HistoryExtra Home of Britain’s bestselling history magazine and award-winning podcast 2026-09-22T08:02:06.000Z https://www.historyextra.com/people/william-the-conqueror/feed/atom Dr David Musgrove, FSA <![CDATA[Why the Nazis loved the Bayeux Tapestry]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/why-the-nazis-loved-bayeux-tapestry-episode-6-video/ 2026-09-22T08:02:06.000Z 2026-09-22T08:02:01.000Z What happened to the Tapestry after the Norman conquest? In the final episode of this HistoryExtra Academy, Dr David Musgrove considers the long and surprising afterlife of this most famous of medieval embroideries.
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Enjoyed episode six? Find more episodes. Discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr David Musgrove is content director of HistoryExtra, and expert and co-author (with Michael Lewis) of The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry.
]]> Dr David Musgrove, FSA <![CDATA[The mysteries of the Bayeux Tapestry]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/the-mysteries-of-the-bayeux-tapestry-academy-episode-5-video/ 2026-09-22T08:02:04.000Z 2026-09-22T08:01:33.000Z Why does the Bayeux Tapestry include an image of a man squatting naked? And what about the birds and horses in the embroidery – what can they tell us about 11th-century beliefs?
David Musgrove looks to the margins of the Tapestry, and unravels some of the mysteries held in the borders of the work.
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Enjoyed episode five? Find more in episode four. Discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr David Musgrove is content director of HistoryExtra, and expert and co-author (with Michael Lewis) of The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry.
]]> Dr David Musgrove, FSA <![CDATA[Who made the Bayeux Tapestry?]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/who-made-the-bayeux-tapestry-academy-video-episode-4/ 2026-09-15T09:54:45.000Z 2026-09-15T09:54:45.000Z Millions of people have viewed the Bayeux Tapestry since its creation in the 11th century. But what was the medieval embroidery actually for? Who had it made, and who was supposed to look at it?
In episode four, Dr David Musgrove considers these key questions.
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Enjoyed episode four? Find more in episode three. Discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr David Musgrove is content director of HistoryExtra, and expert and co-author (with Michael Lewis) of The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry.
]]> Dr David Musgrove, FSA <![CDATA[The Bayeux Tapestry’s ‘big moment’]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/the-bayeux-tapestrys-big-moment-academy-video-episode-3/ 2026-09-15T09:53:42.000Z 2026-09-15T09:51:56.000Z Join us as we resume the story of the action in the Bayeux Tapestry, when a momentous matter between 11th-century rivals Harold and William comes to a head.
In episode three, Dr David Musgrove turns to one of the embroidery’s most crucial scenes.
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Enjoyed episode three? Find more in episode two. Discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr David Musgrove is content director of HistoryExtra, and expert and co-author (with Michael Lewis) of The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry.
]]> HistoryExtra <![CDATA[The Bayeux Tapestry: what is it, why was it made and what story does it tell?]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/5-bayeux-tapestry-facts-what-is-it-why-was-it-made-and-what-story-does-it-tell/ 2026-09-09T08:41:17.000Z 2026-09-09T08:00:18.000Z The Bayeux Tapestry tells one of the most famous stories in British history – that of the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, particularly the battle of Hastings, which took place on 14 October 1066.
The Bayeux Tapestry is not a tapestry at all, but rather an embroidery. It is some 68m long and is composed of several panels that were produced separately and then eventually sewn together to form one long whole. It was most likely made in England by English embroiderers, and while we do not have a precise date for when the Bayeux Tapestry was created, the academic consensus is that it must have been produced very soon after the events it depicts.
What story does the Bayeux Tapestry tell?
The action actually starts a couple of years before the set-piece battle of Hastings, with a discussion between England’s King, Edward the Confessor, and his leading noble (who was also his brother-in-law), Harold Godwinson.
The upshot of that conversation is that Harold sets off on a ship to France. He is shipwrecked and captured by a local nobleman there, and then is transferred into the hands of the powerful Duke William of Normandy. Curiously, they then head off together on a military adventure in Brittany, which Harold seems to enthusiastically take part in.
The story of the Bayeux Tapestry
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Harold’s time in Normandy ends with him making an oath to William on holy relics. The tapestry does not explain precisely what the nature of the oath is, but other Norman-inclined sources tell us that Harold was swearing to be William’s man in England and to uphold his bid to be king on Edward’s death.
Harold then goes back to England and has another meeting with Edward the Confessor. We don’t know what they talk about, but it’s presumably discussing his stay in Normandy. Then Edward dies, and Harold is declared king by the English nobles. A comet shoots through the sky, which is deemed to be a bad omen for Harold.
Then the action swings back to Normandy. William hears of Harold’s accession and immediately starts building a fleet. The ships cross the Channel and the Norman army establishes itself on English soil. They are shown pillaging, feasting and fortifying their position. Then we get to the battle of Hastings itself, which is portrayed in considerable detail. The upshot of course is that King Harold is slain, with the defeated Englishmen being shown fleeing the field in the last scene of the tapestry.
The ending is abrupt and many people have pondered on whether the tapestry was not actually finished, or has lost its final frames at some point over the centuries. If so, the end panels might have shown William being crowned king of England, as that was the ultimate consequence of the Conquest.
Why is the Bayeux Tapestry important?
The tapestry contains a considerable amount of information not only about the political events surrounding the Conquest story, but also about other aspects of military, social and cultural history.
Historians of clothing have gleaned much about Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman garment styles and fashions from the depictions shown in the tapestry, while academics interested in early medieval ship-building, sailing and carpentry have likewise learnt much from the sections dealing with the construction and voyage of William’s invasion fleet.
Military historians have studied the arms and armour shown in the tapestry and analysed the battle scenes to learn more about military techniques and practice at the time. Architectural experts have also been able to interrogate the tapestry for information about building types and materials in the 11th-century from the portrayals of the various structures shown in the story.
So the tapestry is a rich source of information on many aspects of Anglo-Norman life, society, culture and history. But more than that, it’s an astounding and amazing survival of a work of art that is almost 1,000 years old. Its significance derives as much from that as from what it tells us when we study it.
Unravelling the Bayeux Tapestry
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How old is the Bayeux Tapestry?
We do not have a precise date for when the Bayeux Tapestry was created but the academic consensus is that it must have been produced very soon after the events it depicts. This means that it is a key primary source for students of the Conquest period.
Who commissioned the Bayeux Tapestry?
This is a question that has been much discussed by historians over the years. Given the fact that the tapestry broadly celebrates and sanctions William’s Conquest of England, for a long time it was considered to have been the work of his wife, Queen Matilda, and the ladies of her court. That view is out of favour now, and the majority of historians would agree that the most likely patron was Odo of Bayeux, the half-brother of Duke William.
Odo was a key supporter of the duke and a substantial landowner in both England and Normandy after 1066, as well as being the bishop of Bayeux.
The biggest pointer towards Odo’s likely patronage of the tapestry is that he has a disproportionally large role in the events portrayed, compared to his appearance in other historical accounts of the Conquest. It seems that the designers are going out of their way to stress the importance of Odo in the narrative. On top of that, the key oath scene in which Harold swears to William is depicted in the tapestry as having taken place in Bayeux (Odo’s bishopric), which conflicts with other documents that say the event happened elsewhere in Normandy. Plus, aside from the main historical figures, there is the curious mention of several otherwise insignificant characters in the tapestry, and their names match those of men we know to have been Odo’s retainers.
