Why are a million people about to queue at the British Museum for a strip of embroidered linen?
What if the most famous picture of 1066 isn't a tapestry, was probably stitched in England, and treats the losing king as a hero?
And, if the arrow in Harold's eye was stitched back in by 19th-century restorers, how sure are we of the one thing everyone knows about 1066?
With the Bayeux Tapestry in Britain for the first time in nearly a thousand years, Peter Frankopan and Afua Hirsch sit down with Sue Brunning, the British Museum curator who helped bring it here and waved Sutton Hoo off to France in exchange.
Sue takes them through the bishop who probably paid for it and gave himself a starring role, the English women who likely stitched it, and a Harold who looks nothing like a villain. Then come six women in 68 metres, three of them naked; a cleric, a woman called Ælfgyva and a slap nobody can explain; and a battle sequence brutal enough to send visitors out shaken. And then there's the arrow.
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[0:00] 68 metres of linen, home after nearly a thousand years
[3:33] From a Sandhurst summit to Bloomsbury, with Sutton Hoo sent the other way
[7:53] Why it isn't a tapestry, and why 1066 changed everything
[11:55] Harold the hero, hauling Normans out of the quicksand
[13:14] Bishop Odo, Canterbury and the women with the needles
[17:39] Six women, three naked, and a slap nobody can explain
[21:43] The battle that leaves visitors shaken
[26:44] Restorers, fading dyes and the arrow in Harold's eye
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Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas:
Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com
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