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Object type: Animal-head label stop
Measurements: H. 20 cm (7.9 in) at wall; W. 6 cm (2.4 in) at hood-moulding and ear tips; 7.5 cm (2.9 in) at brow; 4 cm (1.6 in) at broken muzzle; D. 9 cm (3.5 in) at hood-moulding; 10 cm (3.9 in) at brow
Stone type: Yellowish grey (5Y 8/1) matrix supported shelly, spar cemented oolite. Shell clasts sparse. Ooliths 0.6 to 1 mm in size. Cleeve Cloud Member, Birdlip Limestone Formation, Inferior Oolite Group, Middle Jurassic.
Plate numbers in printed volume: Ills. 191-4, 199; Fig. 26D
Corpus volume reference: Vol 10 p. 182
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In situ. Noted in present position by Haigh (1846, 17) and Butterworth (1862, 97).
Animal-head label stop carved integrally with the hood-moulding. The head is twisted slightly inwards, thus bringing the hood-moulding to an end on a slightly accentuated curve. The end of the upper jaw is missing, but the lower jaw appears to survive intact. The remaining portion of the muzzle is covered with close-set concentric grooves. The muzzle rises to a pronounced brow ridge above which the forehead is plain. The incised decoration is very similar to the two animal heads at the west end of the church (nos. 13 and 14). The eye on the west side of this creature's head is similar to Deerhurst St Mary 13, shaped like a water droplet with a lightly incised circular pupil, and surmounted by a sweeping brow that ends in a tightly curving, spiral terminal which turns downwards rather than upwards as on nos. 13, 14 and 18. The eye on the east side of the creature's head is similar but the downward turning brow terminal has been partially lost due to surface damage. The nostrils and upper fangs are missing, but the lower fangs survive in low relief. The teeth are not individually differentiated but are cut back a little from the face, while the inside of the mouth is further cut back by about 0.4 cm (0.2 in). The ears are flattened back along the neck, and the surrounding stone has been cut back around them to leave them about 0.3 cm (0.1 in) proud of the head and neck. They lie side by side and are shaped like hollowed-out, tapering ovals that are drawn up into in-turning, comma-like tips. There is no crest between the creature's ears. The straight side faces and flat front face of the hood-moulding rise undifferentiated from the tips of the ears and the inner side of the creature's head, while the outer face is divided from the head by a narrow fillet of triangular section just below the tip of the ear.
See Deerhurst St Mary 13 for a discussion of the group of six animal heads: nos. 13–14, and 16–19.
