Conyers Chapel

Church unroofed and abandoned in 1838. Before this, carved stones noticed built into walls (Surtees 1823, 249). After abandonment of church several references to carved stones lying either in church or in Sockburn Hall, but very few described until after Knowles's excavation and bringing together of all known fragments in re-roofed Conyers Chapel in 1900.

All Saints

Worn; both ends broken

Type g, illustrative. Part of the body and extended paw of an end beast survive.

A (long): Enclosed at the base by an irregular interlace are a bird and a woman. The bird has a long curving neck, pouting breast and squared-off tail. It stands stiffly on one thick foot. The woman, whose head is missing, wears a long dress which trails to a point and is shown in profile advancing with outstretched hands, in which she holds some object. The plait includes bifurcating strands and a pair of simple pattern F elements.

C (long): Part of a coiled trail survives. The spacing of the running spirals is irregular, but each has a dot in the centre.

Lang (1972, 241) compares this scene with that of the horn-bearing woman on 3, and interprets both as the reception of a hero into Valhöll. The dress of the woman has clear Scandinavian parallels – both in England (on the Gosforth cross) and in the Scandinavian homeland.

First half of tenth century

Knowles 1896-1905b, 119, no. 22; Hodges 1905, 237; Lang 1967, 143-5 et passim; Lang 1972, 241-8, pl. 21; Schmidt 1973, 71; Bailey, 1980, 234; Roesdahl et al. 1981, 92, no. F17; Lang 1984, 166, no. 6

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.