Government officials had initially announced that the high-risk transfer, scheduled for Thursday, had been postponed due to the strike in the country.
However, due to the complexity of the process, they ultimately decided to proceed with the date, without making the operation public, according to reports by the French news agency APF, which cited sources close to the process.
The tapestry, an 11th-century embroidery measuring 70 meters in length, had not left the museum of Bayeux in Normandy (western France) since 1983.
This transfer had been in planning for a long time as part of ongoing renovations at the museum, but it occurs just a few months after the controversial decision by French President Emmanuel Macron to loan this UNESCO-classified work to the United Kingdom to revitalize ties between the two countries.
Since 2020, expert reports have meticulously examined the damages weakening the tapestry (24,204 stains, 9,646 holes, or 30 tears, among others) and warned of the “additional risks” that would result from transporting it “for more than an hour of travel.”
In 2021, the Ministry of Culture itself declared that “the work was not transportable before being restored.”
As a sign of its fragility, its removal on Thursday from the showcase where it had been displayed since 1983 was carried out with the utmost care, ensured the sources cited by the AFP.
The tapestry was initially scheduled to be restored over 18 months during the Bayeux Museum renovations, but the loan announced by Emmanuel Macron in July interrupted this timeline. The renovation has been postponed indefinitely.
An online petition launched against this loan has already gathered more than 73,000 signatures.
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