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Liam Lewis, Lecturer in Medieval Literature, Cardiff University

The curious case of the bear in the Bayeux tapestry – what it tells us about baiting in medieval England

Try to imagine medieval England. You might picture knights, castles and battles. But what about bears?

The Bayeux tapestry, which tells the story of the Norman conquest of England, contains a curious image of a man raising a sword towards a bear. New research involving archaeological analysis of bear bones and archival records from my colleague and I suggests that this was not an unusual sight in medieval England.

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