Conyers Chapel

See no. 1; not mentioned by Knowles

All Saints

Worn and damaged

Only one face is carved.

A (broad): Part of a very irregular punch-outlined edging survives on the left. At the top is a fettered quadruped shown in profile and in movement. Its angular body is punch-outlined. It has a spiral on its back haunch and a lobed feature on the front. Both front and back legs are fettered by thick median-incised strands which pass under and over its body. One of its back legs extends over the neck of the animal below, one of its front bending round to enclose its neck. The lower animal appears to be unfinished. It faces up and has a back-thrown head tucked between the two front feet of the creature above. Its head has a short squared-off muzzle and a round incised eye. Its ear extension passes under its neck and becomes the hindmost leg of the animal above and then translates itself into a median-incised strand. Two other legs of the creature above pass over or round the lower animal and develop into a plait.

The traditional formula of this ill-executed motif is clear; it can be traced from Mercian beasts to Anglo-Scandinavian carvings at York, Nunburnholme (Lang 1976, pl. 613; Lang 1978b, fig. 8, 3c) or Folkton (Collingwood 1927, fig. 140) and in this area at Gainford (no. 2: Lang 1978b, fig. 8, 3d). This, however, is crude apprentice work, and is difficult to relate to better executed series.

Late tenth century

Hodges 1905, 235

1. The following are general references to the Sockburn stones: Surtees 1823, 249; Longstaffe 1858, 82; (—) 1869-79f, liv; Allen and Browne 1885, 352; (—) 1887c; Eastwood 1887, 347; Allen 1889, 229; (—) 1889-90b, 132; (—) 1899-1900a, 60; (—) 1903, xiii; (—) 1909-10c, 239; Collingwood 1927, 148, 166, 169; (—) 1951-6a, 213; Pevsner 1953, 211; Lang 1972, 235-6; Schmidt 1973, 68-77; Morris 1976, 144; Bailey 1980, 91.