Odo of Bayeux

Power, images, and dynasties between Normandy, England, and Sicily

In 1096, Odo of Conteville, half-brother of William the Conqueror, Bishop of Bayeux and Count of Kent, a key figure of the Norman conquest of England and considered the commissioner of the famous Telle du Conquest (the Bayeux Tapestry) embroidered for his cathedral, set out for the Holy Land at the age of nearly sixty-four, joining the First Crusade proclaimed by Pope Urban II in 1095.

Accompanied by his nephew Robert II of Normandy, known as Cortacoscia, commander of the Norman contingent, and numerous nobles and ecclesiastical dignitaries, including the Bishop of Évreux and Gilbert Fitz-Osbern, Odo stopped in Sicily during his journey east. A guest of Count Roger I of Altavilla in Palermo, he became severely ill and died in the Norman city on January 2 or 5 (according to some sources in February) of 1097, unable to reach Jerusalem.

His death in Palermo is one of the most significant episodes in the relationship between Normandy and Norman Sicily at the end of the 11th century and attests to the strategic role of the island as a political and military crossroads in the Mediterranean during the Crusades era.

His tomb, marked by an “insigne opus” not further specified by sources and by an epitaph in 15 verses, was located in the chapel of Saint Mary Magdalene inside the Cathedral, where members of the count's, later king's, family of Sicily were laid to rest, and has recently been identified with one of those existing today in the crypt of the same Cathedral.

The exhibition aims to reconstruct, through his key figure, the political, dynastic, and cultural network that united Sicily of the Hautevilles, Normandy, and Anglo-Norman England, up to the Plantagenet legacy, between the 11th and 12th centuries.

The objective is to move beyond the regional reading of the Norman conquests to propose a systemic, European, and Mediterranean vision of the phenomenon, highlighting:

• the Norman aristocratic mobility;

• the dynastic construction of power;

• the role of images as tools of legitimization;

• the transformation of the Norman ducal language into universal Sicilian royalty.

Therefore, Odo's death and burial in Palermo constitute the symbolic pivot of the project: the trajectory from the English conquest of 1066 to Norman Sicily makes visible the European dimension of the power of the ambitious “Men of the North.”

Scientific objectives

• Link the visual, figurative, and decorative cultures of “Anglo-Norman” and “Arab-Norman.”

• Analyze the political function of figurative narration (Bayeux tapestry [high-resolution reproduction, in collaboration with the Musée de la tapisserie de Bayeux] and the embroidered cloth by Thérèse Ozenne (1976-1992) that narrates the conquest of Southern Italy and Sicily by the brothers Robert and Roger Hauteville, following the texts of Abbot Marcel Lelégard (source Geoffrey Malaterra) [original on display, on loan from the Castle of Pirou], Sicilian mosaics [reproductions from the Palatine Chapel and the church of Santa Maria dell’Ammiraglio in Palermo, Cathedral of Monreale]).

• Highlight - through educational panels with family trees, timelines, and brief personal and family biographies, multimedia contributions - the dynastic continuity between the Dukes of Normandy, Anglo-Norman kings, and Plantagenets.

• Restore to Sicily the role of European political and iconographic laboratory.

Cultural impact

• Reinterpretation with a European as well as Mediterranean perspective of the Sicilian “Arab-Norman” heritage.

• Enhancement of Palermo as a medieval geopolitical hub.

• Strengthening dialogue between Italian, French, and British institutions.

• Engagement of academic and general public.

Works on display at the exhibition venue [originals and/or reproductions]

• Bayeux tapestries [reproduction] and Pirou [original]

• Mosaics of the Palatine Chapel and Santa Maria dell’Ammiraglio in Palermo, Cathedral of Monreale [reproductions]

• Coins, archaeological finds, weapons.

• Documents with seals and parchment and paper codes, printed books.

• Paintings, engravings, and prints, celebratory.

• Liturgical insignia and furnishings.

• Ivory artifacts.

In the Crypt of the Cathedral

• Burial of Odo of Bayeux, with educational panels and multimedia contributions.

Treasury of the Cathedral (in particular the last room)

• Crown and funeral attire of Constance of Aragon; the “Carondelet” altar frontal; other fragments and artifacts from the medieval period.

Parallel activities

• Cycle of seminars – in person and/or online, led by local, national, and international experts - on history, art history, architecture history, demoethnoanthropology, on topics related to the Normans between Normandy, England, Southern Italy, and Sicily.

• Conservation interventions, cleaning and restoration of the sarcophagus in the cathedral crypt and diagnostic investigations on its contents.

Practical information:
all audiences 

Partnerships : Centre Guillaume-le-Conquérant, Bayeux; Castle of Pirou