Other candidates are also in the frame, though: Edward the Confessor’s widow, Queen Edith, has been suggested. She also features in the tapestry and would have had cause to want to show herself in a good light to William after the Conquest, so what better way than commissioning a tapestry that supports his claim to the throne?
Alternatively, it might have been made on the orders of William himself. Clearly he would have been keen to have a permanent record of his victory and his right to have claimed the throne.
- Read more | Who made the Bayeux Tapestry, and why?
Is the Bayeux Tapestry a reliable source of information?
Is any historical primary source of information entirely reliable? No – unless you understand the context of the time in which it was produced, and the motives of those producing it. That’s why the question of who had the tapestry made is critical in helping us to interpret what it tells us.
The most likely candidate as the patron of the tapestry is the Norman nobleman Odo of Bayeux, half-brother of William the Conqueror. However, layered on top of that is the likely fact that the actual design and embroidery work was probably done in England, by English hands.
So, although the tapestry is on the face of it a work of art designed to celebrate and legitimise William’s conquest of England, there is also an undercurrent of sympathy to the defeated Anglo-Saxon cause running beneath it. In some ways, the tapestry appears to agree with the Norman narrative of events, as described in the work of writers such as William of Jumieges and William of Poitiers. However, it is also surprisingly respectful of William’s enemy, King Harold II, who is shown as a great and brave lord, rather than just a deceitful usurper.
What’s important to note is that as a source of information on the political events to the Conquest period, the tapestry actually offers very limited definitive evidence. The Latin inscriptions that run above the pictorial narrative are terse and limited in number. This ambiguity means we do not know, for instance, what Edward the Confessor and Harold are discussing in the first scene of the story. Nothing is said other than ‘King Edward’ above the frame, so we are entirely in the dark about the meeting and must infer from other sources as to what the designers are trying to tell us. That is a problem that persists throughout the tapestry, where we are constantly invited to infer what is happening from the pictures, rather than being told what is happening with words.
What was the Bayeux Tapestry used for?
This is a difficult question to answer, if we are focusing on the immediate post-Conquest period, because we have no evidence whatsoever to call upon.
Assuming that the patron of the tapestry was, as is widely accepted today, Bishop Odo of Bayeux, then it may have been used to decorate the cathedral that he had constructed in Bayeux during his lifetime. It may even have been designed as an ornament for the consecration of that building in 1077, though some historians dispute that.
Presumably whoever did have the tapestry made would have wanted others to come view it and share in the story it tells, as well as be impressed by the magnificence of both the patron (for being the benefactor of such a great work), and of Duke William himself for orchestrating his victory.
Where might the Bayeux Tapestry have been displayed?
If it was displayed in a cathedral, illumination would have been dim to say the least. The tapestry could perhaps instead have been displayed in a secular building, or it could have been displayed temporarily and then stored away, maybe being brought out for particular gatherings, when there was someone on hand to tell the story in person as well.
How has the Bayeux Tapestry survived since 1066?
What we do know is that from at least 1476 onwards, the tapestry was held in Bayeux Cathedral (we don’t know where it was prior to that) because it’s detailed in an inventory of that date. It was traditionally brought out for display in the cathedral at a certain point in the year, and then stored away.
This helps to explain why the tapestry survived at all – it wasn’t on permanent view and thus not subject to the risks of being regularly exposed to the elements.
As we move forward into more recent times, the tapestry has continued to have a propaganda purpose. Napoleon considered it important when he was readying his plans to invade Britain at the start of the 19th century and had it brought to Paris for display. In the Second World War it was again deemed a useful tool by the Nazis, where it was studied as part of a research project to demonstrate the Germanic origins of European culture (and moved to Paris for safe-keeping).
View Green Video on the source website]]> HistoryExtra <![CDATA[The making of the Bayeux Tapestry: who made it, how long did it take, and how has it survived?]]> https://www.historyextra.com/period/norman/bayeux-tapestry-where-make-how-long-who-when-stitch-penises-visit/ 2026-09-09T12:36:36.000Z 2026-09-08T17:50:24.000Z Who made the Bayeux Tapestry? How many people were involved in its making?
We have no sources to tell us who made the Bayeux Tapestry; however, most scholars agree that it was made in Norman England, probably by Anglo-Saxon embroiderers. At present we do not know how many people were involved in creating the Tapestry. We can say it would have been embroidered by women because all the surviving evidence demonstrates that only women in early medieval England embroidered.
Men could have created the design, however – there is a famous example where Ӕthelwynn, a 10th-century noblewoman known for her embroidery work, wrote to Saint Dunstan (c924–88) asking him to design an embroidery pattern for a priest’s stole that she and her girls could embroider in gold. Also, monks were well versed in drawing and transferring images onto manuscripts for illumination, so it is not unlikely that men were involved in this part of the process.
Women in Anglo-Saxon England were famed for their embroidery skills. Documentary sources tell us that embroidery was considered a commendable occupation for women in elite circles, while the Domesday Book and the 12th-century chronicle Liber Eliensis both highlight women who embroidered as a profession. Written sources for embroidery production in Normandy point to it being a “worthy occupation” for high-ranking Norman women.
Previously nuns or elite women were thought to have made the Bayeux Tapestry. However, recent research I have undertaken studying the embroidery’s technical attributes as seen on the reverse of the hanging shows the embroidery was stitched to a set standard, indicating a certain level of training. Meanwhile, certain motifs were worked to set formulas – for example, the castles can be divided into three groups: outlines stitched first, then fillings; blocks of colour stitched from left to right and top to bottom; or simply different colours stitched from left to right.
This all points to the possibility of three workers (or groups of workers) completing all the castles featured in the tapestry. This, combined with the fact that each of the eight panels of ground fabric was embroidered before they were joined together, means that they could have been worked simultaneously and leads to the conclusion that a sophisticated level of overall organisation was required.
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It can therefore be hypothesised that a ‘manager’ was in charge of the production process. This person would have needed knowledge of embroidery working practices, so it is likely that it would have been a professional embroiderer who was familiar with training and organising others and had experience working on large commissions. This level of organisation would need to have taken place in a professional workshop-like setting. Anglo-Saxon charters give examples of possible workshops – for instance, one dating to the ninth century records Bishop Denewulf of Worcester giving an embroiderer named Eanswitha an estate as payment for looking after and making textiles for the church. This estate most likely housed some form of workshop, much as other central estates are known to have done for textile production.
My research, too, has highlighted archaeological evidence for possible embroidery workrooms. Such places would need to have been clean so that dirt could not contaminate the embroidery, and they would also have needed access to good light. Larger and more elaborate pieces of the tapestry would have been attached to a slate frame (a large rectangular frame made of four pieces of wood that slot together), so generous space would have been required.
Space would also have been needed to store materials (even if the materials were not being bought in bulk), and for workers to move around and work comfortably. It may be that in good weather, embroidery was undertaken outside under a canopy, much like the illustrations of women weaving depicted in the Utrecht Psalter.
8 quickfire facts about the Bayeux Tapestry
It is almost 70 metres long
More precisely it is 68.3 metres long (224 feet), which is about length of three short-course swimming pools.
The Bayeux Tapestry is really an embroidery
The Bayeux Tapestry is not a tapestry at all, but rather an embroidery. A tapestry is something that’s woven on a loom, whereas an embroidery is thread stitched onto a cloth background.
