15 things I find interesting with the Bayeux Tapestry
Perhaps you do too
There are few things that grate me more than when someone says '10 things you didn't know about...' How do they know what I don't know? Perhaps I don't know those things, but I find it condescending for someone to assume that I don't.
​Having spent 9 years working on a full-scale Bayeux Tapestry replica, I have come across details that some people may not know, but even so, I wouldn't like to assume anything. Therefore, I have decided to make a list of things that I find particularly interesting, in the hope that you do too.​
Before we start, I would like to point out that all images you see on this page are of my embroidery, for copyright reasons. In section 7 - Toes - there is a button with a link to the Bayeux Museum's panorama slideshow, where you can match my work with the original masterpiece
1.More horse heads than bums
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There are more horse heads than horse bums on the Bayeux Tapestry, but not all sit at the front back of the same animal. Counting only the horses on the main panel, omitting all the small ones on the ships, there are 129 heads and 109 bums. 90 of them belong to intact horses, while the remaining 39 heads and 19 bums are somewhat on their own.
Counting heads and bums is not quite as straightforward as I expected though. Some horses don’t have a full head, but I have counted them anyway. However, if they only have a neck and no actual head, they have their own list, 6. Funnily enough, all these 6 horses feature both a neck and a bum. I find that very interesting.
The bums are tricker than the heads. I set out to only count full bums that have a dock and tail. Turns out that there are a few with a full bum and dock, but no tail and others with almost a full bum, no dock, but the tail is visible on the other side of the obstruction. Some of the tricky ones have made the list, but those that were too dodgy got a list of their own, 7.
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In the two photos below, I'm sure you can appreciate the dilemma. In the left-hand image, I didn't count the yellow sliver of a bum, on account of it missing both dock and tail. However, both the yellow and red horse in the right-hand image made the cut. The bums are almost complete and although the docks are obscured, the tails are visible. Would you have judged differently?
​If you count, you may get different numbers than I did. I only did some quick research to settle my curious mind and I don’t by any means claim that I have counted correctly. If you want to investigate this topic, you may want to add the few horses that feature in the borders as well. I didn’t do that. On the other hand, I did add Guy’s mule and the pack pony.
2. Horses without manes
There are several different styles of manes and at least two horses features both a cropped and flowing mane. A bit greedy, if you ask me. One of those is ridden by an important person, probably William, so perhaps it’s a clever way to grab the viewer’s attention in a subtle way. The other one is a random horse on the battle field and I’m not sure what that’s all about.
There are plain and striped cropped dos, long and short flowing manes, as well as forward or backward upward spikes. The forward spikes make me think of a rebel punk-rocker, but perhaps that’s just me.
Then there are a few manes that leave a lot to be desired, the single strand ones, both upright and hanging. Luckily, there aren’t too many of these, because when I see them, I want to get my wool out and fix them.
With so many styles to choose from, I wonder why as many as 8 horse were left without manes. I find that interesting. The first one is a horse that’s trotting behind another one and the visible neck isn’t too wide. Perhaps the designer thought it would look too busy to add a mane. The same excuse could be used for the one that is partially obscured by a cloak. I think a cropped do could have started by the ears and disappeared under the cloak, but that wasn’t done.
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A horse on the battlefield has a rider leaning over the neck, making the addition of a mane difficult, so the designer left it out. I think that was wise. I’m also forgiving about the two mane-less horses that have toppled over, one in a river (see photo above) and one on the battlefield. The remaining ones could have had a do, but they don’t. Why? An interesting question, isn’t it?
3. Not enough legs ​​
This is quite common knowledge, so you are probably already aware of what I’m about to say.
If there are 4 or more horses or men, there are never enough legs. Interesting, right? Can this statement possibly be correct? I think so.
There is one group of 4 horses on the left-hand side in the photo below and in total, they should have 16 legs. They don’t, but they have as many as 14. To be honest, it looks too crowded and if I was in charge, I would cut a couple out. That’s equestrian leg equality out the window. If you compare with the 12-legged group on the right-hand side, I hope you will agree that less is sometimes more.
As for groups of men, I have seen 4 men share 4 legs more than once. You wouldn't believe how many times I have pointed this out during events and some people have been surprised and counted, as you do when given such crazy news. Because there were only 4 legs, that was quickly done, but it took longer for the attendees to accept that they hadn't realised the lack of legs before. It's so obvious, yet it's not.
