With luck, your children will have inspirational teachers, who will fire them up with tales of swashbuckling historical figures and evidence of the miracles of science: but nothing can beat seeing the real thing, and having a great day out.

A trip to see the Bayeux Tapestry is a fantastic way to bring the Battle of Hastings and the history surrounding it, to life. The first challenge is crossing the Channel to the coast of Northern Normandy! The cross-channel ferries are of course rather more sea-worthy than the Viking long ships were in 1066. They did, however, manage to transport William and his army, horses and all, to the English coast, and a marvelous reproduction of a long boat stands outside the ‘Centre  uillaume le Conquerant’ in the centre of sleepy Bayeux.

The long boat is just the beginning of a fascinating journey back in time. Before we had arrived at the museum, we had all pooled our knowledge of the tapestry. It was rather scant, to say the least. The ten-year-olds were more up on it than the adults (they had ‘done’ the Normans in Year 4) but we all basically knew that the tapestry depicted the battle of Hastings in 1066, when William of Normandy defeated Harold. After twenty minutes inside the museum, we knew an awful lot more. And we didn’t just know it, we’d seen it, almost felt like we’d lived it. The tapestry is like a frozen film. Starting in 1064, it tells the story of Harold’s journey to Normandy to offer the throne of England to William (on the say so of the King, Edward the Confessor) and Harold’s subsequent betrayal of his promise of loyalty to William as he decides to take the crown for himself.

The extraordinary genius of the tapestry is in its attention to detail. The clever use of colour and effect makes it feel three dimensional in its vividness. It exceeded everyone’s expectations and there was something in it for everyone. My eight-year-old daughter adored the almost cartoon symbols which run along the bottom of the tapestry and was delighted to recognize scenes from Aesop’s fables (allegories to the action above). The boys were inevitably thrilled by the gory battle scenes of which there are many, and the fantastic depictions of the horses and the boats. My scholarly ten-year-old engaged me in earnest debate about whether the depiction of Harold with an arrow in his eye was ‘really’ Harold or whether the man lying dead at his feet was actually the slain Anglo Saxon hero.

The brilliant audio guides (in English, different ones for children and adults) helped us to understand what we were seeing. They pointed out tiny details, naming characters and explaining action scenes. By the time we had reached the end of the tapestry, we all felt like we had been

on a journey. The next stop in the museum was a film about the tapestry. It runs at various times through the hour in English and I would really recommend it. It backed up everything we had just seen and added more historical detail with some modern reproductions of the battle of Hastings thrown in for good measure. It also pointed out that the tapestry was commissioned by William as a piece of propaganda to appease the British.

Finally, the museum has some wonderful models depicting medieval life in England. The building of the Tower of London, the building of Winchester Cathedral, a classic country hamlet, replete with manor house and serfs. It also has life-size wax models of Normans and Saxons, which were a huge hit. Last stop, the very well-stocked gift shop and we were out in under two hours, clutching books and posters, and even some model knights, which continued to do battle with each other for the rest of the weekend.

Bayeux Tapestry Museum
www.tapisserie-bayeux.fr
Tickets: 7.80€ adults, 3.80€
children, under 10s free.

See also Brining Learning to Life - Discover the Vikings and Starry Starry Night at the Greenwich Observatory