It's made from 9 panels of cloth and 10 thread colours
The panels that were produced separately and then eventually sewn together to form one long whole. In one case the joining of the panels is inexpertly done, as the marginal lines don’t match up precisely.
There's an astronomical object on it – a comet
Halley's Comet is shown on the Bayeux Tapestry after Harold’s coronation, appearing as a portent of disaster.
The Bayeux Tapestry probably wasn't made in Bayeux
There are a lot of indications to suggest that it was most likely produced in England by English embroiderers. The Latin textual inscriptions above the story-boards use Old English letter forms, and stylistically the work has parallels in Anglo-Saxon illuminated manuscripts. Plus, some of the vignettes in the tapestry appear to be based on designs that we know were found in manuscripts held in the library of a monastery in Canterbury, so there are those who argue that it was actually made not just in England, but more precisely in Canterbury.
The Bayeux Tapestry doesn't tell the entire story of the Norman Conquest
It omits pivotal parts and players, notably the other battles of the Conquest year that took place in northern England – Fulford and Stamford Bridge – and one man in particular, Edgar Ætheling, who might have been king in 1066.
The final section of the Bayeux Tapestry is missing
It's believed that at least one scene – possibly more – has been lost from the end of the Bayeux Tapestry.
There are 93 penises on the Bayeux Tapestry
Four of these are attached to men, and what may be a fifth appears on a soldier’s corpse. The remaining 88 are attached to horses.
Who commissioned the making of the Bayeux Tapestry?
There is no direct evidence for who commissioned the tapestry. A number of candidates have been postulated including Queen Edith, wife of Edward the Confessor; William the Conqueror; or the monks of St Augustine’s Abbey in Canterbury.
Most researchers support the suggestion that Bishop Odo, William the Conqueror’s half-brother, is the most likely person. However, Elizabeth Carson Paston, Stephen White and Kate Gilbert explored this theory in 2014 and concluded there is no real evidence to support it.
Who was its intended audience?
The answer to this question changes when we consider where the Tapestry was meant to be displayed. If we take recent arguments put forward by Gale Owen-Crocker and Chris Henige, the Tapestry would have been hung in a room in a castle keep, which Henige suggests is Dover Castle.
In this case, the audience would have consisted of Norman nobles and their families; guests and other dignitaries; and servants/slaves who would have most likely been Anglo-Saxon. Therefore a cross-section of people would have viewed the Bayeux Tapestry.
When and where was the Bayeux Tapestry made? How did it end up in France?
There is no concrete evidence for when the Tapestry was made, nor how it ended up in France. Currently the agreed date for its creation is sometime before the end of the 11th century. Scholars agree that the first positive record of the tapestry in France is the Bayeux Cathedral inventory of 1476. At present we do not know what happened to it between these dates.
Professor George Beech has argued that the tapestry could have been made in France, but most scholars believe it was made in Anglo-Saxon England, with the most likely centre being in or around Canterbury. This is because the artistic style of the tapestry’s design is a type known to have developed in Canterbury during the 11th century, but its precise name is unknown.
How long would it have taken to make the Bayeux Tapestry?
It is difficult to say how long it took to make and there has been no specific research on this. The answer would depend on how many women were working on the embroidery simultaneously; the size of the building(s) in which it was being made; access to light and access to materials.
Any estimation of the time taken to make the tapestry would need to take into account the time taken to manufacture the required materials; plus the time involved in the production of the design itself; plus other logistics. From an embroiderer’s perspective, the stitches employed (more of this anon) are not particularly time-consuming to work.
What is the Bayeux Tapestry made of? What renovations and restoration work have been carried out on the tapestry?
The base textile (ground fabric) of the Bayeux Tapestry is linen. It was stitched with wool threads dyed with natural dyes. A small number of linen threads were also sporadically used.
Over the intervening centuries a number of linen textile patches were added to the back of the tapestry to cover tears and holes. During the 19th century, areas of the missing embroidery were re-stitched with wool thread dyed with chemicals – on the front of the hanging these appear more garish than the original threads. On the reverse, the level of stitch-work is not as neat or precise as the original.
Running along the top of the tapestry is a strip of linen fabric. The French conservators who studied the tapestry during its 1982 conservation thought the strip was old, but they were not sure how old. An early backing was lost during restoration work on the tapestry in the 19th century, therefore a new lining was attached.
- Read more | Why is Harold a hero of the Bayeux Tapestry?
Can you explain why the Bayeux Tapestry is not really a ‘tapestry’ at all, but rather an embroidery?
Correct, the Bayeux Tapestry is actually embroidery. A tapestry is a woven textile where the design is woven into the fabric as the textile is being created on the loom. Embroidery, on the other hand, is stitched onto a piece of textile that is already woven. The design is often, but not always, drawn onto the ground fabric for the embroiderer to follow.
When you view a tapestry the design and the ground fabric appear meshed together because they were created at the same time, whereas when you look at embroidery the stitching often stands proud of the ground fabric. This is particularly true of the Bayeux Tapestry.
What embroidery techniques were used? What can you tell us about the specific ‘Bayeux stitch’ used to make the Bayeux Tapestry?
Four embroidery stitches – stem stitch; split stitch; chain stitch; and laid work – were used on the Bayeux Tapestry. Stem stitch was predominately used as an outline stitch (ie for the lettering and as an ‘open’ filling stitch to emulate chain mail). It was occasionally worked more densely to fill in small areas such as a horse’s cheek.
Split stitch and chain stitch were used rarely – both were worked as independent lines for objects such as the handle of a spear; ship’s rigging; or to add depth to some letters. All three of these stitches are worked in single and double rows.
Laid work, sometimes called ‘Bayeux Stitch’, is the most predominant stitch. It is used for nearly all fillings throughout the hanging. Variations of this stitch were also popular in 17th-century crewel-work embroidery [a type of surface embroidery using wool].
All the stitches used in the Bayeux Tapestry were popular during the medieval period, with stem stitch, split stitch and occasionally chain stitch being worked in wool and silk threads. Laid work does not survive as well, but there are examples from fragmented hangings discovered in Viking contexts, all worked in wool threads.
Which section(s) of the Bayeux Tapestry do you think would have been the most difficult to make?
This is a difficult question to answer. With regard to the embroidering process it would depend on how the design was divided for each worker (or group of workers). I think that, to begin with, the most difficult sections would have been where complex embroidery covers the seams – for example, the horses depicted in the final battle sequence at seams 5, 7 and 8 (there are a total of eight seams joining nine pieces of ground fabric together which make up the surviving length of the tapestry). Here, the technical evidence shows that workers finished the embroidery on one panel some way short of a seam, while starting it slightly further in at the beginning of the next panel.
It is probable that each panel was not worked consecutively or even by the same embroiderer, so each worker would have had to establish how much space to leave in order for the seam to be constructed and to make sure the finished design looked right.
Once the panels were ready to be sewn together, the design would have been matched up but a space would have been left. Once the seam was completed an embroiderer would have finished stitching the design over the completed join. This would have required forethought, vision and creativity, and would likely have been rather an intense mental process. Eventually, of course, it would have become second nature to the embroiderers.
Is it true that the final scenes of the Bayeux Tapestry are missing? If so, what happened and what might they have depicted?
