I’ve always wanted to see the Bayeux Tapestry, which now resides in the eponymous town in northwestern France. It’s not really a tapestry, like the Lady with the Unicorn series (do see that if you’re ever in Paris), but is an embroidery on cloth.
Regardless, according to a tw**t by Literary Interest, a new section of this world-famous embroidery has been discovered. And it shows the literary inspiration of a much later British author. Clearly the invading Normans met some residents not depicted in the original tapestry:
An enlargement:
You got me there. I saw the headline and couldn’t wait for a totally cool historical story. Pooh!
We have a copy of the tapestry in Reading museum. It was done by some Victorian ladies who bowdlerised it by, um, amending some of the saucier footnotes 🙂
Yes, those Victorians were never shy about “improving” things were they? Such as the archetype Victorian “improving” Christoper Wrens decoration of St. Paul’s Cathedral.
Horrifying! To have what appears to be a 400 pound bear charging toward one’s hunny pot! (shudder)
Now that’s a bear of little mass, at least compared to the ones we have here. You should see what they do to an apple tree to get the fruit down to their level. Next year’s crop? No concern beyond today.
“A bear, however hard he tries
Grows tubby without exercise.”
😀
Yeah, the Pooh is actually fairly small for a bear.
😝
And if you are a lover of tapestries and visiting France, Angers Castle has the Apocalypse Tapestry. It is a real tapestry, not embroidery, and was made around 1380. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalypse_Tapestry for more.
Lovely!
p.s. the Lady & The Unicorn are currently in Japan: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/04/20/national/the-lady-and-the-unicorn-tapestries-head-to-japan-for-rare-showing/
We visited Bayeux in 1999 – no cameras allowed in the museum where the “tapisserie” is stored, but as we walked around the exhibit I was able to video its entire length by means of an ill-
concealed hidden video-camera. The images were not great so William the Corncurer – that’s what we used to call him at my school – won after all !
That can’t be real. There’s no nightjar embroidered on it.
Yes, there is.
What — you don’t see it? It’s right there!
b&
I wouldn’t be so sure!
An excellent — if unusually short (I mean, shorter than the tapestry) — shaggy bear story. I was getting all excited, because I have seen the tapestry and it is marvelous. The new addition adds much illumination to the story and, although I hate to criticize my own gender, a touch of humor. Which the ladies of William’s court apparently didn’t really have.
Just brilliant! I love the Bayeaux Tapestry and I love Pooh. I want this!
Love the Frenchified Piglette et Tiggre:-)
Now We Are 1066?
/@
That’s one internet for you.
😀
Agree with Susan!
Roy Orbison once composed an ode to the ribald version of the tapestry, hidden now in the secret archives of the vatican.
He called it “Blue Bayeux”.
Meh, everything’s on YouTube these days, secret footage or not. I bet you can find it there, if you look.
Once, I asked a Houston taxi driver to take me to Green’s Bayou, but I pronounced it bay-you and he couldn’t make any sense of it. Maybe he really did know and was just making fun of my accent.
That’s because it’s pronounced “bai-oh” with both syllables somewhat nasal. That’s the way everyone used to say it. Now only Cajuns and old people day it that way.
I like a lot of Ray Orbison songs, but I loathe that one. We who live among these bodies of water are the authorities on what they are called. Orbison is not.
Psst, bacopa, Roy is dead.
Me-oh, my-oh!
/@
Sometimes major league baseball players refer to a fastball as a “Linda Ronstadt” because it “blew by you”.
I can’t help myself. When I hear Roy Orbison’s name all I can think of is this: http://michaelkelly.artofeurope.com/orb1.htm
Ulrich Hairbrush? Getting kinkier by the moment.
The magnificent Unicorn tapestries are in the MUSÉE DE CLUNY – MUSÉE NATIONAL DU MOYEN-ÂGE. They are the highlight of the Museum visit and really are “do not miss” site.
….but wait until they return from Japan
That’s funny!