There is a group of 8 with a total of 8 legs and don’t get me started on the 7-headed group with only 6 legs. Accurate head and leg ratio was clearly not a thing in the 11th century.
Saying that, I think the designer of the masterpiece made clever choices when it came to legs. Like in the groups of horses, the correct number of legs for the men would have looked way too busy, a limb-jungle. That several of the blokes were left hopping on one leg or floating through time and space on nothing at all is beside the point.
4. There are more heads than bodies
While we’re on the subject of mismatched body parts, I thought it would be interesting to look at human heads and bodies. No, I’m not counting every single body on the Bayeux Tapestry, but I’m focusing on what I refer to as ‘floating heads’. There are a few.
Again, I’m only looking at the main panel. In the border below the battlefield, there are a number of detached heads, but they are of no interest to me. You see, they were once attached and were chopped off in the heat of the battle. The ones that attract my eagle eyes are those that seemingly have a body, but ultimately don’t.
The first one I come across in my search is on the third English ship. There are 2 men with 3 heads on the lefthand side. Just adding an extra leg would have indicated a body, but no such luck. Next up are two floating head during the journey to Guy de Ponthieu’s residence. There are 4 horses with riders and an extra 2 English heads popping up behind the shields. You can tell they are English, due to their impressive moustaches. As least they have facial hair, which kind of makes up for their lack of bodies.
In the leg-less group of 8 that we discussed earlier, 2 heads are hovering in the back row, seemingly snooping at the going-ons without a single leg to stand on. Again, they are English. Feel free to scroll back and have a look.
In Guy’s meeting with William is another floating head. However, he has a horse and something that could be either a very rounded shoulder or a shield, so I’m not adding him to the list. If a head has a horse, there is a body somewhere in the background, I’m sure. He also has a spear, so in my eyes, he’s alright. The same goes for the rider in the scene on the right-hand side of Dinan. He may only have a head, but he has a horse (even if the steed doesn't have a head) and spear, although his entire body is obscured by a shield. He won’t make my list either.
You may want to count one of the pallbearers at King Edward’s funeral. He features in the section 'Not enough legs', in case you want to back-track and check him out. The man is completely legless and seemingly doesn’t have a body, but he has a hand and is therefore pulling his weight. For that reason, he stays off my list. The same rule applies to one of the men watching Halley’s Comet. He doesn’t have a body, but he has an arm and is using it to point at the phenomenon in the sky. However, the head below him is just a head nothing else. He bobs onto my list on his little stumpy neck.
The next one, in the Norman ship-loading scene, could be debated. The head does actually have the top part of a torso, but it stops there. He pops up above the neck of a horse and there is plenty of space for his own horse, yet he has none. No shield, no spear, nothing. That makes him a freeloader without a leg to stand on, a list-man in my eyes.
In the first scene of the battle, there are two men without horses and only a partial torso or none at all, but they both have a hand holding a shield. That can’t be said for the third random head, so that one makes the list.
As you can see, I’m quite a strict, but also fair judge when it comes to floating heads. Only 8 ended up on my list and to tell you the truth, I thought there would be more. There were a few in the thick of the battle, but they all had shields, even if they lacked in the leg department. However, I would like to refer to section 3, 'Not enough legs'. These men had no legs, but shields made them human to be counted on.
There were also a few body-less heads on the ships, but they were obviously sitting low, scared of the waves and who can blame them?
​​​5. Spelling mistakes
There is a spelling mistake in scene 21, an E-spoke to many. The word HIC, meaning HERE, is used a lot throughout the Bayeux Tapestry. ‘Here this and that happened’ or ‘Here so and so did something’. It's one of the few words in Latin that I have managed to drill into my head and actually remember. Imagine my surprise when I came across this, ‘HIE WILLELM VENIT’. HIE, hmm…
My guess is that the seamstress in charge of that stitching was engaging in a rather exciting conversation and her needle swung on its own accord, adding a sneaky spoke when nobody was looking. An easy mistake to make, because sometimes, the E is curved, like a C. I’m sure she started out correctly stitching the C, then her auto-pilot kicked in and the middle-spoke appeared out of nowhere. The question is if she noticed before moving on and thought that nobody would notice, or left that scene behind, none the wiser of her mistake.Universe has a way of evening things out, so much later, an E-spoke went missing. Most of the time, the text is kept to the top of the main panel, with only the occasional word sitting further down. The one I’m looking at in scene 50 sits less than halfway up, in front of a horse.