Yes, the final scene (or scenes) are missing. We know that from 1476 onwards, at no time was the tapestry displayed indefinitely, and at other times it was stored in a wooden chest – and much later on a large roller. When textiles are stored and displayed only occasionally, their edges tend to get handled more often – because people need to hold and hoist them as the textile is being taken out of storage, moved into position, hung, tweaked and then later taken down and put back into storage. This leads to more degradation at the edges. It is also possible that when the tapestry was stored in the wooden chest mentioned above, the final scene(s) were laid on top, making them more vulnerable to damage. In fact, we are lucky any of the Bayeux Tapestry survived at all!
Most scholars believe the final scene(s) of the tapestry would have depicted the lead up to and the coronation of Duke William as king of England, as a fitting end to the story being told. It would also make sense from design a perspective: Gale Owen-Crocker has shown that if the tapestry was hung in a square room of a secular building (possibly a castle keep, as suggested above), the layout design is geometric, with particular motifs mirroring each other across the display space. As such, the coronation of William would mirror the first scene in which King Edward is seated on his throne.
Unravelling The Bayeux Tapestry
Member exclusive | Expert historians unpick some of the biggest questions surrounding the Bayeux Tapestry, from its creation and purpose, to the incomplete story it recounts and its modern-day legacy
Listen to all episodes now
How has the Bayeux Tapestry survived over the centuries?
The Bayeux Tapestry has survived due to a fortunate set of circumstances. Although we do not know how or when the hanging arrived at Bayeux Cathedral, the fact that it did is an important part of its survival story. Stored in a religious setting and given special status, the tapestry was likely displayed only occasionally. As such it was handled less frequently than other hangings that would have adorned secular buildings, meaning there was less opportunity for damage, loss or destruction.
The Bayeux Tapestry has also, through history, become an icon for different political personalities such as Napoleon and the Nazis who studied and kept it safe in order to highlight their political messages (of French military might over the English; and German pan-nationalism respectively).
Finally, the Bayeux Tapestry’s importance as a cultural artefact has ensured that it has been kept safe and well-looked after – particularly in the modern era, by a trained and knowledgeable multi-disciplinary team at the Bayeux Museums Department.
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Alexandra Lester-Makin has a PhD in early medieval embroidery from the University of Manchester and is also a professional embroiderer.
This article was first published on HistoryExtra in October 2018. Find out more about the Tapestry's move to its temporary home in the British Museum.
]]> Dr David Musgrove, FSA <![CDATA[Politically embarrassing to politically powerful: how the Bayeux Tapestry became a tool of diplomacy]]> https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/bayeux-tapestry-exhibition-burnham-macron-diplomacy/ 2026-09-08T16:07:49.000Z 2026-09-08T16:07:49.000Z Britain’s new prime minister Andy Burnham made a droll observation at the British Museum, during the speeches to commemorate the visit of King Charles III and President Emmanuel Macron to the Bayeux Tapestry exhibition on Wednesday 2 September. But it didn’t really make sense.
He talked about how the Tapestry shows “a new leader emerging from a northern territory travelling to the south of England in search of the crown. Clearly something that couldn’t happen today”.
Obviously, he was drawing a knowingly self-deprecating comparison to his own recent journey to power, though I’m not sure who he was actually comparing himself to. Presumably he was thinking of William the Conqueror, though Normandy is to the south of England, so the northern territory he’s thinking of is, I guess, an acknowledgment of the Scandinavian origins of the Normans (the foundation story of Normandy, of course, goes back to the year 911 and Rollo, a Norse warlord, being granted the duchy from the king of France). If that’s the case, our new prime minister is well-informed about northern European early medieval history, so that’s great to hear.
- Read more | Politics and the Bayeux Tapestry: the inside story of the blockbuster loan
However, what he overlooked was the fact that the Tapestry pointedly omits an actual northern leader invading in 1066, but failing in his bid to secure the crown. The Norwegian king Harald Hardrada led a force into Yorkshire, along with Tostig, the disaffected brother of England’s King Harold.
Hardrada won one battle against the Anglo-Saxons, at Fulford, but then was soundly defeated in a second clash, at Stamford Bridge, by King Harold himself. Both Hardrada and Tostig died on the field, along with a huge number of their men, so much so that the river ran red with their blood. Neither Fulford nor Stamford Bridge is shown in the embroidery.
A very selective history
We tend to think that the Bayeux Tapestry gives a full account of the events of 1066. It is, after all, almost 70 metres long, so has ample space to cover the details. However, that’s clearly not the case, as its exclusion of these two northern battles shows. That is because it’s designed with a very specific political purpose in mind – namely to offer a justification for William’s invasion of England.
The Tapestry sets up the story of 1066 as a binary clash between Harold and William, with Harold perjuring himself after making a sacred oath to support William’s claim to the throne, and thus giving William the reason he needed to launch his invasion fleet. Including any other possible contenders to the throne, such as Hardrada or indeed Edgar Ætheling (the closest blood relative to the previous king, Edward the Confessor), would have muddied the picture that the Tapestry was presenting.
So it’s always had this political dimension, and clearly the current story of the loan has a political dimension too. President Macron has been the driving force behind making it happen. It required, in his words, a “willing suspension of disbelief” to get it done, in the face of substantial concern about the wisdom of allowing such a venerable and fragile artefact to travel across the Channel.
It’s fascinating, then, to see current politics play out with the Tapestry as the backdrop. The loan is part of a coming-together of Anglo-French relations in the aftermath of Brexit, and an effort to salve the wounds after the bitter recriminations it produced on both sides of the Channel.
Bringing enemies together
Would the original Tapestry designers have imagined it might have brought people in Britain and France together almost a millennium after they made it? I doubt it, but there is a theory that the embroidery’s original intent was to allow a space for both the vanquished and the victors of 1066 to come together and find common ground after the battle. It might have been part of an effort by Duke William and one of his leading lords, Odo of Bayeux (William’s half-brother and the most likely candidate to have been the Tapestry’s patron), to get the Anglo-Saxons on side in the new Norman regime.
The deliberate vagueness of the Tapestry’s narrative – and its very terse Latin captions – allows for multiple interpretations of the same scenes, depending on how the viewer wants to see what’s shown. England’s Harold gets a pretty positive portrayal in the first half of the Tapestry, at least (before he makes his fateful oath), so there is a world in which you can imagine military men from both sides of the conflict assembling inside some Norman keep to look at the Tapestry and reflect together on what they’ve been through, but with space for all to remember what happened slightly differently.
If Brexit has taught us anything, it’s that you need to fudge things to get through challenging and complex relationships, and the Tapestry offers a masterclass in fudgery. How else could people move on from the massive social dislocation that resulted from Hastings, if not by skirting around some of the issues and allowing recollections to vary of what had just happened?
Past its sell-by date
There was only a brief window of time in which William was interested in bringing together the defeated and the winners. It probably wasn’t long before he had become less interested in justifying why he was right to depose Harold, and more interested in dealing with the aftermath of his actions.
The Norman Conquest was not a one-and-done thing (even though the Bayeux Tapestry might have us believe that), and there were numerous rebellions against Norman rule by the restless Anglo-Saxons. After a brief period of trying to accommodate and understand, by the end of the 1060s, William was laying down a very heavy hand on his new subjects. The Harrying of the North was the ultimate response, and the campaign of destruction wrought on northern England in 1069 and 1070 left the area devastated for years.
- Read more | I'm an expert on the Bayeux Tapestry and this is the important truth behind it that we need to remember
So it’s quite possible that the Tapestry was politically obsolete as soon as it was finished. We don’t know how long it took to make, but if we consider that the Ladies of the Leek Embroidery Society spent a year or so on their replica version in the 1880s (and they had a design to work off and weren’t operating in a war-torn environment), then it surely can’t have been any faster for the original embroiderers.
