Caption: A detail of the Bayeux Tapestry, now exhibited at the Bayeux Museum, Bayeux, Normandy, France.

Further Explication

1. The detail shows Halley's comet. The Latin text reads ISTI MIRANT STELLA: These ones are looking in wonder at the star (see Wikipedia: Omen: Good or bad). Of course, comets are NOT stars in modern astro jargon.

2. The Bayeux Tapestry is sort of a Medieval graphic novel.

   It's all about the Norman conquest of England---1066 and All That.

3. In fact, comets, the long-haired stars, have always been considered portentous, ominous.

   They are strange looking---hairy.

4. They seemed irregular unlike other astronomical phenonema. It was NOT until Edmond Halley (1656--1742) in 1705 recognized the periodicity his eponymous comet (Halley's comet) that comets were tamed to regularity in some cases.

5. In ancient times comets were thought to herald calamities or disasters (i.e., a bad star events):

   1. When beggars die, there are no comets seen;
      The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes.
      
      ---Calpurnia (c.76--after c.42 BCE) to Julius Caesar (100--44 BCE) in Act 2, Scene 2 (scroll down about 25 %) of Julius Caesar (c.1599), William Shakespeare (1564--1616).

   2. And then in 1066, the Norman conquest was it seemed foreshadowd by the infernal Halley's comet (see 1066 and All That (1930)).

Credit/Permission: Medieval artists, circa 1070 (uploaded to Wikipedia by User:Urban, 2005) / Public domain.
Image link: Wikipedia: File:Tapestry of bayeux10.jpg.
Local file: local link: bayeux_tapestry.html.
File: Art file: bayeux_tapestry.html.