentary evidence exists as to its exact origins.
- It
is approximately 64.38 metres in length and averages roughly 50
centimetres in width.
- Although
no one can be sure, the occasional use of Anglo-Saxon spellings, the
dispassionate attitude towards the defeated Harold and lack of
hostility towards the English, and the high reputation of English
embroidery at the time all suggest that this famous record of an
epochal French victory was actually made in England.
- The
Tapestry shows 626 people in total.
- With
its detailed images of ships and the invasion fleet, the Tapestry is
one of the principal sources for marine archaeology of the Middle Ages.
- Despite
its length the Tapestry’s Latin commentary runs to (approximately) an
economical 375 words.
- In
1792, amidst the chaos of the Revolution, the Tapestry was confiscated
from Bayeux Cathedral, termed public property and given a very specific
new purpose: to cover military wagons. It was saved only by the
intervention of a local lawyer, Léonard Leforestier.
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