That replica is now on show in Reading Museum, and is worth a visit if you can’t get to the British Museum (or do both in a day with a quick trip along the Elizabeth Line). If the stitching work started as early as 1067, by the time it was finished, the situation on the ground might well have moved on markedly, and perhaps the Tapestry was politically redundant as the last panels were being embroidered.
That might explain why the Tapestry has survived today. Maybe it was just quietly put in a chest and forgotten about, because it wasn’t hitting the right vibe in the fast-moving world of Anglo-Norman relations. It could have been quietly shipped off to Bayeux straight away, put in the corner of some quiet room, and largely forgotten about for the next few centuries.
I was asked to commentate for BBC News and Sky on the visit of King Charles and President Macron as they toured the Tapestry. I’ve never tried my hand at punditry, but it was fascinating to listen in on the chat that the two heads of state had as they walked down the line.
The king cracked a gag about the French bringing wine with them on their invasion fleet, and the president nodded appreciatively. I did wonder whether this would have been the sort of chat expected from Anglo-Saxon earls and Norman lords in the 1060s, too, as they studied the embroidery.
But if this sort of bonhomie was intended in the 11th century, perhaps it never happened if the Tapestry was indeed past its sell-by date as soon as it was finished. I was a little disappointed that none of the dignitaries seemed to make reference to the graphic sex scenes in the Tapestry, as I’m sure that the post-Hastings viewers would have acknowledged the various nude vignettes.
View Green Video on the source website
Anyway, in the speeches after the tour, much was made by both sides of how the Tapestry is a symbol of the long and durable Anglo-French relationship. It undoubtedly is that, so it was fascinating to think about how the original conflict story might have been designed to encourage comradeship too – but a comradeship that didn’t come to pass.
Macron’s masterstroke
President Macron is clearly a wily political operator. He’s been in place in the Élysée Palace for the entire story of the Bayeux Tapestry loan. He announced it back in 2018, and he’s outlived a succession of British prime ministers. He’s rightly recognised that the Tapestry means a lot more to us here in the UK than it does to much of France.
I’ve been asked by a few perplexed French journalists to explain why we’re getting so excited about the Tapestry coming here, because if they were asked to pick a key date in their national story, the people of France would, I’m sure, plump for 1789 over 1066. William of Normandy is a peripheral figure in the French historical narrative.
So Macron has clocked that this means a lot to us, and he’s expended a bit of his own political capital in making the loan happen – the “willing suspension of disbelief” that he talked about is surely code for having to deal with a lot of objections on his side of the Channel. But he’s done it with purpose because he has seen the soft power of this artefact, and the diplomatic win he’s got from it is surely going to give him leverage in moving forward with a more productive Anglo-French relationship.
So, if the Tapestry’s miraculous survival today is in part due to it being politically embarrassing in the 11th century, it’s all the more interesting that it’s being used as a tool to get over recent political embarrassments in the 21st century. More power to the Tapestry.
]]> Dr David Musgrove, FSA <![CDATA[I correctly predicted that the Bayeux Tapestry would come home. But is football coming home too?]]> https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/bayeux-tapestry-exhibition-football-come-home/ 2026-09-08T18:31:57.000Z 2026-07-10T16:07:05.000Z So the Bayeux Tapestry has come home. In the quietest point of the night of 9/10 July (and a hot, sweltering night at that), a lorry rolled into the cargo bay of the British Museum. Inside, in its special vibration-damping box, was the Bayeux Tapestry.
It had made its journey from Normandy, through the Channel Tunnel, and up into London with a police escort. Now it will be allowed to rest and acclimatise to its new surroundings for a few days before the hard work starts of getting it into its temporary display ready for the start of the exhibition on 10 September.
Perhaps this is the first time that the venerable embroidery has been on this side of the Channel since it was created some 950 years ago. The lorry probably passed quite close to where most experts think it was most likely made, in Canterbury in Kent.
- Read more | The Bayeux Tapestry is coming to the UK – and this is how you can see it
To mark the moment, the British Museum arranged to have an incredible image of some of the sailing scenes from the Tapestry projected onto the White Cliffs of Dover, with a huge “Merci!” inscribed alongside.
Eighteen years in the making
I’ve been following the story of the loan of the Tapestry for years, dating back to 2008 when I wrote an article for BBC History Magazine (now HistoryExtra Magazine) interviewing a panel of experts about the theory that the Tapestry was made in England. In that article, I raised the idea that maybe one day the Tapestry could come home.
Some of the scholars were against the idea, but one – Michael Lewis – was keen. He told me then: “I think it would be lovely to see it in this country… If the Tapestry was returned, it would be possible to display it along with the works that it was influenced by – that would be a fabulous exhibition – to have the Tapestry displayed with the primary sources as far as we can ascertain them.”
Ten years later, in 2018, when President Macron announced that the loan was actually going to happen, I leapt into action and co-wrote a book, with Michael Lewis, all about the Tapestry (it’s called The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry). My co-author is now the curator of the British Museum’s exhibition, and I know he has been working hard over the years to make this amazing moment a reality.
From rivals to partners
What is striking is the level of cooperation between the French and British conservation and curation teams, typified by that grateful projection on the White Cliffs. Yes, there have been voices raised against the loan, questioning the sense of moving such a fragile object, but it’s clear that the teams involved have been working hand-in-glove to make sure the embroidery was moved safely and securely.
This is a contrast to the five previous efforts to get a loan of the Tapestry in the 20th century, when it wasn’t always clear who the UK negotiators should be talking to in order to strike a deal. Earlier this year, I interviewed Britain’s Envoy for the Bayeux Tapestry loan, Lord Peter Ricketts, and he noted that, “Both sides, of course, are equally attached to ensuring the preservation and the protection of this incredibly fragile and precious object.”
- Read more | Politics and the Bayeux Tapestry: the inside story of the blockbuster loan
I’ve spoken to some of the political figures involved in the discussions about the loan and they have been clear that the driving force behind this project was France’s President Macron. UK prime ministers have come and gone, but Macron has been constant ever since 2018. I see that he has written an op-ed in The Times this morning. He says, “This loan from France means much more than simply moving an artwork: it is a gesture of trust, a tangible expression of a long-standing friendship and a sign of our shared desire to see France and the UK build their future together.”
So, this is going to be a huge cultural moment for both countries – a generational experience that will cause interest in medieval history to blossom. Tickets have already sold out for the first few months of the exhibition. Excitement is at fever pitch about this most famous of artworks finally coming home.
A prophecy in thread?
One other item that people in England hope is coming home this summer is the football World Cup. I have mused, in a social media video, that the Tapestry’s narrative mirrors England’s path to soccer glory in the US. Its pointed omission of the battle of Stamford Bridge suggests that England will beat Norway without any fuss on Saturday night, while the Tapestry’s Hand of God ripping through the sky over Westminster Abbey and the funeral of Edward the Confessor surely predicts the righting of the wrong of Maradona’s handball from 1986 in a likely Argentina semi-final. And then of course we come to the battle of Hastings.
You might think that the Norman victory over the English suggests a French success in the final, and that would accord with most pundits’ views that France are the team to beat in this World Cup. Yet I simply note that the Tapestry, as we see it today, is unfinished, with the English flight from the field dissolving into a ragged mess. Maybe, just maybe, the Tapestry’s damaged state is a pointer that the story doesn’t end quite as you might expect.
