Less a tablecloth, more a placemat. And it is doubtful it was thrown onto the fire, where it would probably put the fire mostly out, rather than thrown into the fireplace to hang on something over the fire. There are also translation issues from royal to plain speak. Royals like this rarely did physical things. When the king is observed to "throw" something, it is more likely that he had it thrown by a servant who then placed the valuable object on a rack as planned. Readers of the time would not see a practical difference.

> Royals like this rarely did physical things.

That might be true now but historically kings led armies into war, and had to be skilled enough to fight.

We know the name of Charlemagne’s sword, Joyeuse.

Like how Steve Jobs made the iPhone?

Legend has it that he threw a development team and a multitouch capacitive display in a fire and then pulled a fully built, finished iPhone from the flames.

I thought that was the kindle fire tablet

I read fire is a metaphor for Jobs' tendency to yell at people that worked for him.

Ancient royal lines often start with someone who is, as Neal Stephenson would put it, a stupendous badass.

e.g. The current UK Royal Family have these chaps as ancestors:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollo

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_the_Bruce

That seems plausible, though not quite as cool.

In the early 20th century there were similar demonstrations done by asbestos manufacturers, and at least some of those were recorded on film. Fire resistance was basically the main selling point of asbestos, so they certainly marketed that heavily. I recall watching a video on YouTube of one long ago, but can't find it at the moment.

A tiny video relating a lot of antique use of asbestos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EJ-4koV7m0