(it was this or British electricity prices and frankly the needlework is pretty amazing)
From the Art Newspaper, December 28:
Historic embroidery will be protected from damage or loss under taxpayer-backed scheme
Visitors study the Bayeux Tapestry at the Bayeux Tapestry Museum in Normandy
The UK Treasury will insure the Bayeux Tapestry for an estimated £800m when it goes on show at the British Museum (BM) next year. According to the Financial Times,
which first reported details of the agreement, the protection will cover damage or loss during the transfer of the tapestry from Normandy and also while it is on display at the British Museum from next autumn.
The UK Treasury told the newspaper that it had “received an estimated valuation of the Bayeux Tapestry which has been provisionally approved” with officials involved in the project told that the final valuation will be “around £800m”. The Treasury did not dispute this figure when approached....
....MUCH MORE
Previously:
July 13 (also The Art Newspaper) - "Bayeux Tapestry to return to UK for first time in almost 1,000 years"
In 2024 I explained part of my fascination with the tapestry
There's a lot of stuff going on in the world, isn't there? And sometimes it seems events are choreographed for our titillation and amusement.
Of course that comment could reflect either a semi-deep insight or a final psychotic break with reality on the part of yours truly.
This weekend we'll be pulling at different threads in the tapestry to see if we can reduce the seeming complexity of the embroidery to the underlying foundation mesh.
And what, possibly curious reader may wonder, led to this feeble excuse of an introduction?
I was contemplating whether I was going to be around to see the return of Halley's Comet which led to a 2021 post on the French-English Brexit fishing deal which used a panel of the Bayeux Tapestry as a graphic:
"France warns of 'reprisals' over Brexit fishing deal"
Huh. My first thought was to check the Bayeux Tapestry Museum to see if there are any analogs.
And, as a first pass guess, it looks like a no. Halley's comet isn't due until 2061 so the current reprisals probably won't be a re-enactment of 1066.*****On the tapestry the comet flies across the top as the people watch and point:
(segment 32 on the digitized panorama)
In December 2021's "1415: Wine and the Agincourt campaign, Pt I (logistics and supply)" the focus was again on the tapestry as historical record:
From a depiction in the Bayeux Tapestry we know the Normans embarked on their invasion of England with supplies of wine...