The text says, ‘WILELMI DVCIS’, or that’s what it’s meant to say. The E in the middle of WILELMI is of the straight kind, like a typed E, and it’s missing its middle spoke. Had it been of the curved kind, the word would have said ‘WILCLMI’, but due to the E-shape she chose, that’s not the case. That was lucky, because it would have been really quite confusing. ​
Having called out these ancient spelling mistakes, I would like to stress that I don't pass any judgement. I'm the first to make mistakes in both languages that I'm fluent in, Swedish and English. Luckily, I live in a time period where there are spelling programmes on many electronic devices and dictionaries readily available. I'm not sure if the women who embroidered the Bayeux Tapestry spoke Latin and if they could read it. It not, it was a question of simply stitching shapes. If that's the case, what's a single spoke in the great scheme of things? The embroidery is a true masterpiece and I find it interesting to think about why these spelling mistakes weren't picked up on by someone in charge.​
6. Knee caps
As a textile artist with a special love for embroidery, I’m interested in how body parts have been depicted in stitches. Most legs on the Bayeux Tapestry are fairly unremarkable. From the thigh, it narrows a bit, then swings out to mark the calf, only to slim down towards the foot. Sometimes, the knee is mark from a sideway view, but often quite subtly.​
By the way, thanks for sticking with me for this long. We're halfway through my list of things I find interesting and I'm wondering if you do too.
Anyway, if I’m not mistaken, there are only 2 properly marked knee caps that are seen from the front. For someone like me, that’s incredibly interesting. Perhaps you need to be a needle-person to get excited about frontal knee caps, but I’m hoping you will also find joy in this.
In scene 23, there are two men and both are wearing winnegas, or leg straps of some sort. One of them has coloured hosen with winnegas on top. The other man appears to be wearing the straps around his bare legs.​​​​​​
The straps cross over his bare calves horizontally, but the one across his left thigh is diagonal and we can see a small bumpy knee in a sideway position. One his right leg, the strap across the thigh is curved upwards, most unusual. Even more unusual is the downward-curved knee cap in a frontal view position. This line and the strap almost form a circle, but not quite. To me, it looks like a happy leg, or perhaps a watchful eye. Either way, it's a very interesting one.
In scene 36, we see very long legs with exposed thighs, where the tunics have been tucked up to save them getting wet. Here you can see what I mean with quite subtle sideways knee caps. However, one of the men has twisted his leg and we get treated to a full-frontal view of the knee cap. It has been marked with a curved line, stretching from edge to edge.
I don't know why there aren't more frontal knee caps on the Bayeux Tapestry. Perhaps the designer wasn't fully comfortable with them. There are actually plenty of frontal-view legs, but they don't feature any knee caps. Why? Surely, that's an interesting question
7. Toes
Feet excite me. Let me rephrase that. Embroidered feet excite me and even more so when I get to swing my needle in and out of them. If there are toes on the feet, my day is complete. Does that make me a weirdo? I don’t care, because I’d be a happy weirdo.
There are more barefoot men on the Bayeux Tapestry than you may think. The designer of the masterpiece clearly realised that it would be wise to depict wading men with their tunics tucked up and their hosen and shoes off. I’m grateful for that, because that means toes on show.
What I find interesting is that toes are never shown on both feet, if you don’t count the big toe, as it can be identified from the side. Most of the time, a barefooted man is depicted with one slim-looking foot in a sideway position and the other pointing downward. That’s the one showing off a full set of toes, making my heart sing.
Saying that, in scene 4, I’ve spotted something strange-looking and when I embroidered that section on my replica, I made an attempt to make sense of it. I’m not at all sure that I made the right decision. You see, on the original, both men have one foot with toes and one slim foot in a sideway position. However, the left-hand man's slim foot has been adorned with no less than 5 single-strand lines tightly packed together, sitting on top of the foot. It looks like a tuft of grass, but as the man is wading through shallow water, seaweed would be more appropriate.
Is there seaweed depicted on the Bayeux Tapestry? Unless that’s what the large border image in scene 5 is, the answer is no. There are definitely no water plants on the main panel. Therefore, I have to assume that someone back in the 11th century decided to give this man toes on both feet, even though the top line of the sideways foot had already been embroidered, leaving the grass-like toes sitting on top in a totally weird way. On my replica, I gave the man proper toes, because I felt sorry for him.
