What we can learn from the Bayeux tapestry's lost ending

Almost exactly 960 years ago, on October 14, 1066, William, Duke of Normandy, emerged victorious from the hard-fought Battle of Hastings. It was a confrontation he regarded as a trial by ordeal for the throne of England, bloodily fought out as part of a wider three-way struggle — don’t forget the formidable Harald Hardrada, King of Norway, whose brief invasion underlines England’s ties with Scandinavia — in the neat span of a single year.

In 2026, the anniversary of the battle coincides with the much-publicised display of the 11th-century embroidery familiarly known as the Bayeux Tapestry at the British Museum. The Tapestry is a compelling work of art with a distinctive visual language that makes it instantaneously and universally recognisable. It is a foundational document of our history.

The narrative of the Tapestry now concludes with the flight of the English from the battlefield, a section of unknown length having been torn off at some point. In some ways, that lost ending is appropriate because the legacy of the battle itself — and the Norman conquest that it secured — remains open to widely contrasting interpretation.

One view has been that the Norman Conquest is something to celebrate. By some in the 19th century, it was even characterised as a crucial step in the nation’s march towards global dominance. In reaction to this positive assessment, there has been a romantic characterisation of the Anglo-Saxons as an honest population cheated of their rightful inheritance by brutal and corrupt foreigners.

Alternatively, there have even been attempts to try and write the Conquest out of history. By this analysis, one social elite was replaced by another leaving society at large unchanged. A simple characterisation of the Norman Conquest, however, is impossible. Not least because it entirely overlooks the longstanding role of the Battle of Hastings as a national foundation myth.

Never has there been conflict in which so many people wished to claim an ancestral presence, but only on the winning side. It became, indeed, to popular late-medieval English sensibility what the Tudors have become to us; a historical horizon beyond which everything was obscure.

This week’s issue of Country Life takes advantage of the popular interest catalysed by the display of the Bayeux Tapestry to revisit the legacy of the Normans. At this distance of time, we are not obliged to take sides. Nor should we allow the pain and destruction their conquest of England undoubtedly caused to blind us to their achievement. In terms of the castles and churches that stud our landscape, and even some of the language we use, 1066 still casts a shadow. We would all do well to know more about this fascinating and tumultuous period.

This feature originally appeared in the September 2, 2026, issue of Country Life. Click here for more information on how to subscribe.