The Bayeux Tapestry is a strip of embroidered cloth, as opposed to an actual tapestry where the design is realised using several colours when weaving (similar to fair-isle knitting).

Its existence was first recorded as part of the Bayeux cathedral inventory, there are several hypotheses as to its comissionner and origin, the most widely accepted being that it was commissionned by Bishop Odo, and made somewhere in Kent.