I can’t show you the original work, only mine, because of the copyright issues. Feel free to look it up via this link:​
In scene 36, the one with the knee cap that we looked at earlier, I feel that the 11th century seamstress has cheated me out of a set of toes. On the downward-pointing foot are no little lines, separating the toes. To tell you the truth, even a duck has better toes. Perhaps the man had paddles for feet. I have left the other set of feet in the photo below, so you can properly appreciate how cheated I felt.
After that slight disappointment (not too bad, because there were several other toes in that scene), I had to embroider the entire Norman fleet before I set eyes on another set of toes. Did they make me happy? No! Sure, the big toe was nicely shaped, but the others were just free-standing lines, not connected at neither top, not bottom. Quite frankly, the middles ones weren’t in any way attached to the foot and could fall off at any given moment. That’s not ok. I wouldn't want to have toes like that. Would you?
See, not even something as simple as toes is straightforward on the Bayeux Tapestry and I find that interesting. Frustrating, but interesting.
8. Steering oars
We’re deep down in the nitty-gritty of the embroidery now and what excites me may not appeal to too many others. Even so, I made this list to show you what I find interesting, in the hope that you may do that too, even if it’s not particularly likely that every point on the list is thrilling. Nevertheless, there is more, because some of the steering oars have caught my attention.
Counting the ships on the Bayeux Tapestry isn’t straightforward. What the definition of a ship? Does it have to have a mast? Not all of them do. Does it have to be large? Not all of them are. In an attempt to narrow the sea-vessels that I’m looking at down, I have sorted them into categories.
There are 10 large ships at sea with a steering oar and 6 without. There are another 3 that may be big, but have been depicted far away and therefore look small. They all feature a steering oar. Finally, there are 13 ships on dry land, either in the making or lined up before or after the crossing. These have no trimmings. I’m looking at all ships with a steering oar, simply because I have spotted something interesting. Yes, really.
The second large ship on the Bayeux Tapestry can be found in scene 5. It has a steering oar with a wide crossbar in a light green shade. Below the almost square piece, the oar is dark green and above it, it’s yellow. Most oars are single-coloured, so this one stands out.
On the third large ship, the steering oar has a single line across the narrow part, dividing it into a dark and a light green section. However, it doesn’t stop there. Just above the division line, there is a small red circle. This is unique on the Bayeux Tapestry and if that isn’t interesting, I don’t know what would be. By the way, in the top border is the possible piece of seaweed that I mentioned earlier. What do you think it is?
Moving along to scene 23, we find another steering oar with a crossbar. This one is narrower than the one we looked at before and it sits on a white oar. Don’t be tricked into thinking that the white (void of infill wool) oar is too unusual, because there are another 2 further on. One is on a large ship in the Norman fleet and one is on a small faraway vessel. It’s the crossbar I’m interested in, because it’s been added for some reason and I’m keen to know why.​
In scene 38, on the second large ship in the Norman fleet is another little oddity, tiny, but interesting, if you ask me. A third way down on the right-hand side of the steering oar is a pointy bit that sticks out. It’s the only one I have seen on the entire Bayeux Tapestry and that makes it special.
Am I converting you to my way of looking at things? If not, I tried, I really did. Fancy more? I have another 2 items for my list.
9.Maths was hard already in the 11th century
You would have thought that counting to 4 was easy. 4 lines coming down the chain mail from the top and 4 lines coming up from the bottom. Turns out, this was bodged twice in scene 37.
In the ship-loading scene, where the men are carrying chain mails on poles, we can see two different designs of links. 2 of the suits of armour have a diamond design and these have been stitched perfectly fine. The other 2 are of a square design and they leave a little to be desired in the counting department. I find it very interesting that someone could get it so incredibly wrong.
The chain mail at the top left in the scene is the one I mentioned above, with 4 lines from the top and 4 from the bottom. Do they all meet in the middle? Nope.
The second line from the top left stops abruptly 3 horizontal lines down, leaving the 2nd left line from the bottom to veer off to the right. Ultimately, this mean the 4th line from the bottom has nothing to connect to and has to join the edge of the garment. It’s mindboggling that this could have happened. I mean, it’s not a large piece of embroidery and counting to 4 really isn’t that hard.
