Note 579 — Chapter XI

Queen Matilda was not the originator of the idea that a hero’s deeds might be recorded by his wife’s needle. Penelope wove the deeds of Ulysses on her loom, and it is suggested by Aristarchus that her peplos served as an historical document for Homer’s “Iliad.” See Rossignol’s “Les Artistes Homériques,” pp. 72, 73, cited by Louis de Ronchaud in his “La Tapisserie,” p. 32. Gudrun, like the Homeric woman, embroidered the history of Siegfried and his ancestors, and Aelfled that of the achievements of her husband, Duke Brithnod. The Saga of Charlemagne is said to have been embroidered on twenty-six ells of linen, and hung in a church in Iceland.