Museum of Antiquities, Newcastle upon Tyne, no. 1814.23

First mentioned in 1822 when given to Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne. Found about six years before by the Rev. J. Wood, Presbyterian minister of Falstone, c. 3 ft. below surface in bank which divided a field being cleared for cultivation. Exact location not known, but footnote to earliest reference says find-spot marked 'Ruins' on Armstrong's 1769 map of Northumberland, which places find in angle between Hawkhope Burn and North Tyne, on Falstone side.

N/A

Incomplete and worn in places

This diminutive stone is incomplete on every face and appears to have been split at mid-point. One long face containing a bi-alphabetical inscription is perhaps complete save for the lower moulding, but examination of the face under the moulding seems to indicate that it could have been attached to a lower block.

Roughly half of one of the narrow sides survives. The long side is slightly curved and this, together with the remains of a pointed gable, gives the appearance of a house shape. The stone has an uncarved, slightly bombé, top which is possibly not its original form, since the point of the end gable projects above it and it seems plausible that the roof was originally higher (see below).

A (long): The base, and possibly the left edge of this face has a wide cable moulding. The face is divided vertically by a lumpy flat-band moulding, and at the top, roughly in the centre, the upper horizontal curves up and around, lying along the `roof' like a handle. This handle-like appearance is particularly convincing when seen from above. The surviving upright moulding on the left rises in an unbroken line to form the end ridge, whilst the horizontal top moulding appears to curve under the upright to form the base of the end gable. In the centre, the vertical moulding does not extend to the base of the stone, but terminates one line from the bottom in a rounded end. The mouldings have clearly been carved before the inscription, since the guide-lines for the inscription and, in one place, the lettering impinge on the central divider.

The inscription on the left panel is in Insular majuscules, and on the right panel in runes. Both are in Old English. The bottom line of the majuscules, however, crosses the entire face:

(a) Left panel: the first two lines are very worn, but the last three are clear. It may be read:

 + EO[—]

 TAARE[FT]AER

 HROETHBERHT[E]

 BECUNAEFTAER

 EOMÆGEBIDÆDDERSAUL[E]

(b) Right panel: the runic inscription is most worn also in the top line, but is in worse condition throughout. It may be read:

 + [—]

 aeftaerroe[—]

 tac[be]cunae[f]taere[o —]

 geb[i ]daedÞe[r]saule

[1]

Both inscriptions may be interpreted together: +Eo[—- ]ta aeftaer Hroethberht becun aeftaer eomae gebidaed Þer saute (Translation: 'in memory of Hroethberht, a monument of the uncle: pray for (sc. `his') soul'). Stephens (1884b, 136) saw additional letters on the 'roof' of the stone, but none are visible today.

D (narrow): This is divided into a panel of four-strand plain plait below a pointed gable with possibly a central support.

The scale of this piece sets it apart from the general run of house-shaped stone monuments. However, it is worth noting that some pre-Viking stones, such as at Ingleby Arncliffe and Dewsbury, Yorkshire, are smaller than the later hogback type. Although Collingwood (1927, 165) sees it as a diminutive hogback, it is not accepted into this category by Lang (1967), who has extensively studied this type of monument. Collingwood remarked perceptively if frivolously: `It looks as though a man called Uncle Robert must have grown up before he died, in which case the size of the stone has nothing to do with the size of the grave.' There is nothing in the report of the finding to indicate that this was found in a graveyard. Indeed, it seems to have been found in a field with building debris. The size invites comparison with the small shrines on the top of Irish crosses – or the house-shaped metal shrines which have survived in the British Isles and on the continent from the seventh and eighth centuries. The roof ridge on the Mortain casket rises to a point, and like Falstone carries a runic inscription, and there are other features which may be compared with the Gandersheim /Brunswick casket which bears an Anglo-Saxon runic inscription (the authenticity of which has been doubted) (Blouet 1956; (—) 1965a, 120, pl. 14; Page 1973, 36-7). The Brunswick casket has, like the Falstone stone, round ended hinges which are outlined by a raised moulding. The `handle' on the `roof' of the Falstone piece may be compared with the handle and clasp, and the `hinges' would be on the back. It seems to me that this piece is best thought of as a skeuomorph of a metal or bone reliquary or shrine. It could have stood on a small pediment, and it might, like some other inscriptions, have been built into the wall of a church.

Mid eighth to mid ninth century.

(—) 1822; Wood 1822; Charlton 1855-7, 71; Haigh 1856-7, 519-20; Haigh 1857, 155-6, fig. between 192-3; Haigh 1861, 41, pl. 2, 15; Stephens 1866-7, xxviii; Stephens 1867-8, 456-60, fig. on 456; Haigh 1869-70, 217; Ellison 1876; Haigh 1877, 419-20; Smith and Cheetham 1880, 1979; Stephens 1884b, 136 and fig.; Allen and Browne 1885, 351; Sweet 1885, 127; Sweet 1887, 88; Frank 1888, 43; Allen 1889, 208, 211, 217, 230; Hall 1889, 267-9; Tomlinson 1891, 224; Hodges 1893, 71; Stephens 1894, 24; Viëtor 1895, 17-18, fig. 10; Searle 1897, 302; Gruenberger 1900, 297; Chadwick 1901, 83-4; Collingwood 1903-4, 223; Browne 1906, 205; Brown 1921, 264, 268; Collingwood 1925, 85; Collingwood 1927, 165; Flom 1930, 287; Ross 1932; Ross 1933, 152; Ross 1937, 124; Arntz 1938, 89; Dahl 1938, 17, 193-4; Dodds 1940, 256-7, 330; Page 1958, 149; Elliott 1959, 71, 86, fig. 32; Page 1959, 405; Marquardt 1961, 45-6; Page 1961, 76-7; Page 1962, 900-2; Page 1964, 87 note; Page 1969, 35; Okasha 1971, 71-2, pl. 39; Page 1973, 24, 30, 34, 117, 135-6, 145, 154, 157; Cramp and Miket 1982, no. 60

1. I am grateful to Professor Vera Evison for help with the reading of these runes.