1066

Product Description

A brilliant new reading of the Bayeux Tapestry that radically alters our understanding of the events of 1066 & reveals the astonishing story of the survival of early medieval Europe's greatest treasure. The Bayeux Tapestry was embroidered (it's not really a tapestry) in the late eleventh century. As an artefact it is priceless incomparable
- nothing of it's delicacy & texture let alone wit survives from the period. As a pictorial story it is delightful: the first feature-length cartoon. As history it is essential: it represents the moment of Britain's last conquest by a foreign army & celebrates the Norman victory over the blinded Saxon Harold. Or does it? In this brilliant piece of detective interpretation Andrew Bridgeford looks at the narrative contained within the tapestry & has discovered a wealth of new information. Who commissioned it? Who made it? Who is the singular dwarf named as Turold? Why in a work that celebrates a Norman conquest is the defeated Harold treated so nobly? Is Harold indeed the victim of the arrow from the sky? & who is the figure depicted in the tapestry who at the moment of crisis for the Normans rallies the army just at the point when it mistakenly believes William is dead & it will be defeated? Using the tapestry the book retells with vivid characterisation the story of the remaking of England in & after 1066. It is a compelling story as is the tale of the extraordinary survival of the tapestry itself: history has rarely been writ so large with such fine detail & yet been so veiled in mystery.