Overview
- The National Trust has bought and returned a Tudor tapestry depicting Queen Esther to Oxburgh Hall, and the piece will be on public display from June 20 until December 2026.
- Research curator Jeremy Warren spotted the tapestry at an art fair in Maastricht last year after noticing an exhibition label that linked it to the King’s Room at Oxburgh, triggering the recovery effort.
- Records show the work was one of seven tapestries sold in 1924 by Sir Henry Bedingfeld to dealers associated with Seligmann & Co and exported to the United States in 1925; the other six pieces remain missing.
- National Trust conservators dated the tapestry to the reign of Henry VII, found it in exceptional condition with bright original colour and only minimal past reweaving, and oversaw its authentication and conservation.
- The return underlines how early 20th-century sales to cover death duties dispersed country-house collections and shows that further recoveries depend on provenance research, chance identifications and available public or private funding.