Given that in 2008, I predicted that the Tapestry would come home, maybe you should trust me that football is going to follow this year too. That might blow apart the spirit of bonhomie between the Tapestry community on both sides of the Channel, so maybe it’s lucky that the transport has already taken place. It’s coming home, both ways.
]]> Dr David Musgrove, FSA <![CDATA[Politics and the Bayeux Tapestry: the inside story of the blockbuster loan to the British Museum]]> https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/bayeux-tapestry-politics-british-museum-loan/ 2026-09-08T18:32:29.000Z 2026-04-16T10:44:00.000Z Not many 11th-century embroideries get plastered across the vast billboards on Piccadilly Circus. In fact, I can think of only one – the Bayeux Tapestry. On 26 February this year, the British Museum managed to secure a full 15 minutes of primetime advertising overlooking Eros to announce details of its blockbuster Tapestry exhibition, kicking off in September.
I went along to witness this event at London’s landmark traffic junction. It’s hard to judge whether people walking past were more surprised to see the Tapestry flashing across the big screens, or former chancellor (and now British Museum chair of trustees) George Osborne standing on the street staring up at it.
The Tapestry has been living rent-free in my head since January 2018, when I got a wake-up call from Radio 4’s Today programme asking me on to discuss the impending announcement of the loan of the Tapestry to the UK by France’s President Emmanuel Macron. They had my number because I’d written an article for BBC History Magazine (now renamed HistoryExtra Magazine) some years earlier canvassing experts on whether a loan like this could ever come to pass.
Overexcited by that turn of events, I partnered up with the British Museum’s in-house Tapestry expert, Michael Lewis – curator of the forthcoming major exhibition, scheduled to open in September – to write The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry. Leaping into action, we had the book written and on sale by spring of 2021, just in time for… nothing much at all to happen. For several years, the proposed loan was challenged and delayed, the idea being eclipsed by bigger geopolitical trends, according to Lord Peter Ricketts, the UK government’s Bayeux Tapestry Envoy. When I interviewed him for the HistoryExtra podcast, he explained that period of radio silence.
“The first hint of President Macron's interest in loaning the tapestry came at the Sandhurst Summit in 2018 with Theresa May,” he recalled. “But then everything went rather quiet, mainly because of Brexit and all the difficult politics around that and Covid. It wasn't really until relations began to improve that the idea was rekindled – particularly at a meeting between [then Labour Culture minister] Chris Bryant and his counterpart, the French culture minister Rachida Dati at the Cannes Film Festival in 2025. There, they essentially agreed at a political level that Macron’s idea should be pursued.”
Macron’s mission
I’ve been following the politics of the loan since 2018, and it’s clear that progress has been driven by President Macron. While several UK prime ministers have come and gone since Macron’s first statement, he has remained an ever-present in discussions – and, it seems, an enthusiastic champion of the idea.
“I think this really has come from Emmanuel Macron himself,” Lord Parkinson, Conservative heritage minister from 2021 to 2024, told HistoryExtra in an interview last year. “I think he’s aware that he made this very kind suggestion [of loaning the Tapestry]; he wanted to deliver on his promise, and this summit has allowed him to do that”.
“I do think Emmanuel Macron has been the driving force,” agrees Lord Ricketts. But, he notes, it was circumstances in Bayeux that kickstarted the loan conversation as much as it was about politics. “Over the decades, there have been sporadic discussions about the tapestry coming to the UK,” he continues. “I think the key thing was the decision that the museum where the Tapestry is now exhibited was going to be knocked down and rebuilt as a more modern museum. That meant the Tapestry was going to go off display and into storage.”
Those sporadic discussions occurred five times in the 20th century, when requests were made to loan the Bayeux Tapestry to Britain. The first was in 1931, for a ‘French exhibition’ at the Royal Academy of Arts in Burlington House, London. It was repeated in 1953 for Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation, and again in 1966, on the 900th anniversary of the battle of Hastings, when both the Victoria and Albert Museum and Westminster Abbey hoped to display it. In 1972, when France sought to have the Rosetta Stone exhibited in Paris, Britain enquired about receiving the Mona Lisa and the Bayeux Tapestry in return. And in 1980, the British Museum again requested a loan, but to no avail.
The story of those negotiations, and the reasons why they didn’t get anywhere, are outlined in an updated chapter of the brand-new edition of The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry. Often the conversations faltered because it wasn’t clear whether the UK representatives should be talking to people in Bayeux or in the French government. Even the possibility of a reciprocal royal visit by the Queen Mother to Bayeux in 1981 wasn’t enough to get a deal over the line. This time, we have envoys to make sure that both sides are talking to the right people. Ricketts’s role is to be the ‘docking point’ of contact between the UK and French administrations, working in partnership with his French counterpart, Philippe Bélaval.
Damage prevention
Nevertheless, concerns have been raised. A petition in France objecting to the loan has garnered more than 70,000 signatures, and the celebrated English artist (and Normandy resident) David Hockney has also come out in opposition. The principal worry is that the venerable artefact could be damaged in transit.
Similar concerns were voiced when previous loan requests were made. However, it is important to note that, since those earlier negotiations, the Channel Tunnel has opened, providing a much smoother transit route than sea or air.
“We are talking now about how the tapestry will come, not whether it will come,” according to Ricketts. “Whether it will come was decided when Emmanuel Macron and Keir Starmer signed that agreement last July. That's a formal government agreement, and that will be implemented.”
“The question now is the practical logistics of getting it here safely,” he continues. “Both sides, of course, are equally attached to ensuring the preservation and the protection of this incredibly fragile and precious object.”
- Read more | Is the Bayeux Tapestry in “mortal danger”?
“Clearly, everyone wants to avoid the risk of any kind of incident while it’s travelling. So I think the date on which it travels will be kept private. It will be very carefully protected and guarded by the gendarmerie on the French side and the British police when it arrives in Kent to be safely conveyed to London. And of course, from the moment it's in British hands, it will be extremely carefully protected, whether it’s moving or once it’s in the British Museum.”
Those arrangements sound rather more stringent than those proposed in 1953. Plans for the loan then had progressed to the point at which British bureaucrats and police officials discussed transport arrangements. Two armed officers were to join the vehicle carrying the Tapestry when it arrived by ship in Southampton, and two motorcyclists were to provide an escort from there to the Victoria and Albert Museum. Back then, the Tapestry was insured for £250,000 – but, as was noted, “it is regarded as irreplaceable”. That sum today is £800 million.
Different perspectives
We should expect a more sophisticated transport operation with the Bayeux Tapestry in 2026 than the plans from 1953. Even so, the concerns raised in France indicate that not everyone is sanguine about the loan. This might be a reflection of the fact that the embroidery is seen differently by the French to us in Britain. Back in 2018, I spoke to the Tapestry museum curator in Bayeux, Antoine Verney, who sadly has passed away recently. In his experience, he said, the British tend to recognise the Tapestry as marking the end of a period, while the French consider it more as the start of a story of Anglo-Norman expansion.
Verney also noted a very different level of knowledge about the Norman conquest story. For the British, the one date everyone knows is 1066; for the French, it is 1789. “A lot of French people think that Hastings is actually in Normandy,” Verney told me, “and that the battle took place in the Hundred Years’ War rather than the 11th century.”
