The Bayeux Tapestry, a nearly 1,000-year-old, 70-metre wool-on-linen embroidery depicting William the Conqueror's 1066 victory, is scheduled to travel to the British Museum for nine months from September 2026. French conservators who have worked on the embroidery warn that it is so fragile that transportation risks irreparable damage and describe it as essentially untransportable. A petition organized by Didier Rykner has gained nearly 62,000 signatures urging reversal of the loan. The British Museum director called the tapestry one of the most important cultural artefacts and symbolic of a millennium of shared history. The tapestry has been housed in a purpose-built Bayeux museum since 1983.
The Bayeux tapestry is so fragile that transporting it risks irreparable damage, French experts have said, as a petition urging Emmanuel Macron to reverse a catastrophic decision to loan the unique embroidery to Britain passed 60,000 signatures. France's president declared in July that the nearly 1,000-year-old, 70-metre-long wool-on-linen artwork, which depicts William the Conqueror's victory over King Harold II of England at Hastings in 1066, would cross the Channel next year.
I'm not against the loan of cultural artefacts and I have always liked the UK, said Didier Rykner, the editorial director of La Tribune de l'Art, an art news website, whose month-old petition against the loan has been signed by nearly 62,000 people. But this is a purely political decision. Here is an extraordinary work of art, a wholly unique historical document, an artefact without equivalent anywhere and which expert opinion agrees, overwhelmingly, cannot travel. It's not complicated.
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