MORTLAKE tapestry.This is one of a set of six of a famous tapestry series designed by Francis Cleyn in 1625, woven at Mortlake works on the Thames. In 1918, Lever acquired the Mortlake tapestry series, sold from Stella Hall ,depicting the story of Hero and Leander, from the family of the industrialist Sir Joseph Cowen (1800 - 1873.) The set may have been woven for the Tempest family, a 17 th century Catholic courtier family - Stuart loyalists when the Mortlake tapestry works was at its height.In the fable, Leander swam the Hellespont, the straits between Europe and Asia at the Bosphorus, to see his love, the priestess Hero only to be drowned on stormy night.