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Looking at the other square-linked suit of armour, we find a different issue. Here, there are 4 lines starting at the top and 2 from each part of the split bottom. Had that been all, everything would have worked out fine. However, someone decided to throw a middle-line into the mix, making it a total of 5 coming up from the bottom. With only 4 lines to join up with, that someone had to be creative and let me tell you, it was solved in a rather satisfying way.
3 horizontal lines up, the 2 lines coming up from right-hand hem merge into a single line that continues all the way up. Neat as a pin, was it not for the wobbly stitching (on the original), but perhaps the needle-woman was giddy with excitement after having averted a disaster. I feel forgiving. Even so, 4 doesn’t equal 5, even I know that.
10.Mildred’s lopsided bird
Let me introduce you to Mildred, an 11th century seamstress that was invented in my Facebook group, Mia’s Bayeux Tapestry Story. Mildred was a rogue needle woman, a true rebel, who scoffed at rules and regulations and did her own thing. How she thought she’d get away with it, I’ll never know, but her work is still visible today. We’re about to look at one of her border images.
Most border creatures come in pairs, but none are identical, not even the mirror-mate. There are always details or colours that differ, making each animal unique, although rarely as unique as this bird.
In the top border of scene 48 are two, at first glance, quite standard-looking birds. One is light blue and the other one is dark. The dark blue bird has light blue and yellow details, although some of the wing feathers have been left white. Only one leg is visible, but it’s of a standard kind with the commonly seen hip lines where the leg attaches to the body. This isn’t Mildred’s bird.
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Mildred worked on the light blue bird and she opted for a more lizard-like head, with a less pronounced and slightly rounded beak, but that’s not what sets this creature apart. Neither is the fact that both wings have been left white. That could be blamed on lack of time to finish and I’ve seen a lot of this throughout the Bayeux Tapestry.
So why would I say this bird was stitched by Mildred, our rebel friend (because we like her a lot)? First of all, it’s the only bird I’ve come across that’s lopsided. Its space between the division bars is smaller than the mirror-mate’s and Mildred solved this issue by tilting the animal, stretching its foot onto one of the bars. I really want to reach in and help it back onto its foot, before it topples over.
Following the leg up towards the body, I would expect to see the two traditional hip lines. Do I? Nope. Well, they start as two diagonal lines, but they both sit behind the leg. The one leaning forward goes up a few diagonally stitches, as expected, then turns sharply and continues horizontally to the edge of the body, cutting off the leg section completely.
Oh dear, that doesn’t look right. Mildred wasn’t worried by that in the slightest. She simply added a little stump in front of the leg and filled it all in with yellow. Well, apart from the foot, but I guess she had to stop somewhere. Perhaps she named this bird ‘Lopsided Stumpy’ and if she did, I can totally see why.
I hope you have enjoyed the list of details I find interesting on the Bayeux Tapestry. I also hope it featured a few things you hadn't noticed before. If so, my very best advice is to continue looking for more undiscovered treats, because I'm sure you can find loads, given half a chance.
11. A funny leg
One of the riders in scene 48 has a very unusual leg. I have two theories and none of them make sense. Even so, I will run them by you, then you can form your own opinion and cast mine aside, should you wish to. To fully appreciate the leg, you need to look at it in comparison with the others in the same scene. Only then will it stand out like a sore knee… thumb… or something sore. Let’s have a look.
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It’s the 4th man in line, riding the 3rd visible horse. The horse-less man was discussed in section 4, where we looked at floating heads. Anyway, it’s the bloke on the dark blue horse. Note how all the others have a leg that slopes forward and stretches down towards the foot. Not this one.
Nope, it almost has the shape of a man’s bottom, which derails the curve and has it sloping backward, only to straighten up and finish off with a shapely lower leg. Isn’t that odd? My first theory is that the rounded curve, seen just below the yellow horse’s head, is the rider’s knee. However, that means he has the longest lower leg in history. Now, I don’t really do history, so I don’t know if this theory is at all possible, but I shouldn’t think so.
That leaves me to consider the other idea, that of it being a leg that’s been screwed on backwards. Thinking about it, that’s not very likely either, because it would mean that he’s twisted twice – once at the hip and again at the knee, as the lower leg seems to be pointing in the right direction.
By the time I’m writing this, I have embroidered more than 52 metres of my Bayeux Tapestry replica and I can't recall seeing any other leg like this. I have seen a rider’s leg twisting backwards and it doesn’t look this strange. We will be looking at that one shortly, not to worry.
