I have offered "Bayeux Tapestry!" as a response to a Jeopardy answer/question more than once through the years. Some themes recur on the popular game show.
This extraordinary work of art, history,and propaganda celebrating the Norman Conquest of England and the winners of the Battle of Hastings in 1066 is on the move these days. It currently resides in a museum in Bayeaux, France -- figures -- but for the first time in nearly 1,000 years it will return to Britain where it was created. There are critics who say that it is too delicate to be loaned out but there are also assurances that it can be done safely.
This embroidery -- not technically a tapestry -- was done by nuns from a convent near Canterbury, in England. at the behest of the bishop who was William the Conqueror's half brother. It is about 70 metres in length and 50 centimetres in height, what must have seemed like an endless scroll for these devoted women.
Within the cloister, in a time when accurate news was scarce anywhere, did they have much of a sense of the broader drama they were depicting? We see photos of the smitey bits of the tapestry, so what were they imagining as they worked on these scenes of battle? Did they whisper their speculation to one another, with needles in hand, and were these considered "signs and portents" of biblical significance? God bless those anonymous nuns for such a remarkable achievement.
Because it's Creation Time in the liturgical calendar I'll add that the sisters also included a vast menagerie of creatures, real and imaginary, on the margins of the embroidery. All God's creatures got a place on the battlefield...
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