Key articles on the Bayeux tapestry collected in one volume, providing a comprehensive companion to its study.

The story of the Bayeux Tapestry, an embroidered strip of linen telling the story of the events starting in 1064 that led up to the Battle of Hastings and the Norman Conquest of England in 1066

An analysis of the famed medieval English tapestry through examination of the depicted landscapes, towns, castles, and other structures. An Archaeological Study of the Bayeux Tapestry provides a unique re-examination of this famous piece of work through the historical geography and archaeology of the tapestry. Trevor Rowley is the first author to have analyzed the tapestry through the landscapes, buildings and structures shown, such as towns and castles, while comparing them to the landscapes, buildings, ruins and earthworks which can be seen today. By comparing illustrated extracts from the tapestry to historical and contemporary illustrations, maps and reconstructions Rowley is able to provide the reader with a unique visual setting against which they are able to place the events on the tapestry. This approach allows Rowley to challenge a number of generally accepted assumptions regarding the location of several scenes in the tapestry, most controversially suggesting that William may never have gone to Hastings at all. Finally, Rowley tackles the missing end of the tapestry, suggesting the places and events which would have been depicted on this portion of William’s journey to Westminster. Praise forAn Archaeological Study of the Bayeux Tapestry “We all know what the Bayeux Tapestry celebrates in its iconic artwork, but Trevor Rowley goes one step further and looks at the buildings and characters with a view actually identifying them! Absolutely fascinating, brings a whole new dimension to the study of this amazing artefact.” —Books Monthly “Rowley’s arguments are copiously illustrated with details from the tapestry, photographs and plans. It results in very densely packed chapters well worth reading, and you certainly will never look at that tea towel in the same way again.” —Hexham Local History Society

Commanding its own museum and over 200 years of examination, observation and scholarship, the monumental embroidery, known popularly as the Bayeux Tapestry and documenting William the Conqueror’s invasion of England in October 1066, is perhaps the most important surviving artifact of the Middle Ages. This magnificent textile, both celebrated and panned, is both enigmatic artwork and confounding historical record. With over 1780 entries, Szabo and Kuefler offer the largest and most heavily annotated bibliography on the Tapestry ever written. Notably, the Bayeux Tapestry has produced some of the most compelling questions of the medieval period: Who commissioned it and for what purpose? What was the intended venue for its display? Who was the designer and who executed the enormous task of its manufacture? How does it inform our understanding of eleventh-century life? And who was the mysterious Aelfgyva, depicted in the Tapestry’s main register? This book is an effort to capture and describe the scholarship that attempts to answer these questions. But the bibliography also reflects the popularity of the Tapestry in literature covering a surprisingly broad array of subjects. The inclusion of this material will assist future scholars who may study references to the work in contemporary non-fiction and popular works as well as use of the Bayeux Tapestry as a primary and secondary source in the classroom. The monographs, articles and other works cited in this bibliography reflect dozens of research areas. Major themes are: the Tapestry as a source of information for eleventh-century material culture, its role in telling the story of the Battle of Hastings and events leading up to the invasion, patronage of the Tapestry, biographical detail on known historical figures in the Tapestry, arms and armor, medieval warfare strategy and techniques, opus anglicanum (the Anglo-Saxon needlework tradition), preservation and display of the artifact, the Tapestry’s place in medieval art, the embroidery’s depiction of medieval and Romanesque architecture, and the life of the Bayeux Tapestry itself.

This collection of fifteen papers ranges from the author's initial interest in the Tapestry as a source of information on early medieval dress, through to her startling recognition of the embroidery's sophisticated narrative structure. Developing the work of previous authors who had identified graphic models for some of the images, she argues that not just the images themselves but the contexts from which they were drawn should be taken in to account in 'reading' the messages of the Tapestry. In further investigating the minds and hands behind this, the largest non-architectural artefact surviving from the Middle Ages, she ranges over the seams, the embroidery stitches, the language and artistry of the inscription, the potential significance of borders and the gestures of the figures in the main register, always scrutinising detail informatively. She identifies an over-riding conception and house style in the Tapestry, but also sees different hands at work in both needlecraft and graphics. Most intriguingly, she recognises an sub-contractor with a Roman source and a clownish wit. The author is Professor of Anglo-Saxon Culture at The University of Manchester, UK, a specialist in Old English poetry, Anglo-Saxon material culture and medieval dress and textiles.

A full and provocative reappraisal of the Bayeux "Tapestry", its origins, design and patronage. Aspects of the Bayeux Tapestry (in fact an embroidered hanging) have always remained mysterious, despite much scholarly investigation, not least its design and patron. Here, in the first full-length interdisciplinary approach to the subject, the authors (an art historian and a historian) consider these and other issues. Rejecting the prevalent view that it was commissioned by Odo, the bishop of Bayeux and half-brother of William the Conqueror, or by some other comparable patron, they bring new evidence to bear on the question of its relationship to the abbey of St Augustine's, Canterbury. From the study of art-historical, archeological, literary, historical and documentary materials, they conclude that the monks of St Augustine's designed the hanging for display in their abbey church to tell their own story of how England was invaded and conquered in 1066. Elizabeth Carson Pastan is a Professor of Art History at Emory University; Stephen D. White is Asa G. Candler Professor of Medieval History (emeritus), Emory University, and an Honorary Professor of Mediaeval History at the University of St Andrews.

This book presents the hypothesis that the Bayeux tapestry, long believed to have been made in England, came from the Loire valley in France, from the abbey of St. Florent of Saumur. This is based on a number of different kinds of evidence, the most important of which is signs of a St. Florent/Breton influence in the portrayal of the Breton campaign in the tapestry, about a tenth of the whole.

Turold, Wadard and Vitalis: Why Are They on the Bayeux Tapestry?

The vivid scenes on the Bayeux Tapestry depict the events leading up to the Battle of Hastings in 1066. It is one of Europe's greatest treasures and its own story is full of drama and surprise. Who commissioned the tapestry? Was it Bishop Odo, William's ruthless half-brother? Or Harold's dynamic sister Edith, juggling for a place in the new court? Hicks shows us this world and the miracle of the tapestry's making: the stitches, dyes and strange details in the margins. For centuries it lay ignored in Bayeux cathedral until its 'discovery' in the eighteenth century. It became a symbol of power as well as art: townsfolk saved it during the French Revolution; Napoleon displayed it to promote his own conquest; the Nazis strove to make it their own; and its influence endures today. This marvellous book, packed with thrilling stories, shows how we remake history in every age and how a great work of art has a life of its own.

One opens each new volume expecting to find the unexpected - new light on old arguments, new material, new angles. MEDIUM AEVUM