Bayeux tapestry reveals medieval architecture across the Channel
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Architectural historians are studying the 33 buildings depicted on the Bayeux Tapestry, a famous embroidered cloth documenting the Norman Conquest of England. These buildings, including palaces, churches, and homes, offer insights into 11th-century construction on both sides of the English Channel, even though the tapestry presents them as general impressions rather than accurate depictions.
The tapestry’s designer likely drew upon styles found in monastic writing rooms and Romanesque sculpture, suggesting a trained artist created the designs for embroiderers to follow.
Scholars speculate the tapestry may have originated in England, possibly created by nuns at Barking Abbey, due to similarities in the needlework to other English embroideries from the period. The artist prioritised conveying the essence of a building, grand entrances for palaces, a building atop a rock for Mont-Saint-Michel, over realistic detail. Most structures of the time were built with timber, with stone reserved for churches like Westminster Abbey, which was still under construction in 1066.
The tapestry shows Edward the Confessor’s funeral procession approaching the abbey, detailing its arcade, tower, and choir. Compared to the modest scale of Bosham church, where Harold prayed before sailing to France, Westminster Abbey’s depiction illustrates the difference in size between important religious buildings. The tapestry also accurately portrays emerging castle designs, specifically motte-and-bailey castles, earth mounds topped with wooden structures, which William the Conqueror’s army used to secure conquered lands.
The tapestry shows five of these castles under construction in both France and England, with Norman knights directing Anglo-Saxon labourers. While the buildings aren’t architecturally precise, they reflect how people of the time understood and pictured different types of structures.
