Lost site depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry is DISCOVERED after 900 years: Archaeologists pinpoint the residence of Harold, the last Anglo-Saxon King of England
Lost site depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry is DISCOVERED after 900 years: Archaeologists pinpoint the residence of Harold, the last Anglo-Saxon King of England
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Revellers with drinking horns surround the last Anglo-Saxon king, who was just two years away from a painful death following an arrow to the eye. Now the famous, rambunctious feast scene in the Bayeux Tapestry, two years before King Harold was brutally killed at the Battle of Hastings, has been located by archaeologists.
![[The exact location was unclear, although people in Bosham often spoke of their suspicions that King Harold had lived on an estate in the same area as a private house near a church. Pictured: Holy Trinity Church, Bosham]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/27/15/94563395-14330123-The_exact_location_was_unclear_although_people_in_Bosham_often_s-a-41_1737992400468.jpg)
Experts can now identify with certainty the site of King Harold's palace in Sussex - oddly enough, based on the discovery of an 'en suite' toilet discovered there in 2006. Experts, drawing on very recent evidence showing inside toilets were often found in high-status 10th and 11th century homes, can now narrow down the tragic king's estate to the specific site of a modern-day house in a coastal area of the village of Bosham, in West Sussex.
![[The owners of the house (garden wall, pictured), who have asked to remain anonymous, commissioned the firm West Sussex Archaeology to see what they could dig up in 2006.]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/27/15/94563405-14330123-The_owners_of_the_house_garden_wall_pictured_who_have_asked_to_r-a-40_1737992392948.jpg)
It is a major historical breakthrough as Bosham, where King Harold said his goodbyes before later setting sail for Normandy, is central to the narrative of the Bayeux Tapestry, as one of only three locations - along with Westminster and Hastings - to be shown twice.
![[The Bayeux Tapestry, which is longer than an Olympic-sized swimming pool, at about 68.3 metres (approx 224 feet), has the Bosham scene right at its beginning before going on to show Harold plucking an arrow from his eye, and then being hacked down by a Norman knight]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/27/15/94563397-14330123-image-a-42_1737992407340.jpg)
The Bayeux Tapestry, which is longer than an Olympic-sized swimming pool, at about 68.3 metres (approx 224 feet), has the Bosham scene right at its beginning before going on to show Harold plucking an arrow from his eye, and then being hacked down by a Norman knight.
![[King Harold died at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. Pictured: a sculpture of Harold Godwinson on the exterior of Waltham Abbey in Essex]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/27/15/94563399-14330123-image-a-43_1737992546289.jpg)
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