The Bayeux Tapestry: Embroidering the Facts of History (review)

The appeal of the Bayeux Tapestry, both as an artwork and as a historical document, has remained constant throughout the twentieth century. Anyone who has even contemplated studying it is instantly confronted by an intimidating bibliography. Indeed, given the publication of Robert Gameson's comprehensive collection of essays in 1997, it might seem surprising that such a substantial volume as this should follow so soon afterwards. But the purposes of the two are quite different. Gameson, in part, aimed to compile a collection of significant writings on the topic. This new book is a record of a highly ambitious colloquium held in Cerisy in 1999.

The Cerisy Colloquium aimed to take stock of the state of research and to create a standard work of reference on the subject. It succeeds admirably in both objectives. The organisers of the colloquium gathered together scholars mainly from England and France to discuss various technical, historiographical and art historical aspects of the embroidery. This volume or proceedings contains 22 essays, divided into five main sections: Historiography of the Bayeux Tapestry; the Artefact as Textile; Medieval Sources and Historical Narrative; the Bayeux Tapestry as Documentary Evidence and the Work as Art. It also includes an update of Shirley Ann Brown's bibliography of Bayeux Tapestry Studies. Perhaps the most important contribution is the publication of the 1982-3 technical reports from a scientific study carried out when the tapestry was moved to its new home in Bayeux at the Centre Guillaume le Conquérant. Six papers were presented on the embroidery, its backing strip and the types of stitches and materials used, as well as on its state of preservation. The removal of its backing allowed access to the usually inaccessible reverse of the Tapestry.

The conference also included papers on the early antiquarian interest in the work, among them a discussion of the first studies and visual recordings of the tapestry, such as the first photographic record made in 1871-2. It is shocking to realise that one of the early recorders of this piece, Thomas Stothard, actually removed fragments from it, while plaster casts were taken from it in the nineteenth century are still held by the Society of Antiquaries in London. David Hill explores these in an attempt to establish the earlier state of the tapestry and to distinguish later restorations. There is some divergence between his analysis and that of the technical reports. For example, he regards the use of chainstitch as an indicator of later restoration, while two of the restorers, Isabelle Bedat and Béatrice Girault-Kurtzeman, suggest that the original embroiderers employed chainstitch. One fascinating essay by Sylvette Lemagnen recounts the interest taken in the Bayeux Tapestry under the German occupation, when a team of members of the SS examined and photographed it with the intention of publishing a comprehensive study. This was never completed, but the article includes accounts of their plans and their activities.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the technical examination did not resolve many of the questions that have surrounded the Tapestry's production. Much of the scholarship is concerned with date, location, patron, style and motivation. It seems generally accepted amongst the participants that it was produced early in William the Conqueror's reign, and that the most probable patron was William's brother Odo, the Bishop of Bayeux. A date before 1070 seems to be generally favoured, and Canterbury or Southern England is agreed upon as the most probable location, despite Wolfgang Grape's controversial theories about a possible Norman location. Much of the argument for this seems convincing, except for the essay by Barbara English on the Coronation of Harold. She seems to accept the evidence of the embroidery as documentary in a very basic way, as if the artist was an eyewitness to the...