What do you think? Do you vote for the knee and incredibly long lower leg or is the twice-twisted theory more plausible? Perhaps you have an idea that makes more sense. If so, I’m all ears.
12. Guy’s twisted leg
In the section above, I mentioned a twisted leg. It belongs to Guy de Ponthieu in scene 13 and it makes perfect sense. At least, I think so. You may very well have seen this before, so it’s most likely not exciting news. However, this list is of details I find interesting and this is the only foot on a rider (that I have seen so far) that’s pointing backwards.
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Why on earth is it doing that and why is the leg twisted to accommodate this movement? Ah, it’s because Guy is pointing at his hostage, Harold, who is riding behind him. Guy's foot is making doubly sure that we look where we’re supposed to look. As far as I understand, Guy wasn’t a man to mess with and his body language on the Bayeux Tapestry is speaking very clearly, whether you understand ancient Norman or not.
It's common knowledge that extra-large hands with extra-long fingers guide us through the storyline, letting us know where to look next. Although we have already seen Harold, as we move from left to right, Guy is telling us to look again. I find it interesting that he’s pointing with both his finger and toes, as if we’re rebellious and don’t to do what we’re told. Just do it.
Thinking about the odd leg we looked at in the previous section, note how there isn’t really anything strange about the shape of Guy’s leg. Sure, his hip is somewhat angular and his crutch in the saddle somewhat dubious, but depicting a twisted leg isn’t all that easy. To be quite honest, I think the creator of this scene did a fine job.
13. Stomach turned into a saddle
While we’re in the saddle-region of a human body, we may as well look at William’s stomach in scene 49. When I first drew this image, I didn’t think too much of it, because I was focusing on the linework. I assumed there should be chain mail links on the bulging belly, thinking I had missed them, and I was prepared to add them later.
However, when I started stitching the outlines and had a closer look, there were no links to add. Why? Because it was to be filled in with red, like the saddle. But… it’s not the saddle. I found myself wanting to shout through time and space, making my voice heard in the 11th century workroom. It was pointless. I had to fill it in, whether I knew it was wrong or not.
It has been suggested in my Facebook group that it may actually be the saddle, but I don’t think so. It doesn’t look like any of the other saddles I have stitched on my replica. It does, however, look very much like a rider’s full belly that has been cut off by a misplaced or misunderstood line.
To fully understand what I just wrote, we’d better look at some examples of rider’s bellies. Some extend a little, some a lot and some even more. Where the leg gently curves up to reach the top of the thigh, we sometimes see the line of the bulging belly cut past the thigh-line. Sometimes, the thigh-line cuts in under the belly a little bit, sometimes a lot.
In the images above, we can see different belly sizes, but also the thigh-line I'm talking about. In the 3rd photo, the thigh-line reaches all the way up to the arm, yet we can see chain mail links in front of it, slightly obscured by the saddle horn. Even so, the belly is there.
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Now, compare that with the circled belly/saddle in the 4th photo. Can you see what I see, that the thigh-line is the same as in the 3rd photo and therefore, there should be a belly in front of it. There kind of is, but it's red.
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I find it interesting how two lines that look pretty much the same were interpreted so differently. Looking at the rider in the 3rd photo, with that deep line, his extended belly makes him look in proportion. The same can’t be said for William. His fairly regularly sized thigh, featuring 4 chain mail links across, narrows to a 2-link waist. He really needs that cut-off belly, or he’ll risk snapping like a match stitch during the battle.
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With all that being said, I’m now wondering if you’re on Team William the Twig or Team Seamstress, who according to some people (not me) can’t do anything wrong.
14. Not all horses were created equally well
Not all people are beautiful, although it’s said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder and everyone is beautiful in someone’s eyes. I’m interested to find out if the same applies to some of the horses on the Bayeux Tapestry. What do you think?
Most horses on the masterpiece look alright, even though some are more shapely than others. At least, they look horse-like. I have discussed many of them in my book, Mia’s Bayeux Tapestry Musings – Horses, if you are interested in finding out more.
We’re starting off with the poor steed in scene 14 that somehow left its jaw behind, perhaps in the food through that morning. There is also something strange going on at the top of the head. What's the single line that goes from the base of the ear diagonally up to the mane? I would expect to see the top part of the bridle going from the little circle below the ear, heading almost straight up. I think someone was a little confused when working on this horse.