According to Ricketts, President Macron clocked this too. “I think Emmanuel Macron understood something that's essential to this loan, which is that the tapestry is far more fundamental to the British national story than it is to the French,” he observed. “It's not central to the development of modern France in the way that 1066 and the Norman invasion is here. So the loan of the tapestry would be a hugely powerful cultural event that would underline the links between the two countries at a time when they'd been going through some pretty rocky times after Brexit, and also with war in Europe [in Ukraine]. It’s a good time to remind the people of the two countries how much we share.”
- Listen now | A new take on the battle of Hastings
It’s also a good time to remind people in both France and the UK about the Tapestry itself. Though it is justly famous already, the forthcoming exhibition – and the major media operation launched around it, Piccadilly Circus billboards and all – is going to propel the Tapestry even deeper into the popular consciousness. Sure, there is some risk in moving the embroidery, but the reward is that it gets a generational boost in awareness in France and Britain. That ought to secure a long-term flow of visitors not just to the British Museum but also back in Bayeux when the Tapestry returns there in time for the 2027 Year of the Normans, celebrating a millennium since the birth of Duke William.
Ricketts even reckons that the French will come to Britain to see it. “I think it will certainly bring an awful lot of French people to London to see it,” he states. “We already know that a large number of French schools are interested... We are producing a lot of materials for schools in French as well as in English.”
“You can see it in a more vivid way than you ever were able to in Bayeux, as we’re showing it at full length,” he adds. “Then, of course, when the tapestry goes back, the Bayeux Museum will be reopening, providing a very modern setting there as well. I think the impact it has in the UK will immediately feed back into France.”
The loan is a political gesture born of a need to reboot cross-channel relations. It would be remarkable indeed if a 950-year-old embroidery could help to smooth political differences today – but, with the vivid potency of its imagery, the Bayeux Tapestry reaches parts that other medieval sources cannot hope to. That’s why this exhibition is so exciting, so important, and so timely.
Lord Peter Ricketts was speaking to Dr David Musgrove on the HistoryExtra podcast. Listen to the full conversation.
]]> HistoryExtra <![CDATA[What are history's biggest misconceptions? 9 experts reveal what we get wrong about the past]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/what-are-historys-biggest-misconceptions-9-experts-reveal-what-we-get-wrong-about-the-past/ 2026-04-08T15:31:04.000Z 2026-04-08T15:30:41.000Z Ancient Athenian democracy was democratic
There’s plenty to criticise about that ancient approach
We wouldn’t recognise the system practised in ancient Athens as democracy in the sense we understand it today. Women did not have the vote, and the entire society depended on a massive slave population to be able to function. Yet in other ways it was also more democratic than our democracies today. Every (male) citizen took an active role in governing the city, and every major decision was taken by a vote involving every citizen who attended.
An even more egregious misconception is the idea there is an unbroken link between ancient and modern democracy. Athenian democracy lasted for only around 200 years; since then, through most of the rest of antiquity, the Middle Ages and more modern historical periods, democracy has not been practised.
In more recent times, Athenian democracy has been held up as a system to avoid rather than imitate. During debates between the founding fathers about the Constitution of the United States in the 1780s, many argued that “even if every Athenian had been a Socrates [ie very intelligent], Athenian democracy would have been little more than mob rule”. It is only very recently that we have come (again) to admire Athenian democracy, and want to link our own system of government to that ancient ideal.
Michael Scott, professor in classics and ancient history at the University of Warwick
Most people in the past had much shorter lifespans
Many people died very young – but many others lived long lives
On paper, this seems to be true: today, the average global life expectancy is around 72, whereas for much of the medieval and early modern periods the figure hovered around 30–35. You might think, then, that modern medicine, public health initiatives and better nutrition have all combined to help us live longer than our ancestors.
In fact, though there has been a significant improvement in living conditions, the idea that there has been a corresponding increase in lifespan over the centuries is incorrect. The overall life expectancy has risen simply because more of us are living to older ages.
It’s important to understand the difference between life expectancy and lifespan. The former is an average – so, for example, if two people are born on the same day and one lives to the age of 80 but the other gets ill and dies before their first birthday, their average life expectancy is 40. Although that is statistically correct, we should be wary of drawing conclusions about typical lifespans. Using such figures doesn’t tell us that all (or even most) people in the past lived shorter lives.
For most of the medieval and early modern periods, infant mortality was high due to the prevalence of disease, the lack of vaccines and medical knowledge, poor hygiene and sanitation, and complications from childbirth. But if you made it through childhood, you had a fair chance of living for almost as long as the average person today.
There are plenty of historical examples of people living well into their seventies, eighties and beyond. Elizabeth I was in her 70th year when she died, and the Roman author and scientist Pliny the Elder recorded one musician who enjoyed good health until his death at the age of 105.
Tracy Borman, author, historian and broadcaster
Every war ends at a single moment
The consequences of conflict can drag on for years
The greatest historical misconception is that wars come to an end neatly, on a specific date, with the signing of an armistice or surrender agreement. No war in history has ever ended happily-ever-after with a sudden return to normality. The consequences of war – famine, displacement, lawlessness and political violence – often last longer than the conflict itself.
The First World War is a perfect example. In our popular imagination, especially in the west, it came to an abrupt end on 11 November 1918. But the guns did not fall silent for long. Popular revolutions soon broke out in Germany, Austria, Hungary and many other places. Turkey was consumed by ethnic and religious violence, and vast battles took place between Poland, Ukraine and the new Soviet Union. Such events created an atmosphere of chaos that lasted well into the 1920s.
The same thing happened after the Second World War. Ceasefires in 1945 did not bring immediate peace. Instead, armed groups rushed to fill the power vacuum left by the defeat of Germany and Japan. Political violence became the norm, and full-blown civil wars erupted in Greece, Poland, China and Indonesia, among other places. That period of chaos lasted at least until the end of the 1940s.
War is sometimes unavoidable. But if we had a better historical understanding of the long-term consequences, perhaps we would prepare a little better for the period of instability that always comes afterwards. And maybe we would be less eager to embark on war in the first place.
Keith Lowe, author of The Fear and the Freedom: How the Second World War Changed Us (Viking, 2017)
History is written by the victors
Voices of the defeated often resonate the loudest
“History will be kind to me,” said Winston Churchill, “for I intend to write it.” Or such, at least, is the popular paraphrase of a line that Churchill trotted out on numerous occasions, always in jest. In reality, as he must have appreciated, no one gets to dictate how they are viewed by posterity. Nevertheless, the notion that ‘history is written by the victors’ is a persistent one.
Consider a few counter-examples from the broad sweep of British history. Our only narrative source for Britain at the time of the Anglo-Saxon invasions is Gildas, a British monk lamenting the arrival of the invaders. Similarly, when the Vikings were ravaging Europe in the ninth century, the tale of their bloody progress was recorded by their monastic victims. Even the Normans, who produced an abundance of propaganda to justify their conquest of England in 1066, did not get to control the narrative. One of the most insightful portraits of William the Conqueror is the obituary of him penned by an English monk. The king, we are told, “was stern beyond measure to those who opposed his will… In his time people suffered grievous oppression and manifold injuries.”
When Edward I conquered Wales in the late 13th century, no one (insofar as we know) celebrated his victory in verse, but Welsh poets did lament the passing of his vanquished opponent, Llywelyn ap Gruffudd. The voices of the defeated are often the ones that resonate the loudest across the centuries.
