How did Harold II die at the Battle of Hastings according to the Bayeux Tapestry?

The Bayeux Tapestry depicts the death of Harold II in an ambiguous manner, and the common belief that he was killed by an arrow to the eye is not definitively supported by the artwork itself.1

Beneath the inscription Hic Harold Rex Interfectus Est ("Here King Harold has been killed"), the tapestry shows two figures: one clutching a shaft near his face and another being struck down by a Norman knight. Scholars have long debated whether Harold is represented by the first figure, the second, or both.1

Furthermore, the appearance of an arrow in the first figure is historically contested. Evidence suggests that the feathered flights on the shaft were likely added during a 19th-century restoration; earlier engravings of the scene show no such detail, leading some to conclude the weapon may have originally been a spear. Consequently, while the tapestry is a vital historical record of the Battle of Hastings, the exact circumstances of Harold's death remain uncertain.1