I’m not saying that to be mean, just pointing out the obvious. I would like to know what happened during the image transfer and embroidery of the horse. Did the template slip? Had the seamstress never seen a horse’s head up close. My mind boggles every time I look and I feel desperately sorry for it.
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Next up is a pair of horses, a male and a female, by the look of it. The dark blue stallion in scene 24 has an incredibly juicy bum, rising as high as the back saddle horn. Is it called a saddle horn at the back? Oh well, you probably know what I mean. In my image, I have shaved off a little ‘flesh’, perhaps in an unconscious attempt to tone it down a notch. The dark stallion is doing its best, showing off his pride and joy and boasting with a fancy breastplate, to distract the viewer’s eye from the mare’s proportions.
She is a strangely short-bodied, but long-legged and don’t get me started on the straggly mane. That’s not a good look and I think those responsible for this horse’s creation were quite unfair. Part of a mane strand is missing, but in all fairness, that piece of wool could have fallen out later. Let's not dwell on that for too long. However, we can dwell on the head, which looks a bit too box-like for my linking. Compare with the dark stallion and you'll see what I mean.
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Yes, the neck is too thick, but I have a theory about that. You can just about see the front of the saddle, the dark bit to the right of the man's red thigh. We are used to seeing a saddle horn at the top, but here, there isn't one. I think that the small triangle between the man's arm and the last mane-strand was meant to be shaped as a saddle horn and filled in differently. Again, confusion struck. Perhaps this was a novice seamstress' very first day.
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Everyone experiences a first day at some point, doing something for the first time and it's rarely perfect. It was just unlucky for her that her initial attempt at stitching a horse would survive for almost 1,000 years and be viewed by millions of people. Also unlucky for her that someone like me called her out. Sorry, but it is an interesting piece.
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However unfair the creator of the horse above was, it's nothing compared to the horrific treatment of the leading horse in scene 37. That one is quite shocking, at least the back part. As far as I know, this is the only horse on the entire Bayeux Tapestry that has a back leg knee shown in a forward-bent position, making everything look incredibly awkward. For some reasons, this also results in the horse have 2 hip-lines and the stallion’s jewels sit side by side, a combination that's unique.
We have discussed this horse in my Facebook group and agreed that it’s most likely scared of the ship ahead, judging by its stance. It's unusual for the front leg to have its hoof forward, as if the horse is trying to retreat. The rider also looks rather aghast. Even so, I still feel sorry for how the horse's back end looks. When working on my replica, I really, really, really wanted to change it, but I couldn't. I set out to honour the masterpiece, so I had to copy it as well as I could.
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Finally, we need to look at the light blue horse in scene 40, due to its tiny front legs. It's shown with its legs in the air, but if and when they hit the ground, the rider will come off headfirst. Mind you, considering how tall he is, he may still be in the saddle when his head hits the ground.
The mare also has a massive chest, resulting in the breastplate sitting very high, in turn pulling the saddle up the neck. I find it interesting how the designer could get the front half so wrong, when the mare has a lovely behind. I'm happy that this is a 2-part horse. At least, it has something to be really proud of, because that back end is really quite stunning. Actually, the head is lovely too.
There are loads of horses on the battlefield, but they all look pretty horse-like to me. The funny and funky ones seem to be present fairly early on. Perhaps the seamstresses could produce woolly steeds in their sleep by the time the battle begun.
15. A flag in the shape of a bird
One of the ship flags is very interesting, if you look closely. It’s the English ship in scene 34. It’s carrying men with a message to William about Harold having been crowned, if I have been correctly informed. At first glance, the flag looks like a traditional one at the top of the mast – a vertical strip from which 3 flapping elongated triangles stretching forward. How they can flap forward when the ship sails in that direction is in itself odd, but all ship flags are depicted in this way.
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Anyway, we need to look closer at the vertical strip to see the interesting detail. Rather than the traditional flat top of a regular flag, it’s rounded and there is a tiny point on the left-hand side. It’s a bird! How cool is that?
I now wonder if this ship didn’t have a flag to begin with and a bird landed on the small round ball-shape at the top of the mast. Yes, there are several ships, both in the early English and later Norman fleet with only a ball, no flag, so this theory could hold water. Considering the bird-flag mimics a traditional ship flag exactly, with its vertical strip (although shaped) and three flapping bits, my vote is for an unusual flag rather than a resting bird. What do you think?
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We have now looked at no less than 15 details that I find interesting. How do you feel about them?