Marc Morris, medieval historian, writer and broadcaster
Vikings drank from their enemies’ skulls
Those horned helmets are hooey, too
Lurid myths swirl around the Vikings: that they wore horned helmets, drank from the skulls of vanquished foes, and tortured and dispatched enemies by splaying their ribs in the gruesome ‘blood eagle’. It’s all nonsense.
We can blame the 19th century for the horned helmets. When translations of the Old Norse-Icelandic sagas were published, that headwear started to sneak into the illustrations. Wagner didn’t help. In 1876, for the first performances of his Ring cycle, costume designer Carl Doepler decided that horned helmets would be just the thing.
The idea of drinking from the skulls of enemies comes from a misreading of an Old Norse verse. That’s easily done, because the Norse wrote fiendishly complicated poetry that was deliberately difficult to unpick. One ode, Krákumál (‘The Lay of Kraka’), features a line about heroes drinking from the “curved branches of skulls”. It’s actually a poetic reference to animal horns, but 17th-century antiquarian Ole Worm translated it as heroes quaffing “from the skulls of those they had killed”.
The ‘blood eagle’ is trickier to unpick, but again Old Norse poetry might be the source. The sons of Ragnar Lodbrok (‘Hairy-Breeches’), it was written, murdered the king of Northumbria by cutting his ribs from his spine and drawing out his lungs so that they looked like gory wings. It has been argued that this is a misunderstanding rooted in knottily obscure Old Norse verse, and that no such form of torture was ever perpetrated.
The moral of the story? If in doubt, blame poets and costume designers.
Eleanor Barraclough, historian, broadcaster and author of Embers of the Hands (Profile, 2024)
Pompeii was ‘frozen in time’
Most citizens of the Roman town escaped a violent volcanic demise
The eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79 didn’t happen in an instant. Nor was Pompeii buried in one swift sweep by lava. In fact, there was no lava at all.
On the morning of the eruption, a thin curl of smoke rose from Vesuvius. By midday, the volcano had erupted, sending a vast column of smoke, ash and pumice 16 miles into the sky. Pumice rained onto the surrounding towns, and over the next few hours many of their inhabitants started to flee. Sometime after 7pm, the column – now too heavy to support itself – collapsed. This sent a scorching gush of pumice, gas and ash known as a pyroclastic flow hurtling towards Herculaneum. The city was buried beneath 20 metres of volcanic material. There were no survivors.
It wasn’t until 6.30am the following day that the first pyroclastic surge reached Pompeii’s northern walls, sweeping about 200 metres into the city before losing momentum. Then, between 7.30 and 8am, the column above Vesuvius collapsed again – and Pompeii was engulfed. Any people remaining in the city were killed instantly, their bodies locked in a rigid ‘boxer pose’ as their muscles contracted rapidly in the fierce heat.
Though many died beneath collapsing structures or from suffocation during the first parts of the eruption, most residents escaped before the final lethal surges; the death rate in Pompeii may have been as low as 10 per cent. The eruption didn’t happen in an instant – and the destruction it wreaked took place over the course of some 24 hours.
Jess Venner, ancient historian, presenter and author of The Lost Voices of Pompeii
The North won the American Civil War
White racial democracy was not displaced even after Confederate defeat
Southern planters lost much when the American Civil War ended in 1865. The North’s victory in that conflict ensured that the Confederacy would never establish a global empire of cotton, and paved the way for emancipation, citizenship for freed people, and the franchise for black American men.
Yet white racial democracy was not displaced, even if the slaveocracy was somewhat diminished. For the remainder of the 19th century, white people mounted deadly battles against black voters, business owners and politicians. They raged against the short-lived experiment in full democracy known as Reconstruction until they struck a deal with the federal government to end it. By 1877, the rest of the country had left black southerners and their few allies to defend democracy alone.
Even more strikingly, white southern elites won a narrative war that changed Americans’ sense of what happened. Historians call it the myth of the ‘Lost Cause’: an understanding shaped in schoolbooks, monuments and popular media that the antebellum South was a place of romance, not horror, and that there was something noble in the region’s last stand. Secessionists were understood as rebels, not traitors, and freed people as, in the words of future president Woodrow Wilson, “dusky children untimely put out of school”.
“Whoever tells the best story wins,” it’s been said. The white South told such a compelling story that they secured Jim Crow segregation by 1900, bringing themselves back into the union on their own terms – and at the expense of black Americans.
Adriane Lentz-Smith, associate professor of history at Duke University
The Victorians were po-faced prudes
The queen herself loved to laugh
"We are not amused.” These words, supposedly uttered by Queen Victoria, have burdened the 19th century with an unfair reputation for prudishness and humourlessness. Many still characterise the Victorian era as a stiff and solemn time when fun and pleasure were suffocated under a cloud of self-discipline and respectability. This, quite frankly, is nonsense.
Fun was a vital part of Victorian culture. Celebrity comedians packed music halls every night, the country’s most popular newspapers brimmed with jokes, and the saying “laugh and grow fat” – the belief that cheerfulness promoted health – was a familiar household phrase.
Victoria herself was no exception. Her diaries are packed with things that made her laugh. At one dinner party, she found herself talking to an elderly admiral who bored her with a story about a damaged ship. Hoping to change the subject, she asked after his sister’s health. Mishearing her, the admiral replied: “She’ll be fine, ma’am, when we turn her over and scrape the barnacles off her bottom.” Victoria shook with uncontrollable laughter until tears ran down her face.
It’s true that Victorian humour was less coarse than that of earlier generations. Jokes about sex, farts and other bodily functions fell out of favour – in respectable circles, at least – but puns became a national obsession, and the era’s comedians produced plenty of books, cartoons and one-liners that still have the power to amuse.
It’s high time we stopped treating the Victorians as solemn bores, and started laughing with them instead of at them.
Bob Nicholson, writer, broadcaster and historian at Edge Hill University
The Middle Ages were dismal
The Renaissance starts here
I am continually astonished by how often I hear the medieval period in Europe called the ‘dark ages’. One thousand years of history cannot be dismissed so quickly. This was a period of seminal political developments – of genuine statecraft. It was a period of architectural and visual glories. It was a period of outstandingly rich intellectual achievement. It encompassed the Carolingian Renaissance in the eighth and ninth centuries; the so-called 12th-century Renaissance, another period of great cultural revival and vibrancy; and the late 14th and 15th-century Renaissance. (Indeed, we can blame those latter Renaissance thinkers for the denigration of the earlier Middle Ages: they had a vested interest in making out their immediate predecessors to have been benighted and stupidly dogmatic.)
Modern intellectual approaches were developed in the 12th century, pioneered by the scholar Peter Abelard in his dialectical text Sic et non (‘Yes and no’). Abelard also wrote a text called the Ethics, which set the tone for many centuries of ethical thinking; he foregrounded the idea of intention, too, and promoted the dictum ‘Know thyself’.
On a more everyday note, the Middle Ages were also not as filthy as often assumed. By the later part of the period, urban authorities in particular were deeply concerned about hygiene, and regulated extensively.
The metaphor “standing on the shoulders of giants” is often attributed to Newton, but he was merely quoting a 12th-century philosopher, Bernard of Chartres: “We are like dwarfs on the shoulders of giants.” We should, like Bernard, acknowledge our intellectual debts to our medieval predecessors.
Hannah Skoda, associate professor of medieval history at the University of Oxford
This article was first published in the March 2026 issue of HistoryExtra Magazine
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