Tapestry loan is not enough to make us lose our marbles

President Macron’s loan of the Bayeux Tapestry to the British Museum is the perfect way to mark King Charles III’s first state visit of his reign.

- HARRY MOUNT

It ticks all the boxes.

It’s the greatest relic of Anglo-Norman royal history, probably commissioned in the 1070s by Odo of Bayeux, William the Conqueror’s half-brother, who became the Earl of Kent after the Conquest. And the tapestry’s extreme beauty - strictly speaking, it’s an embroidery - appeals to the King’s aesthetic side.

It features the King’s direct ancestor - the monarch who, more than any other, created England, with a Norman infusion of blood and mighty Romanesque churches, cathedrals and castles. What’s more, the tapestry is coming home. Experts suggest the tapestry was made in Kent - Odo’s heartland - before finding its way to Bayeux.

Macron has been pondering this perfect present since 2018 when he first said the tapestry would come here for a 2022 exhibition. Conservation worries put the present on hold.