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“Many fall in battle and King Harold is killed” (detail) from the Bayeux Tapestry
Artist / Origin: Unknown artist(s), France or England
Region: Europe
Date Before 1082
Period: 1000 CE – 1400 CE
Material Wool embroidery on linen
Medium: Textiles and Fiber Arts
Dimensions H: 20 in. (50 cm.), L: 230 ft. (70 m.) (entire tapestry)
Location Musée de la Tapisserie, Bayeux, France
Credit Courtesy of Bridgeman Art Library
Column of Trajan
Artist / Origin: Roman artist(s)
Region: Europe
Date: 113
Period: 1 CE – 500 CE
Material: Marble
Medium: Sculpture
Dimensions: H: 125 ft. (38.1 m.) (with base)
Location: Trajan’s Forum, Rome, Italy
Credit: Courtesy of Giraudon/ Bridgeman Art Library
Historical narratives are found in art across cultures. They appear in a variety of media and employ diverse methods to establish chronology or the relationship between multiple events. Some images, for instance, use continuous narrative, in which a series of moments occur within a single frame. In other cases, cycles or series of images appear within separate frames, but work together to tell a full story. Both the Bayeux Tapestry and the Column of Trajan fall somewhere in between these two modes.